2025-08-17 Back together again - Lewes to Chesapeake City

Kris’s Mom took a sharp downturn, and passed away on Sunday the 10^th.   Monday, the family moved all the furniture out of Memory Care back home and finalized funeral plans.   Kris flew out Tuesday to head back to the boat – a late overnight flight, arriving in Philadelphia at 5:30 in the morning.  She then had a 3-hour wait, until a shuttle bus that goes from the airport to Lewes, DE left.  That was a two-hour bus ride, then she took a local bus to a bus stop not far from the dinghy dock.  Dean met her at the bus stop to help carry the luggage.  Kris was a bit out of it by then.

Kris was not impressed with the Philadelphia airport.  Spent 3 hours waiting in the baggage claim area, walking around in circles and taking breaks to sit.  It was worn out and dirty, and she watched the police come remove a homeless person, and watched a mentally disturbed lady in the bathroom obsessively tearing paper towels off and wiping the floor.   Oh, and did we mention the pigeon napping on the luggage carousel?

 

Did not seem to be bothered by Kris walking around - carousel was not running.

Kris was one worn out, tired person after the overnight travel, and only had to lay down briefly to fall sound asleep in the cockpit.

21 hours of travel - only a 2-hour nap while flying.

While Kris was in Bend and travelling, Dean checked out the local bus system and dinghy dock option in Lewes ahead of Kris’s return.  Found the best place to take the dinghy, which was a 30-minute ride from the boat.  10 minutes going fast to the channel entrance, and then a 20 minute no wake slow ride down the channel to the dinghy dock.    He scoped out and rode the bus to the local grocery store as well.

He did have entertainment, watching the numerous large jellies around the boat, and even got in some polishing of the stainless.

There were many many of these jellies, about 1 foot in diameter in the waters around the boat

Pre polish

After - Dean does great work

Wednesday together again we took the long dinghy trip in, and rode the bus to get groceries before leaving Lewes.  This was the last grocery trip until we haul the boat on the 20^th, and spent 4 days working on it, so had to plan for normal meals, and haul out meals.

We did walk through Lewes a bit, as Kris wanted to see the town.

Lightship Overfalls - now a museum

Lots to look at while on the 20-minute slow ride to the dinghy dock

Pretty church and graveyard in downtown area

Nice park area next to dinghy dock

Cute little downtown area in Lewes

Although Lewes has a nice little downtown, when you take the bus out to the busy area where the stores are, the traffic in incredible - very busy.   Three lanes each way, plus a dedicated bus lane - good thing or riding the bus would be impossible to maintain a schedule.

Traffic never stopped, no breaks at all

Thursday we relaxed on the boat doing nothing much, Friday we left Lewes and sailed / motored / and motor sailed up to an anchorage in the northern Delaware bay, where we spent the night.  Early the next morning, to time the currents right, we headed down the C&D canal to Chesapeake City.   Spent the rest of Saturday just relaxing, and Kris working on getting our new tablet for navigation ready to go.

We will move south tomorrow or Tuesday and anchor near Worton Creek, as haul out is scheduled for the 21st.  The weather looks to only be in the mid 80s, so hopefully not too bad while we are on the land.