Century Club: Tim Ford

Threw everything I own in the car in terms of boat cleaning, waxing etc. Except: forgot the bag of clean rags. So, I decided: just getting half the boat done was progress.  Plus it served as an excellent reminder of why owning an 18 foot sailboat sure beats owning a 32 footer, at least when it comes to this particular chore.

I was sore enough as it was.

Waiting for the boat to dry after the initial scrub down, I took a rod and reel out and made a few desultory casts. Nothin' doing. Which was fine.

Finally, put boat work supplies away and went up to the club's deck to do some work and wait for the storms to roll in.  Eventually they did, but there was no reason to have postponed the Oriole game, a full 24 hours in advance.  There's nothing certain about a forecast four days out and I guess this year we can knock that down to 24 hours.  All the panic about this front passing through...and it turned out to be pretty much of a non-event.

Beautiful partly cloudy day.

Figured on putting a couple of hours on the O/B, maybe over to the south side of Ferry Pt., but once in the river it was obvious that the 8-10 kn ESE in the creek was more like 12-14 SE in the river, with a short period chop.  My flat bottom boat hates this kind of chop and the pounding causes a slamming vibration that runs through the boat from stem to stern. Plus with the water temps still in the high 40s-low 50s, it really wasn't too safe on a boat with no lifelines.

So I chickened out and went back into the creek, found a lunch spot out of the breeze and watched the ospreys do their thing.  There were three of them trying to roost or nest  or mate in the trees on the narrow neck and they were making quite a racket, so much that a nap was out of the question.

Outboard ran great and seems to have survived ethanol clogging from being relatively stationary all winter.

Rain sort of let up during and after a club "small boat" meeting.  So I figured what the heck, may as well paddle a bit.  Of course, the intermmittent rain returned along with a persistant drizzle, which was more annoying than the rain.  Stiill, the light was wonderful and many birds have returned including a pair of mating Ospreys that were determined to make every turn I was planning to make and then complaining noisily when I "followed" them.   And a sinlge Great Blue perched eerily on a log in the middle of the creek.  It reamined so motionless as I approached, I was wondering if it was a gag bird someone had nailed to a board for entertainment purposes. 

Figured I'd go flog the water one more day after trout fishing on the Gunpowder the day before.  I tried dragging a modified muddler minnow through the fairway/deep water into the creek in hopes that the perch have arrived.  No dice and it was a little too windy for my flyrod skills, plus there was a calm sunny spot in the lee of the wooded point on the south side of PSA. Which meant lunch and a nap and yes, it is possible to nod off in a kayak for a few minutes for a "power" nap.