This is only our third stop in the Chesapeake but one thing is really clear – it’s very boaty here!!! Yes, Boaty is a word in my dictionary. Here in Solomons, boaty is an understatement.

There isn’t one area around Back Creek, which is quite big, that there isn’t a marina or a boat yard. Solomons even has a Yacht Club which hosts Loopers – except for this weekend of course. But no worries, we found funky Beacon Marina run by Captain John to be very welcoming and he even gave us a very nice AGLCA discount. Captain John and his wife are also planning to do the great loop in a few years and he really enjoys chatting with loopers.

Marinas are like hotels in that some are basic no frills, like a Holiday Inn Express and some are high end like a Ritz Carlton. We tend to go for no frills but sometimes it’s nice to splurge, which is what we are likely to do in NYC. Who doesn’t want to stay at the marina across the river from NYC with crazy beautiful views of the skyline and a ferry right into Manhattan!!!

Our cruise from Kilmarnock Virginia to Solomons Maryland was 53.1 nm and a bit sportier than all the reports indicated. Those dang weather gnomes were at it again.

Escapade handled it well but the wind on our beam makes for a bit of a rolly ride plus we had some rain to make it more interesting! We did get her up on plane for a bit to work the engines. I told Wally to look out the back of the boat to see the dollars flying out the exhaust!

At 10 knots, the boat is fairly economical and burns about 8 gallons a hour… as you can see from the cruise report below, we run at 10 knots most of the time. At 16 knots, we are burning about 25 gallons an hour. Do the math, the break even for time vs fuel burn definitely isn’t at 16 knots. That said, sometimes we need to get up and go or just work the engines a bit harder.

53 nm in rolly conditions is tiring so when we got into Beacon Marina in Solomons on Friday, we took a walk, chatted with some fellow loopers and just relaxed later with a glass of wine.

Saturday was dreary and rainy… almost all day. So while Wally did inside projects, I placed a Harris Teeter Instacart grocery order and did some trip planning for north end of the Chesapeake.

Instacart is awesome, go online, fill up your virtual grocery cart and schedule the delivery. Boom, done! 99% of the time I am very happy with the shoppers and the quality of produce they pick out for me. My shopper Brenda who is a lifelong local in the Solomons area was a great communicator and delivered the grocery’s right to the marina parking lot. All I had to do was put on a rain jacket, walk up and get the bags. The app tells you when they are shopping, you can discuss a substitute if your first pick isn’t available, when they have checked out and their arrival ETA.

Wally worked on getting our Boston Whaler, Hyjinks recommissioned. It is our tender for Escapade and it rides snuggly on top of the back of the flybridge. We have a lift to get it off there and into the water. Turns out the original battery that came with it passed away over the winter (not sure how this happens but things on a boat can be mysterious). No fear, the Napa Auto part store 3 miles away had the exact marine battery we needed. Bummer was, it was raining and a trip on the ebike with a 40lb battery strapped to the cargo rack seemed dicey.

Well, Kim St. Laurent, AGLCA Harbor Host extraordinaire came to the rescue and drove Wally there and back. What is a Harbor Host??? Harbor Hosts are volunteers who lend a helping hand to other Loopers as they pass through their home ports.  Members in need of local knowledge or assistance, or who just want to say hello to a Harbor Host on their way through, reach out via phone or email. Harbor Hosts provide advice and information on local services and things to see and do.  Some go above and beyond by offering rides for provisioning, or will meet you at a marina to enjoy Docktails.  Many Harbor Hosts have also provided written Harbor Guides about their areas. This is just another example of the great support we loopers get from the AGLCA.

We had a great time chatting after the parts run and I gave Kim a tour of Escapade. Kim is planning to do the Great loop in 2030. She is enjoying meeting Loopers and learning about the lifestyle – THANK YOU KIM!!!!!

The history here on the Chesapeake is fascinating and I am so glad I read the James Michener book “Chesapeake” before we started our cruise in this area. Reading any Michener is a commitment and he can be very verbose but the history in his books is solid and he has a gift of bringing you right into it the lives of people and places he wrote about.

We spent Sunday morning at the Calvert Marine Museum where pre-history, natural history, and maritime heritage come together to tell a unique story of the Chesapeake Bay. This is a wonderful museum, located in Solomons, Maryland, at the mouth of the Patuxent River. It offers an aquarium, live animals, fossils, interactive exhibits, daily activities, and a furnished cottage-style lighthouse which you can tour. I love the aquarium exhibits and the seahorses were so cool!

The natural resources in and around the Chesapeake Bay were incredible in the day, so many waterman made a living on the bay and some still do. Work hard, play hard… this is evident in history of the bay as well. Showboats plied the bay and offered entertainment of all kinds!

It was very easy to spend the entire morning in this museum and I felt myself being drawn back to the book Chesapeake over and over. I love that feeling of being pulled back into the history of an area and the way things resonate in a place like this museum.

This area of the Chesapeake is rich with fossils and the Calvert Cliffs have yielded some amazing finds. The skeletal remains of such land fauna as tapirs, mastodons, rhinoceros, horses, and dogs have been found here.

The Drum Point Lighthouse which now resides at the Museum was fascinating.. I don’t think I have ever been in a cottage style light house. It is beautifully restored and seemed cozy, until the docent told stories about the second level kitchen being flooded when the windows were blown out in a fierce storm.

This screwpile, cottage-type light is only one of three remaining from forty-five that once served the Chesapeake Bay at the beginning of the twentieth century.  Decommissioned in 1962, the lighthouse fell victim to vandals until moved to its present site in 1975. Beautifully restored, complete with furnishings of the early twentieth century, it has become the waterfront’s main attraction and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

After our delightful stroll back in time at the museum, we took a walk to Solomons Island, stopping along the way for lunch at the CD Cafe. The food delicious and the strawberry mimosas were very refreshing.

To walk off a bit of our lunch, we continued on foot seeing some interesting old homes, loads more boats, the happening Tiki Bar, a fox and a water snake! Not a dull walk. Strolling the boardwalk along the Patuxent was a lovely way to meander back to the marina.

We enjoyed our final evening in Solomons with a light dinner and glass of wine on the flybridge. Water fowl and birds were abundant, the water was like glass as the sun slowly crept into the horizon.

Next Stop…. Annapolis Maryland.