Ice cream, a spinnaker and dick waves

Ryan’s friend from high school and his wife Marie came out to visit us for a few days.  They’re both from Washington but Marie works every week in D.C. flying back and forth Sunday through Thursday.  So, occasionally Jason will come visit her in D.C.  for the weekend and this time they made it out to see us!

First the Ice Cream….  They arrived on Friday to Annapolis so we had to initiate them to the Annapolis happy hours!  We went to a few different places before Ryan decided he needed ice cream.  The cones were so delicious Ryan wanted to save some in his beard for later!

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Ryan attacking that ice cream cone.

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Hey Jason…it’s dripping!

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Next the Spinnaker.  It was a light wind day on the Bay and we were headed down to Harness Creek.  We were in no rush, but seeing as it was such a nice day decided to take out the spinnaker.  Jason and Marie were happy to help with the sailing and it all went smoothly!

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Lastly, the dick waves.  Ryan describes a dick wave as ..

“Dick Wave:  a wave created from the wake of a large power boat (generally a Sea Ray or Carver) over taking within 100 ft of another vessel in open water.”

With a lot of people on the Bay we were rocking and rolling from all the wakes they threw up.  Some people got unnecessarily close to us.  This is a world wide phenomenon and I’m glad Ryan has finally named it.

Also, while there in Harness Creek we met Mr. Waterfront.  We knew it was him by the 3ft tall letters painted on his boat!  We had anchored out in front of his house and boat and when he dinghy’d over to us we weren’t sure what to expect.  He just wanted to welcome us to the neighborhood and invite us to use his yard to walk Stanley or his house for showers or laundry!  What a nice guy!  We did take him up on walking the dog and got to explore the beautiful neighborhood there at Harness Creek.

Here are some bonus pictures from our night in Harness Creek.

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Crab, a boat ride and a beautiful sunset….yeah we’re good!

We left Annapolis, which has turned into our home base this summer, to go less than an hour to Ridout Creek in Whitehall Bay.  We were visiting our friends Kirk and Donna who were staying at a friend’s dock.  This is yet another idyllic creek with gorgeous houses around it.  But the difference here is that their friend had a power boat!  So, the six of us took off on the boat to head to Cantlers for some Maryland crab!

Arriving at Cantlers

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Enjoying the crab in some of that delicious Old Bay Seasoning

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After dinner we took a fun boat ride through some of the nearby creeks and enjoyed a gorgeous sunset!

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Relaxing with friends in Shaw Bay

We spent 3 nights tucked away in Shaw Bay on the Eastern Shore.  The trip was organized by some friends who usually stay in Annapolis.  We all ate together and there was so much food to go around!  It was nice to go somewhere to relax and enjoy the good company.

Gail on the ATA Marie.

Gail on the ATA Marie.

There was nothing around except some big fancy houses and grass and trees, but our dinghy could go fast and we zoomed around for a while!

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And there was a beach there!  Stanley had gotten used to running and playing on the beaches in the Caribbean and the Bahamas so he was happy to relive that experience!

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Harness Creek

Harness Creek is a nice little spot about an hour by water from Annapolis.  It’s off the South River and there are lots of pretty houses to look at and a nice park to go walk around in.

We rode our dinghy around to check out the creek.

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And walked Stanley in the park.  They even have a dog park where he made a new friend!

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And spied Ryana through the trees from the park!

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And we took the kayaks out to explore!  This was such a nice relaxing place.

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The Eastern Shore

We were lucky to be invited to share the dock at the house of our friends brother in Cox Creek.  We spent one night there enjoying their hospitality and took a fun walk around the neighborhood.  I think that seeing this beautiful house and neighborhood was the highlight of the trip for Ryan’s Mom!

At the dock and looking up at the house:

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We took a fun walk around the neighborhood with our friend Kirk.  It used to be an old plantation that is now broken up into a few parcels for houses.  There is still co-op farming done on the land and we met the farm manager Mr. Fred.  He gave me a start when he saw a fly on me and smacked it away, but as he said “that’s how we do it around here.”  LOL.  What a fun time!  And we are continually amazed by the hospitality shown by folks in these parts.  But, I guess ,that’s just how they do it around here.

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A quick trip to St Michaels

After visiting Washington DC we took the boat over to St Michaels which is a delightful town on the Eastern Shore.  Ryan and I had never been there so were excited to visit somewhere new.  The harbor has plenty of room for anchoring and the town is very cute.  We pulled our dinghy in next to the Crab Claw restaurant and maritime museum.

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We had a great time and wandered around town.

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And then had an amazing dinner at the Bistro restaurant.  Chuck’s comment was that this was the first time in 30 years that Cindy had eaten her whole dinner.  I just wished we had gotten a picture of the empty plate!!

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The next morning we visited the maritime museum.  It has an old lighthouse that you can tour and a lot of old boats and exhibits about the Chesapeake Bay.  We spent about 4 hours enjoying all the sights!

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They even have some tools for you to catch oysters!  St Michaels was a fun place I’m sure we’ll visit again!

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Fun in DC – Day Two

The next day we woke up eager to experience more of DC.   First though we wanted breakfast to build up our energy before a tour of the Capitol.  We went to Old Ebbits Grill to fuel up and had a delicious breakfast!  We enjoyed ourselves too much though and were running a little late for our tour.  We also underestimated the distance across town.  When everything is so big it feels closer together!  We did make it for our tour though, thanks to Ryan sprinting ahead!

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After that we went underground (beat the heat!) to the Library of Congress.  It’s an interesting building and had a great view of the Capitol.

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After exploring there we walked back underground to the Capitol and got some great pictures in front of it.  We were running so fast earlier to make our tour that we didn’t have time to stop and smell the roses.

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We next visited the National Art Gallery and then decided to call it a day.  What a fun time in DC!  I think we walked 5 miles each day but had a blast!

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