About 75 boats and lots of cars (new word, CLODS: “Cruisers Living On Dirt) arrived at Camp Letts on the Rhodes River just south of Annapolis for a long weekend of seminars for long distance cruisers. Bob was in sailor heaven, getting to share his passion with so many other like minded sailors, and getting to meet some of his cruising gurus: Nigel Calder, Lynn and Larry Parday, and Hal Roth’s widow Michelle. It was a quite the gathering of famous cruisers…
Each day from Friday through Sunday we had catered breakfasts, lunches and dinners ashore, with two morning seminars and two afternoon seminars. It was a very busy weekend, and we fell into bed exhausted each night! We met lots of people who will be spending the fall heading to various exotic locations, and some of them will be heading to the Bahamas like we are! This gathering was a way of not only learning some important techniques and ideas from well known sailing authorities, but also a way to meet the folks who’ll be traveling to the same destination we are, or traveling to destinations that we hope to go in the future. I can see why this yearly gathering of sailors is so important!
Bob and I took seminars on lots of subjects relating to long distance cruising, and I knitted through most of them. The baby sweater is now finished and I’m nearing the end of the second front of my Vivian Hoxbro “Ann Jacket.”
Now we are in Annapolis, anchored right where all the hoopla is going on to get the Boat Show set up. Bob is like a little kid at camp, enjoying watching all the pilings get driven in and the temporary docks being assembled. As the next few days go by lots of show boats will get put on those docks. We will be in the thick of it….
Today’s chores are laundry, restocking the larder, and mailing the shawl and the baby sweater! ….mixed in with reconnecting with lots of friends who come to this boat show every year. This is our first year to arrive by boat rather than by car.
Days 17 – 20, Sept. 27 – 30: Camp Letts, Rhodes River
Day 21: Annapolis We are going to be here almost a week. It’s hard to believe that we’ve only been out sailing for 3 weeks today. In many ways it seems like a lot longer. By the time we leave Annapolis next week, we will have been gone a month….and only have traveled such a small distance, 477 miles! We have a lot more ground to cover to get to Vero Beach by early December, another 1200 miles or so. It will be time to make tracks!
