Today started out beautifully. We were up with the sun, had a nice breakfast and had the anchor up and cleaned off (there was a ton of mud on it) by 8:45AM. The anchorage on Mill Creek was pristine. It really was a great way to start this journey, and encouraged us to spend more time at anchorage rather than trying to find a marina for the evening.
I have included a couple of shots.
This one is of the imminent sunrise looking off to the east and out over the Chesapeake Bay.
This is one of Steve fishing. He always has a line in the water when we are anchored or docked (more on this later).
A few other boats managed to get in here before we anchored last evening. What a beautiful and tranquil place!
As we were motoring out of Mill Creek, the Cross on the bank in the middle of nowhere just seemed appropriate as we asked the Lord to watch over us on this 1500 mile journey.
Trip to Norfolk Harbor and Hampton Roads
We arrived in the Hamtpon Roads, crossing over the Hampton Roads Tunnel, I64, at 3:48PM. We were shadowed by a USN destroyer as we motored in, and gave him plenty of ground to port. it was a bit intimidating!
After we moved into the channel we turned to port (left) and entered the channel for the Elizabeth River. We motored for about 10 miles before finally reaching downtown Norfolk and our slip for the evening at OceanMarine Marina on the west bank of the Elizabeth River in Portsmouth.
Here is a multitude of photos as we motored down the Elizabeth River, including an aircraft carrier, E2C Hawkeye, downtown Norfolk Waterfront, and the red buoy which is Mile Marker "0" on the Atlantic Intercoastal Waterway (ICW).
Once reaching the marina, we fueled, filled up our water tanks, and dumped our waste tanks before backing into a slip around 6PM. For the record, backing up in a single screw sailboat can be a difficult task. We are fortunate to have bow thrusters which makes the effort manageable in a 49' sailboat!
We made it into the ICW, by about 1 mile. Here we are in the slip. Steve is waiting for me to hope off the boat so that we can go get some dinner.
We found a great little Italian restaurant, Amore, on High Street in Old Portsmouth. We had a good meal and then headed back to the boat and called it a night around 10PM.
Tomorrow will be our FIRST full day on the ICW..only 1087 miles to go to Miami!!!
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