After we learned about the aftercooler delay, we decided to blow Deltaville and rent a cabin along the Blue Ridge Parkway. We envisioned long hikes with the dogs since those may be hard to come by in the Nation’s Capital. Assuming we ever get there. We now have good reason, however, to believe that the weather in Virginia almost always sucks:
That’s right, we were hit with what forever will be known to history as The Great Blizzard of ‘18. Ok maybe it was only three inches, but in April at most we are supposed to get May flower-bringing showers, not snow.
If only to keep us from constant complaining, Mother Nature finally supplied a georgous day that coincided with a break from mechanical bad news. Today we cast aside the shackles that had held us at the service yard. Mac Davis was wrong; Happiness actually is Deltaville, Virginia in our rear view mirror. We left the dock at 0740 heading for Colonial Beach. (Because the Belknaps now are a seafaring family we morally if not legally are obligated to use military time nomenclature.)
Oscar and Benny proved they really can go 10 hours without a potty break. We couldn’t be more proud of them. Oscar also served as co-pilot for a stretch of the trip.
The wind whipped up just as we arrived at our stop for the night but we managed to tie up, wash the salt off Misty Pearl, and get surprisingly good shrimp tacos.
We have to get out by 0630 if we want to get to DC tomorrow. That’s because we’re 10 NM from a naval installation at Dahlgren and they actually close off the Potomac River at 0800 for some sort of military exercise. It’d be just our luck to get hit by a Tomahawk missile or some such thing. If the wind is too much we may stay here.
