Time: 11:30 local
Lat: 38º 54.7’N
Log: 76º 30.6 W
Selby Cove, Mayo, Maryland

We thought we were far back and out of the way.  It was a small bay with room for a few boats to anchor, no marked channel.  When we first arrived, there was one boat there, and we tucked in, feeling like the two of us pretty much filled the space.

Tuesday evening a large catamaran comes in and drops anchor in between the two of us–way closer than I figured was prudent.  If the wind changed, there wasn’t room to swing without hitting other boats.  Since the general run is “First in–Last out”  I figured that if things threatened to get too close at 2AM it would be on them to haul up and move.  Fortunately, nobody bumped anybody else and it was a quiet night.  Until we got our wake up call in the morning…

“HONK!”  A big boat horn very close by jumps us out of bed.  A look out the window shows the bow of a tug boat right THERE.  The crew was polite, explaining that they needed to move a barge out of the back of the harbor, and we needed to up anchor and get out of the way.  As quickly as I can move in the morning BC (Before Coffee) we had the boat out of their way.

Since our plans were to more further north, and we were already under way, our first thought was to just keep going.  We poked our nose out in the bay, where the wind was blowing 20 knots and I realized that we really weren’t really ready to go yet, so turned around and went bay in the harbor and anchored to take the time we needed to really get the boat ready.  While we prepped, the skies opened and and a biblical class downpour deposited about 3 inches of rain in the next 90 minutes.

We eventually had a delightful sail up the bay almost the whole way on a beam reach at speeds of 8 to 9 knots.  We anchored by the last light in Selby Cove.  An anchorage recommended in the cruising guide.  It was windy and stormy, but we got the anchor set, went to bed, and quickly to sleep.

“What’s that noise?”  It’s the anchor alarm, the app on my phone that lets us know if we have drifted from where we are supposed to be.  It’s midnight, and raining, and blowing like stink.  For the first time ever using this type of anchor, we actually have dragged.  Not too far, but we obviously are not in the same place we were before.  Getting the anchor up and reset in the dark with the wind blowing hard isn’t quite as easy as it is in the middle of a peaceful afternoon, but we managed.  We motored back and reset the anchor, this time with a scope of 10:1, just to be sure.  It’s morning, and we are still here in the same spot, so that worked!  Now we are going to move to a more protected spot since the weather is supposed to be rough for the next couple of days.

We are now just around the corner from Annapolis.  We have reservations at a downtown marina in a few days.  We haven’t been at a dock since we left New Jersey.  We are looking forward to showers with unlimited water, and a hose where we can wash 6 weeks worth of dirt off the boat!