Log 157; Day 434; July 29, 2009; Anchorage Marina; Baltimore, MD.

On Monday evening we went to Camden Yards, the home of the Baltimore Orioles. They had a stature of Babe Ruth just outside the park

The ball field is just off the downtown area, and a great place to see a ball game
This is the view from the center field bleachers

This is just outside of center field, where all the action is prior to the game

This is the view of center field from our seats

And the view from our seats to home plate

It was hot and sticky, but a great night for a ball game

Log 157
Day 434
Wednesday, July 29, 2009

1:30 PM EDT
Location: Anchorage Marina, Baltimore, MD
Weather: 84 degrees with light winds, and lots of rain in the area

It got down to a LOW OF 79 last night. Man, it has been hot and sticky for the last several days. It has also rained almost every day for the past week or so. It’s never a full day of rain. It just either rains in the morning, then clears up. Or...is hot and sticky in the morning, then rains in the afternoon. Today, it rained in the morning, and has been cloudy all day. The radar shows lots of rain to our west, so I’m sure it will rain later this evening.

I usually do these logs in the morning, but I have been so consumed with looking at so much information on weather, between here and New York, that by the time I do all of that, I am ready to work on a project, and put the log off for another day (sometimes, I get too much information). Also...there is not much to put in a log anyway. With the weather being so hot and rainy, we have been inside the boat more than we have been outside. It’s so humid, you just don’t want to do much outside. I usually do any outside chores first thing in the morning, then save inside projects for the rest of the day.

One thing we did do was go to the Baltimore Orioles baseball game, at Camden Yards Stadium. Neither Deb, nor I, are baseball fans, but we had heard what a great stadium it was, and we wanted to see it. So, on Monday night we went to see the Orioles play the KC Royals. We had a great time, although it was hot and humid (87 at game time (7:05) and the humidity has to be close to that). Actually, the game was secondary.. we went to see the stadium, and have a hot dog...which we did. We bought tickets at the park for $27, and they were great seats (3rd base line about 1/3 of the way up). We also followed my motto on most events. Go early...leave early. We were there 2 hours before the game started, and left in the 5th inning. Both of us saw, and did, what we wanted.

Other than that, we have been getting ready for our trip to New York. Deb has been to the store, who knows how many times. I, have been to the liquor store, and West Marine, about as many times. I have also spent hours, looking at charts, tide tables, and current flows in the various waters between here and NY. We are in a part of the trip, that you have to be much more aware of the weather, than we have had to be for a while. Our course will take us out of Baltimore Harbor, east, on the Patapsco River, and rejoin the Chesapeake. We will then go north about 30 miles up to the Elk River, where we will join the C&D Canal...which will take us 8 miles due east to the Delaware Bay. From there we will go about 40 miles SE to Cape May, NJ. We plan to do all of that tomorrow. Based on the weather I can see now, we will be in Cape May Thursday and Friday night. Then Saturday, the Atlantic is supposed to be pretty good, so we will head north to either Atlantic City (40 miles) or Manasquan (100 miles). Sunday looks “iffy” at this point, but next Tuesday, looks good. So, we’ll go the rest of the way to NY when we get a weather & wave “window”.

At this point, we plan to leave the slip about 6 to 6:30 and head out. That should put us in good shape based on the tides, and forecasted winds. The tides you can count on...the weather...not so much. The total trip (tomorrow) is about 100 miles, which seems like a lot to us. Until, we remind ourselves, on the first loop trip, we used to do over a 100 miles...every day. No doubt, we have gotten lazy, and very finicky boaters. Which is just fine with us.

I’ll keep you posted.

Bob