Visiting more on the western shore…Solomons Maryland

5/16/22

After 9 days in Deltaville, we were ready to move along. The trip to Solomons is 62 miles up the west side of the Chesapeake. We have heard wonderful reviews about this town from numerous sources and put it on the ”must visit” list for traveling back through this area. We started out at 7:30 am in fog (which cleared in late morning) and arrived at Zanhisers Safe Harbor, six and a half hours later. The engine was happy all the way and our anxiety about residual problems (from the overheating) gradually faded after several hours of motoring.

The bay was choppy which obscured our radar image with blips of sea clutter (caused by the radar reflecting off of the face of waves) but visibility stayed at about a quarter mile for most of the morning before the fog burned off and we could actually see where we were going.

It felt good to be back in cruising mode. Arriving at Solomons, we were greeted by the marina manager, Mary Hunt. Mary is a former Rhode Islander (grew up in Warren) and is a collegue of our daughter Holly. We borrowed bicycles from the marina, rode around the small town, walked the boardwalk and, even though we had lost a week due to engine troubles and weather, we decided to stay for another night.

It was now time to reset our homeward bound agenda. Our plan had been to be back in Rhode Island around the 22nd of May. While this was possible, it would mean pushing ahead with long travel days and a series of 1 night stays. We had been looking forward to spending a week exploring the Chesapeake and decided to stick that plan. There is just too much to see here and we don’t know when we will have a chance to do this again.

The eastern shore of the Chesapeake has so many interesting places that we had to make some difficult choices. We had wanted to visit Tangier Island but the weather had other ideas so we reset our agenda and now plan to push on from Solomons, go to the eastern shore and visit St Michaels, Maryland, then cross back to the western shore and revisit Annapolis. One of our dockside conversations, in Solomons, prompted us to also add Havre De Grace ( near the north end of the bay) to our itinerary.

In Solomons, we visited the small maritime museum, had dinner at the Italian restaurant on the marina property, rode bikes around the town and got ribs to go from the local Barbecue joint. This was a delightful stay, punctuated by several dockside conversations and one rainy afternoon spent reading.

We are now traveling in company with several loopers, making their way to Albany for the seasonal opening of the Erie Canal next week. We are also starting to recognize several of our fellow northbound cruisers when we meet them on the docks, and know which boats they are on when we see their electronic signature on AIS. An added advantage to these connections is the exchange of both destination and weather information.

Next stop…St Michaels on the eastern shore.