Day 116 - Solomons Island

There was not a cloud in the sky today and the humidity was low – perfect weather!  The 2 sailboats left around 8:45 am. We were waiting for Wanda’s shop to open so that the captain could exchange his shirt for a different size.  Mr. Parks told us that she lived behind the store and we should just go knock on the door.  Well that’s what we did.  It took Wanda a couple minutes to answer.  Turned out that she was elderly and had had recent heart surgery.  We felt so bad for bothering her before the shop opened.  She did open the store for us but did not have the right size – now we really felt bad!

At 9:25 am Mr. Parks helped us off and we entered the real world again.  Several sailboats and a few powerboats were on the Chesapeake Bay.  The water was calm, one foot or less waves.  It wasn’t long before we passed the mouth of the Potomac River, which leads to Washington DC.  We had wanted to stop in DC, but decided against it because it would take an extra 4 to 5 days to get there and back to the Chesapeake.   There is a lighthouse at the north shore of the river mouth at Point Lookout.  There is another at Point No Point (??!) that is red and white.  Just after that is the mouth of the Patuxent River, where we turned inland to our destination, Solomons Island, at 11:40 am.  The island is connected to the town of Solomons, on the mainland, by a causeway (bridge).

We are staying at Zahniser’s Marina, a full service boatyard with a pool and restaurant.  Since it is mostly a sailboat marina, there is no fuel dock.  We stopped at Harbor Island Marina, just inside the Back Bay to the Patuxent River for fuel, but they were working on their diesel line, so we would have to get fuel later.  We did do a pump out, then went on to Zahniser’s.

Solomons Island has a wonderful museum, the  Calvert Marine Museum and Drum Point Lighthouse.  The lighthouse is cottage style and was in service from 1883 to 1962.  Shortly after, it was moved to the museum grounds.  The museum itself has live exhibits of skates and rays, and another of river otters.  There is a building full of boats that were operated on the bay for harvesting oysters and crabs. The history of the area includes boat building and fishing, like many of the communities on the Bay.  Tobacco plantations were located on both sides of the river prior to the Civil War.  There was an interesting exhibit of powerboat racing that took place off Swann’s Pier from the 1950’s to the 1980’s.  The fossil exhibit included a huge replication of a megatooth shark skeleton.   I had to take a picture of the cornfield on the way back to the marina.  It was the first one I have seen since leaving the Midwest.

We had dinner at Zahniser’s restaurant, the Dry Dock, located on the second floor of one of their buildings.  We ate on the outdoor deck and had Rockfish Fingers and Tilapia baked with crab.  They had burgees hanging inside, but would not trade for ours.  We decided to wait and  check out the Solomons Island Yacht Club the next day and see if they would trade.