Didja ever have one of those days?
I'm officially on the road again and yesterday was my first day back. The doctor removed the single external stitch from my hernia operation Monday afternoon and I finally got away around 10am Tuesday, 11/2/99.
It was raining pretty hard as I left Westville, NJ and aimed the truck down 295 towards Delaware and then Maryland on my way to Cambridge, MD on the eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay. Why? Why not? There is a concentration of bald eagles in the area as well as crabs and oysters. Seems as good as any place and its not New Jersey.
I took a quick peak at a map before I left and decided to go down 295 to the Delaware Memorial Bridge, take 95 south into Maryland, down 301 or 213 south and worry about the rest later. So I'm driving, driving, driving down 95 looking for 301 or 213 when I cross a large body of water. I drive another 10 miles or so and decide that was the Chesapeake and I'm on the wrong side now. I stop at a service exit to look at a map and see it wasn't the Chesapeake. It was the Susquehanna River. The Chesapeake was 20 miles farther back than that. Geesh! I must have only been in Delaware 5 minutes.
There was a visitor or tourist information center at the service exit and would you believe they had computers with complimentary access to the Internet. There's something to be said for HotMail and some of the other free emails where you login to the email service rather than your ISP for your email. I looked around but they didn't have any telephone jacks for hooking up your own computer. I still need that to update the web site, etc. Right now I have to stop at a motel once a month to get access to a telephone. I'm going to try an airport when I have time and think about it and will be on the lookout for other places with telephone jacks, maybe a library.
The southern New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland fall foliage was pretty near peak all the way down and was pretty even in the rain. I had forgotten the Mason Dixon line runs along the southern Pennsylvania border (the line separating free and slave states during the civil war) and I never knew Delaware used to be part of Pennsylvania but it was.
The farther into Maryland I got, the more Canadian geese I saw, both in the air and on the ground. I saw hundreds of them forming their long V's and many hundreds more in fields. Most of the drive down was through farmland. I'm currently reading (about the settlement of the) Chesapeake by James Michner and it's interesting to see some of the areas he mentions. This is the second or third time I've read this book.
I made a quick stop at Wye where the oldest white oak in the country is located. It's estimated to be 450 years old, is 34+ feet in circumference, over 100 feet tall and 150 feet wide. The branches are so big and heavy they have them cabled so they don't break of their own weight. They've got a fence that goes around the tree for a couple of hundred feet and have made that a state park. At least I think that's the Wye Oak State Park. The biggest oak in the smallest park?
I made a wrong turn when I got onto route 50 and almost ended up on the Bay Bridge which takes you across the bay to Annapolis. The wind really picked up and the truck and kayak were really being buffeted around.
It was around 4pm, real dark clouds, torrential rains and I could barely see. It was one of those days when you follow the taillights in front of you, period. If he drives into the ocean, you just blindly follow because you can't see anything on which to make a decision.
I'm in the left lane of a 2 lane with the wind pushing me around, trying to get over into the right lane. I have the turn signal on and I'm looking in the right side mirror when the damn thing falls off. Yup! It vibrated a few times and then it was gone.
I get to the campground on Taylor's Island, midway down the Maryland coast and ring the office bell but no one answers. The wind is still blowing but the rain has let up some so I get out and walk around a little. The campground is located just across the 0.25 mile bridge across Slaughter Creed that connects the island to the mainland and the creek(?) is kicking up pretty good with lots of white caps.
The manager finds me and sets me up with a tent site right on the water. The rain stops but the wind is stronger than ever. Even so I look up in the sky and say "Thanks, big guy!" and give him a thumbs up. In retrospect, I think I heard him snicker.
I was putting the poles on the tent when a gust caught the tent and almost ripped it out of my hands. I was less concerned about it blowing away than I was about getting the poles bent so I would put a pole in and stake it down immediately.
The wing tarp went up fairly easily. I placed the tarp over the picnic table and loosely staked the key points down starting with the windward side. Then, also on the windward side, I put the end pole up and secured the other stakes a little tighter while the leeward side flapped around. Then I put that pole up and tightened everything down real well. Too well!
It was dark by the time I was finished and I had just stepped back to think what I had to do next when I heard dogs barking. Then the barking got louder and then louder still as the dogs came running in my direction. They stopped just out of visual range in the darkness barking like crazy. I didn't know if they were attack dogs, a pack of wild dogs, the Hounds of Baskerville or what. I grabbed the hatchet I use as a hammer for stakes in my right hand and put my left arm up around my throat preparing for whatever was going to happen. I've just recently come from a few days in active bear country and maulings and being eaten alive are still very near the front of my mind.
The dogs came a little closer and backed off when I took a step forward. I had no ideas where this was going when a light comes on and some guy comes out and calls them off. He comes over and the dogs follow. I let them sniff my hand and the next minute we're the best of buddies. But I really didn't need that.
Around 7pm I see the manager coming and think he's bringing me firewood but he's just checking on the boats tied up out in the water. We chat for a while and he tells me how he runs a non-commercial trotline to catch crabs and that there's a big oyster bed on the other side of the bridge and I don't need a license for them and how much the wind affects the tide and that it's been gusting 45-50mph all day.
The edge of the campground has a timbered breakwater secured with pilings. I think the water is at high tide and it's a couple of feet below the breakwater and the waves breaking against it don't splash very high. The picnic table with my tarp over it is about 15 feet back from the breakwater and my tent is 25-30 feet farther back.
I dozed off listening to the water gurgling and bubbling and thinking it seemed to be coming from all around me and I sure hoped I didn't float away while asleep.
I woke up around 11pm with the wind still howling. I looked out the front tent flap to see how the aerodynamically designed tarp was holding up. It was upright but looked funny and after a moment I realized why. It was surrounded by water! The water was calm but it was up over the breakwater, past the picnic table and 10 feet from the tent with another 5 feet of grass all soggy with water.
What the hell happened and what should I do about it? Why nothing of course. I first noticed the water level at 4:30pm. If that was dead low tide then, it's been more than 6 hours so the tide has to be on the way out so there's no problem.
I lay down and checked 15 minutes later. Has anything changed? I can't tell. 15 minutes later I'm still not sure but I think the water is closer. 15 minutes after that I notice some grass tufts forming a little island were no longer there. 15 minutes later the grass in front of the tent look soggy so I bite the bullet, get dressed and step out into a soggy mess. I pulled up the tent stakes and dragged ground cloth, tent and everything to a spot 100 feet away, get undressed and back in the sleeping bag.
And the wind picked up some more. I hadn't staked the tent down after moving it and now the poles were starting to collapse inward on me from the wind. A couple of years ago I was caught in a gale in Maine in the same tent and the wind buckled the entire tent in on me. I was lying in the tent on my back with hands and feet up in the air pushing the tent up as the wind pushed it down. The poles were so badly bent I spent $80 to replace them.
So I get dressed again and go out but the hatchet I use as a hammer is out on the picnic table. I don't have an extended cab on the truck so I keep the tools behind the seat and the first thing I come across is a 5lb sledge. That'll work. After securing the tent and checking the tarp is still OK I get undressed and lie down again.
The wind is still picking up but the tent's holding up OK and it's dry. 15 minutes later I check the tarp again and one corner's flapping in the wind. Sh*t! I was afraid the water would loosen the dirt and allow a stake to pull out. I get as close as I can and now see a seam has split. Sh*t! There goes $180! Sh*t!
Not much I can do now so I get undressed again. But as I'm lying there I decide it might be repairable and I should salvage what I can and get the other stuff I left on the picnic table. So I put a nylon wind breaker on and go out barefoot and in my underwear. Before hitting the water I start the truck and turn the heater and the fan on full blast. I know I'm going to be a sorry sucker when I come back.
As I wade 30 feet or so through a foot of water I say "Yup, that water's freakin' cold. I stumble over the first stake, pull it up and shuffle my feet around looking for the next one. My hands and feet are both getting numb when I head for a stake near that was anchored near the breakwater.
And then I slipped and started to slide and then I fell, right into the water. My first thought was I'm going to slide over the breakwater, the current will get me and I'll be dragged out to sea.
My second thought was that damn little gully leading to the breakwater as I sat there up to my waist in 50 degree water, in 50 degree weather, in a 50 knot wind that's howling like Banshees, and in my underwear, yet!. Then I'm pretty sure I heard the big guy upstairs give another little snicker. I get up and go after the remaining stakes thinking "That strong wind feels great on my freezing butt. Not!!!" I get to the last stake and of course it's been pounded all the way into the ground and I can't get a grip on it. I finally wrap the cord around it and use that to pull the damn thing up.
Of course as I've been pulling the stakes up the wind has been wrapping the tarp and the cords around the picnic table so now I have to unwrap everything. I do so in a calm and collected manner without rushing or cussing. Not! I get the tarp and cord up to the truck and debate about going back for the rest of the stuff. Not knowing what the wind and water are going to do the rest of the night I go back into the water a second time. As I carried the stuff to the truck I was stepping full force on pine cones and barely felt them.
After finding another shirt, jacket and underwear by feel alone, I get into the cab and the blessed warmth of that heater. After drying off and getting dressed I sat there for 30 minutes or so and just soaked it up. When I went back to the tent I didn't care if I floated away or not and drifted off to sleep. I did wake up once and looked out the tent flap and the water had already receded.
I guess it could have been worse. The truck was originally parked down by the picnic table but I moved it to block a light that was shining on the tent.
Right now I'm parked on a back road right next to the bay. It's 15 feet across the road from me and still quite nasty looking. The wind's still blowing and the waves are spraying up over a stone breakwater onto the road, which flooded last night. The water is very muddy with 1.5 whitecaps. I better get out of here before the truck and I go bobbing across the bay to Annapolis.