Monday morning, Memorial Day, we set out
exploring Yopps Cove and the adjacent creeks.
This was the first extended trial of our new propane powered
outboard. We were using one of those
small propane canisters normally used for grills and since we had previously
used it for our grill, we were unsure of the amount remaining. We brought an
additional canister along just in case.
The first canister lasted 45 minutes and it was no problem to switch to
the second canister which lasted for the remainder of our exploration (another
hour), and still seems to have a little left.
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| Exploring by dinghy with Lehr propane-powered motor |
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| Someone has to live this life, right? |
|
The anchorage and surrounding creeks were
dotted with expensive houses, well-kept and nicely landscaped, accessorized
with a dock and nice boat. What a life!
On Carter Creek we passed the well known Tides Inn and resort marina. It has a hotel as well as marina slips and
provides patrons with complimentary use of the pool, kayaks, paddle boards and
pedal boats. We saw several people out
making use of these.
We returned to the boat and were relaxing
and enjoying the quiet setting when along came a small barge-like boat with
what appeared to be a huge pile of gravel on board. The boat stopped not far off our stern and
then crew members opened doors in the vessel sides and began pumping strong
jets of water at the pile which started spilling out the open doors. It was then that we realized it was oyster
shells from a nearby oyster processing plant!
We were surprised that they would dump in such a shallow body of water
(mostly 9 ft.), and a residential area as well.
It was a very short distance to go dump the shells in the wide and deep
Rappahannock River. It took about 20
minutes for the whole big pile to be washed off the boat as it slowly turned in
circles, presumably to spread the pile out and not create a mound for boaters
to hit. I also wondered if there wasn’t
some cost-effective market for the oyster shells, but apparently this business
didn’t find one. We couldn't upload our video clip, but here is a small photo excerpt from the video to give you the idea.
The afternoon was quite warm (high of
80°F), and the water was fairly clear, so Peter decided to again scrub the
bottom of the boat which had already grown quite a bit of slime in the month
since he had last cleaned it. The water,
however, was only about 70°F, so he wore his wet suit. During the process, he
found that both of our zincs needed replacement. For those who of you who are
not boaters, a little explanation. The
propeller shaft on boats in salt water tends to get pitted and corroded from
electrolysis. So boaters attach about a
one pound piece of zinc to the prop.
Often referred to as a “sacrificial zinc”, it corrodes before the shaft,
and if you replace it when it gets pitted and soft, your boat’s shaft will be
preserved. The same diver who usually
cleans our boat also takes care of this task for us, but Peter thought he could
manage it using his SCUBA gear to stay down long enough. The task involves using 3 screws on each zinc
and 2 different size allyn wrenches, but we had spares of everything in case
something was dropped, so we got out the SCUBA tank, etc. Excellent success! Peter didn’t drop a thing
and it didn’t take very long either.
However, our boating friends reading this can tell diver Paul not to
worry about getting his job back when we return!
The night promises to be very peaceful and
comfortable in this anchorage – excellent weather for sleeping on the boat.
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