planning for the Bay

It's just a little piece of string, but cut to match a scaled 20 nautical miles on my ADC Map of Chesapeake Bay it gave me a rough idea of what we could cover in a comfortable day of sailing.   It confirmed the plan I had sketched out was practical.  The stops along the way could include Smith Island, the Honga River, Choptank River, Annapolis, Rock Hall and the Wye River.
Some days we might do 15 nautical miles, others we might do over 30.  It just depends on wind and weather and what we feel like doing.  There is a lot of give and take at this point.  The Honga River, seen above, is a good example.  That could be our anchorage on the second night of the trip.  It is 10 miles long with plenty of small coves, marshes and creeks on either side.  So we've got lots of options and more than 10 miles of choices before dropping the anchor.  That is pretty typical of the Bay's rivers.
As for food, we are talking about taking the same kinds of food with us that we had on the Skeeter Beater 126.  We'll just take a bit less of it (we had plenty leftover after the last trip).  Bruce promises a repeat on his great meals.  The trail mix snacks, beef jerky, cups of fruit, tuna salad lunches and peanut butter crackers will all be on board.

The soft-sided cooler with dry ice worked very well on the last trip so we'll do that again.  I found a "12 pack" soft sided cooler that nests perfectly in to the larger cooler we used last time.  There is room in the 12 pack for dry ice, a few frozen bottles of water and at least four one-pound packs of frozen meats.  Put the 12 pack inside of the larger cooler and I suspect it will keep the meats frozen or at least cold for five or six days.
Bruce wants to improve on Spartina's cook kit.  My kit is made up of odd pots and pans that I found around the house or at the dollar store.  He says he's found the perfect nesting, light weight camp cook kit at REI and will bring it back for the fall trip.  Fine by me.
Planning for this trip seems pretty straighforward to me now.  We've got a good boat, the right gear and a little bit of experience.  Just need to resupply our food, get new batteries and spend some evenings looking at the charts.  That should leave plenty of time for day sailing this summer (like tomorrow maybe!).

-Steve