So. It's been a while. More than a week. So I shall give you a rundown of what happened last week. Monday, after we got home, we went to a summer solstice party. That was a lot of fun! Then Tuesday night, I had TNMSGT (Tuesday Night Mime Small Group Thingy). Wednesday was haging around the house, watching Veggie Tales! Thursday was small group planning with Katie, then LIT meeting (yes, I really do know how to make jello!). Then I had music practice. Friday was another music practice, working on the Irish Dance for CYMA with Kristina, then mime. Saturday we (Our Church music group) went up to Altoona P.A. and we played at a mass in a baseball field. It was fun, except for the fact that it was very very hot. We got back at 11:30. Then Sunday, we (the same church group) played at Mass at our church. Then my mom and I went to a friends graduation, and from there we went to my grandparents house. We spent the night, and then on Monday it was decided that I would stay up at my grandparents so I could go birthday shopping. (my grandmother takes us clothes shopping for our birthdays). So that is where I am now, and where I will be until Thursday morning.

Thats all for now!

We're home!!

Yesterday was a long day. We left at 8-ish, and didn't get to Still Pond till 7-ish. We motor-sailed for part of the day. As soon as we anchored, we went swimming off our boat. We left Still Pond 9:30 this morning, and got back at 11:30! Our boat is at a mooring ball at Tidewater Marina, and she will stay there until we leave for our big trip. We can use our dinghy to get out to her if we want to go on any trips this summer.

Sailing!

This post is for Saturday - I was getting ready to hit the 'post' button when the internet crashed, so I'm posting it today!


We actually sailed today! Well, technically, motor sailing. But we still had the jib out for about 4 hours today. While it didn't help our speed to much, it did keep us steady in the 3 foot swells. It was fun! We went from Kilmarnock to Solomon's Island. I was able to drive for a long time. When we got here, we got the dinghy off the davots, and used it to get to the shore. Since we have a mooring ball, we were able to use the marina facilities, which include a pool! They also have bikes you can borrow, so we biked to the grocery store to pick up a few things my dad and I forgot last night.

Funny story - my mom was making Thousand Island dressing for us to dip cauliflower in. But she realized that we didn't have Cat

Chesapeake Boat Basin

Tonight we are staying at Chesapeake Boat Basin, in the marina. We were going to anchor out, but we went into a slip instead because our refrigeration isn't working. I'm not quite sure how going into a slip helped the refrigeration, but, oh well! We needed to get some stuff from Walmart, so my dad and I took the trolley into town so we could get what we needed. However, the Walmart is like the third stop out of twelve, so it was really nice on the way there, because it was a fairly short trip. But on the way back, we had to ride the rest of the route which was an hour. So that took a bit of time, but at least we were able to get to the Walmart! We attempted sailing today. I say attempted, because it didn't really work. We were getting winds of 15 kts, so we decided to sail. So we put up the mizzen and the jib sails. But as soon as we did that, the winds dropped down to 5 kts. So we decided to put up the main sail as well, in order to go a little faster. But in order to do that, we had to furl in the mizzen. So we furled in the mizzen, and started to raise the main. When the main got about halfway up, it got stuck. We worked on it for about 15 minutes, then decided to furl both the main and the mizzen, and go back to driving. When we got to the marina, we were able to fix the sails! I think we are anchoring out tomorrow night, so I might not be able to post!

Bluewater Yacht Club...

...is where we are staying tonight. It has a pool! (major bonus points) We had a relatively short day today, docking at 1:30, after leaving at 9:30. The first day we were on the boat, my mom was so hot that she said that every time we stopped at a marina, we would get ice cream. She was thinking we would only be staying at a marina once or twice, but we have stayed at a marina every night so far! I didn't get ice cream last night, because I wasn't feeling to well. But today, we went looking for ice cream, and found it in an unexpected place. We went to the dollar store, and found ice cream there! So that was fun! Our Aunt and Uncle are going to be visiting this evening, because they live about 30 minutes from here!

6/16/10 - Our third day on the boat

We went 72 statute miles today, which is approximately 65 nautical miles. We left at 6:20 this morning, and the first thing we had to do was cross the Albermarle Sound. We have heard horror stories about the sound being really rough, and I remembered that last time we went across the sound (6 years ago) I got seasick because of all of the waves (That was the only time on our last boat trip that I got seasick). But, this time, we got started early enough so the wind/ waves weren't to bad. I drove part of the way across it. It rained just as we were leaving the sound. After that we went into the Currituck sound, then into the North Landing river. The North Landing River was really stressful to drive through, because it was a very very narrow passage that was deep enough; the rest was 4ish feet. We had to go through a couple of bridges, and since some of them only open at certain times, we were doing some circles waiting for them to open. We docked at Great Bridge. It started hailing just as soon as we got our boat tied up! Tomorrow we are going through the lock! (changing topic) I don't think that our depth sounder is very accurate, because at one point, it showed that we were going through 3'2" of water. You have to add 1' to the depth shown on the sounder, so that meant we were supposedly going through 4'2" of water. We draw 5'6". How we managed to do that is beyond me. We think either our depth sounder isn't working quite right, or we just slid right through some mud on the bottom. We don't know!

Our boat trip so far...

...has been hot, fun, and relaxing! We went 40 miles yesterday, and 40 miles today. Yesterday was very hot, up in the 90's. Today was cooler, with winds up to 26 kts! I got a little sunburn yesterday on the tops of my legs, a little on my arms, and a little on my face. We are hoping to do a long day tomorrow, 70 miles. We will have to stop halfway through, because we need to let the dog off the boat, and get fuel. We are leaving (hopefully) at 6a.m., so we should get there between 6 and 7(ish). I am not sure if we will have internet access or not. We shall see! We haven't done any sailing yet, for a number of reasons. But, I have been able to drive the boat quite a bit! I drove for a total of about 5 hours, between the two days.

Klutz

I am a klutz. Background: we have a lid type thing that goes over the piano keys on our piano. (end background) So I was shutting the lid thingy with one hand, and my other hand was on the edge of the keys. Somehow, the lid slipped out of my hand and landed on my other hand. Fortunately, I didn't permanently injure myself, just managed to bruise one of the fingers. Then, later, I was going down my brothers zip line, and I was putting my feet down to slow me down. Not Smart. I hit my toes on a rock, and cut open my second to littlest toe on my left foot. It was gushing blood. bleh. So there are two (among) many incidents that prove I am a klutz.

City of Ember

My mom and I watched City of Ember last night. It was pretty good. However, I didn't like the ending. But other than that it was a great movie!

Bike Riding......ugggg

I went on a bike ride this morning with my mom. Not your typical couple miles around town....but all the way down to the Susquehanna Dam. That's 23 miles! And a good bit on the way back is steep uphill. It took us 3 hours! It was ...fun... I think.... :)