Portsmouth and Norfolk marked the end of my Intracoastal Waterway passage. After a welcome pause with Jack Tar and Eye Candy, I headed out past rows of naval vessels towards Chesapeake Bay. Before sailing north, however, Malua needed a clean bottom.

A 24-hour haul at Little Creek

Weed and barnacles had grown rapidly during the ICW passage. Despite attempts to clean the hull in the water, Malua had lost nearly a knot. Cobbs Marina offered a short haul: out one morning and back in the next. Approaching Little Creek, I found a restricted naval entrance guarded by a boom and vessel, turned away from it and entered the marina.

I came out just after 10 am. I scraped while the hull was pressure-washed, cleaned the stained topsides and applied Micron Extra antifouling before dark. I cleaned and greased the Autoprop, then coated it with lanolin the next morning. By about 10 am Malua was back afloat: a complete clean and antifoul in roughly 24 hours.

Yorktown, the Solomons and Annapolis

I sailed on to the York River, where Jack Tar and Eye Candy had arrived with the same idea. We anchored near Yorktown and visited the town and Williamsburg before moving north together. A good breeze gave us a proper sail up the Chesapeake. We stopped at the Solomons and passed Deltaville, where I had arranged to lay up Malua at the end of the season.

I reached Annapolis on a Saturday afternoon as yacht races of every size were under way. I anchored near the Naval Academy and the yacht clubs. The racing fleet’s return was quite a sight from the boat. Rain curtailed much of my time ashore, though I walked the old streets and took a day trip by bus to Washington DC. The Korean War Memorial and Vietnam Veterans Memorial stayed with me.

The C&D Canal and Delaware Bay

With the visit to Annapolis over, I sailed north to Chesapeake City and the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. After an overnight stop near the town, I timed the tide and stopped again at the Delaware City Branch Channel anchorage. The following morning I continued through the canal and down Delaware Bay, keeping to the well-marked shipping channel among the shoals.

I entered Cape May through its narrow breakwater with the tide running strongly and anchored off the Coast Guard Training Centre. Tropical Storm Andrea was approaching. The soft mud and sand of Cape May would soon be tested.