Cruising The Ditch

716 miles to Boston!

Locks!

The Dismal swamp Canal isn't very dismal at all.

Potluck! People living on boats love veggies, because it's hard to keep them around.

It appears that most cruisers stick to the Intercoastal Waterway (aka ICW, The Ditch, etc) when voyaging longitudinally on the Atlantic.  We were pretty set on not taking the ICW for a variety of reasons, but mainly because we hate listening to our 2-stroke outboard all day.  It works, it moves the boat, it's reliable, but damn it's loud.  However, to go outside from the Chesapeake to Hattaras is a pretty big commitment - about 120 miles without a feasable port - and then you're stuck going in another Inlet of Death.  We decided to forgo that headache and instead head down the Dismal Swamp Canal, part of the ICW.  It looked pretty neat, and despite the engine noise it might be a bit of a break.  Anyway, we had earplugs.

We headed out from our anchorage in Norfolk at around 6 AM so we could make the various bascule bridges and locks in good time.  After motoring through all the industrial sprawl of Norfolk it was a relief to turn onto Deep Creek and find ourselves in the woods, more or less.  We reached the first lock about an hour before its first scheduled opening of the day, so we tied up to a piling, killed the engine, and relaxed.  

Locks are neat.  In the case of those surrounding the Dismal Swamp they first raise a vessel up 9 feet before you proceed the 20 miles down the canal, where the second lock lowers the boat 9 feet onto the river on the other side.  There is a current in the canal, which I'm told the engineers (this is all run by the Army Corps of Engineers) can make run whichever way they want, so they have it go north for half the canal then flip and move south.  We'd read great things about Robert, the operator of the Deep Creek Lock at the north end of the canal, and we weren't disappointed.  He came on the radio and asked us to move into the lock when the door opened.  The lock itself is probably 70 by 40 feet, with huge metal doors that swing out on either side.  We tossed him our dock lines, which he looped over a couple cleats, then he closed the doors and water began rushing in.  The whole area fills up quickly, and it took maybe 4 minutes for us to be at the top of the lock.  We drew in line as we rose up to hold ourselves against the wooden fenders that lined the sides.  Once at the top, Robert asked us if we had any questions, then gave us a thorough overview of the Dismal Swamp Canal.  Then he invited us into the office for coffee and donuts.  What a guy!  After insisting that we polish off the danish he'd cut up for us, he told me to take some yogurt from the fridge because he's "a man, and doesn't eat that stuff."  I asked him if they'd made yogurt for men yet, and he told me they hadn't.  As we pushed off from the wall to proceed into the canal he gave us some good advice:  don't plan your day past lunch, and never be afraid to venture up river to a small town off the waterway because they'll treat you real nice.  Seriously, Robert was rad, whatever his feelings about yogurt.

Right after the lock there is a scary metal dock, which we gingerly tied up to so we could walk the 100 yards to the gas station and not have to worry about fuel the rest of the day.  We also bought a watermelon from a guy selling them from his truck.  I seriously had only good impressions from everyone I met in Virginia.  Go figure.

Once underway, we had a very straight, very pretty motor for the next 20 miles.  Despite the engine noise it was pretty relaxing, and we took solar showers on the trampoline.  There were turtles everywhere!  At one point I saw something in the water and thought, "a hippopotamus!"  But then I remembered that hippopotamus are imaginary, like leprechauns and eskimos.*  Anyway, it turned out to just be two geese.  I also saw an enormous rattlesnake swimming down the canal.  yikes.

We passed out of Virginia and into North Carolina, 5 miles later coming to the second lock.  This lockmaster was not nearly so friendly as Robert.  Given the hour of the day I was expecting espresso and biscotti, but all we got was a friendly hello and the comment that he'd never seen a green sailboat before.  

Once outside the lock our passage became a little more what we'd expected from the Great Dismal Swamp.  It was wider, windier, and generally more swamp-like.  By this point we had 16 miles left to Elizabeth City and we had both grown weary of the engine noise.  We took turns doing yoga on the bow and ate our watermelon.  

Elizabeth City is known as the "Harbor of Hospitality" or something like that, and there is a free dock and supposedly some shuttle that runs downtown.  Well, the free dock we found, and gratefully saw that there was a slip wide enough to accomodate our big girl.  A younger guy from a neighboring boat helped us tie off, as did a much older man who appeared to just be hanging out.  After a few minutes of conversation the younger guy returned to his boat to work on whatever project was occupying him, and the older man talked to us.  And talked to us.  And it just went on and on, like Grandpa on The Simpsons.  He was retired and came down to the dock everyday to be hospitable.  He was so nice, and he said some really interesting things (I haven't been able to verify this, but he said he was the NC Lieutenant Governor or something at one point, and met with MLK and worked with the civil rights movement?  And MLK gave him an honorary membership to the NAACP?  Which is amazing and rad if it's true!  But.)  Well, we were exhausted from our day of motoring and were baking in the sun, so finally I said we had to go get some food or something and took our leave. 

There isn't really anything going on in Elizabeth City.  We wandered around downtown for a bit and nothing was open and there weren't really any people.  I was just looking for a place to get a beer or something and it took 25 minutes of walking aroudn to come across anything.  At one point we walked by what I took to be a senior center just as one old guy walked up to another who was sitting on the bench out front.  The one sitting on the bench said, "You know what's wrong with this town?" "What?" the other replied.  "There's nothing but old folks!" the first said.  

Cody was getting tired and hangry (hungry + angry) when I finally found us a little diner to get beer and food.  I had a nice local IPA and a quesadilla and Cody had a burger and a PBR or something.  As we were getting ready to ask for our check the waitress came over and told us that the man at the end of the bar who'd just left had bought our dinner, as well as the other two couples in the restaurant.  He didn't want her to tell us until he'd left.  What a guy.

Anyway, we headed back for the boat and had a beer and chatted with the young couple docked next to us and the family they were travelling with, who it turns out were from Boston!  Then we crashed.  

The next morning we were sitting in the cabin drinking coffee when someone said, "Hey there, young man!" and started talking to Cody from the shore.  I won't get into all the details of his rambling, but let's just say that I'm surprised he didn't ask us if we wanted to contribute to The War Against Northern Aggression.**  He went on sympathizing with Donald Sterling and said, "y'all are yankees, aren't ya?"  Then he told us how good the Hardy's was for breakfast.  Then he said that there was a "black midget who always wear's a patriots cap" who we'd really like.  You can't make this shit up.  Well, once again I realized if we were going to get out of this conversation gracefully we'd have to abandon ship, so we put on our running shoes and stepped off the boat for a run.  "Y'all going jogging or something?" he asked.  "Yep."  "Well, that's all right I guess," he replied.  Whew.  Well, we had a nice run anyway, then got back to the boat and made breakfast in peace.  I was told later by a fellow cruiser that, "You are in the South, and the South will rise again."  So it would seem.

We spent the day wandering around Elizabeth City in search of groceries and other provisions (we're on a quest to find a collapsable 5 gallon water jug but have been striking out wherever we go).  Then we did laundry (or, Cody did landry and I laid down in the boat for a little while), and I got the key code for the shower there (you have to pay 5 dollars for the code but the girl nextdoor gave me the one they had given her) and I got my first hot shower of the trip.  We had been invited to a cruisers potluck that night!  I was extremely excited, because it's sort of a thing and it meant we were real cruisers! I made a salad, and we all sat on the grass beside the harbor and enjoyed food and conversation.  It was very nice.  Then we showed our neighbors the boat and they showed us theirs.  Nothing like touring a boat with a nice large cabin to realize just how undersized Tri-oomph is for longterm cruising.  We love her, of course, but man, head room.

Anyway, everyone was taking off the next day - us heading south, the others north into the Great Dismal Swamp.  Onward!

*Bonus points for The Simpsons reference.
**Bonus points for MST3K reference.