Seas The Day Sails South: Crisfield to St Mary's College

Due to the weather, we spent 3 days in Somers Cove Marina. The day we were supposed to leave the winds were blowing up to 40 kt. and it just did not make sense to leave. I talked to a 28 ft fishing boat that was going out on a tournament. I said have fun, and he replied that he was not expecting it to be much!!

They were fishing for Rock Fish or striped bass. They have a system here with a contraption hung off the side of the boat and the various lines they use are strung through it to give some separation for the lines.

Finally on Sunday, the rain had disappeared and the winds dissipated to a manageable amount. The wind still blew from between 18 to 25 kt. and the waves were up to 4ft. On one set of waves we got spray over the top of the flybridge soaking the windows on 4 successive waves. The waves were mostly on our bow so there was not much rolling motion and with the waves fairly close together the pitching was at at minimum.

As you can see the worst part was after we left the protection of Tangier Sound and crossed the bay.

1942 LIBERTY SHIP "AMERICAN MARINER"

Along the way we passed a derelict ship that the Navy uses for target practice. It was a "Liberty Ship" (American Mariner) built on 1942. It is the Navy's only Live Fire target ship on Chesapeake Bay. Several times month various Helicopter, and planes take off from the Patuxent Navy Air Station to use it as target practice using machine guns and missiles.

Our destination was to anchor off St Mary's College where a relation to Jimmy had gone to school. This is a liberal arts college situated in historic St. Mary's which was the first capital of Maryland.

This school is known for its sailing program and has an impressive amount of boats, We saw people out windsurfing and the water temp was about 68 and the air temperature 60. Oh to be young and hardy!

Just some of the boats

A foil boat

We took the opportunity to walk around the campus. Attached to it is a historical display of when Maryland was founded. They have done many archeological digs and constructed framework similar to the style of the day to explain where the buildings were.