Thou Shalt Take the Kids Trick or Treating - Or Not?

Today we were faced with a Big Parental Dilemma.

Two scenarios:

1. Perform expected parental duty of taking the kids trick or treating.  Doing this would require going to a town and either docking at a marina (with minimum cost probably around $50) or anchoring close enough to dinghy into shore.  As trick or treating would likely stretch past sunset, we would probably choose the marina due to forecasts of high SW winds causing tricky conditions for using the dinghy.  

2. Do not perform expected parental duty of taking the kids trick or treating. Save $50. Anchor in a safe place protected from the forecasted high winds.  Be wrought by high levels of guilt for not taking the kids trick or treating.

The only town we could go to today was Belhaven, NC.  Earlier in the week we had thought about staying in Elizabeth City a few extra nights as trick or treating prospects seemed more favorable there (population of 18,000 vs Belhaven's population of 1,700).  Fellow cruisers that had visited Belhaven several times before had also warned us we might not find good trick or treating close to the marinas there.  The decision to leave Elizabeth City was made not without some angst.

We love holidays.  At home, I would probable have already attended two or three classroom Halloween parties, baked and decorated several dozen Halloween cookies, spent the past month making or finding Halloween costumes, etc.   Who does not remember the excitement one feels as a child looking forward to trick or treating?  How could we take that away from the kids?!!

For other holidays, there are alternatives.  In the past when the kids were younger, Jamey and I have changed the date of Christmas when I've had to work Christmas morning.  We've been flexible with our celebration of Valentine's Day, Easter, and even Thanksgiving.  But true house-to-house trick or treating really is an October 31 thing.

Well, after much discussion and with consideration of weather, cost, and parental obligation, we chose #2 and anchored in the middle of nowhere.  We involved the kids in the decision making, and surprisingly they were excited and happy about our alternative Halloween.  We decorated the boat with fake spider webs (which make very good tell-tales hung from a shroud to help with reading the wind), had a candy hunt, created a haunted house, used the letters of Halloween to make smaller words (52), played with face paint, and went trick or treating in the boat (V-berth, back berth, under-the-table fort).

It was our best Halloween ever.  I like to think it's our great parental ingenuity that made the kids only minimally wistful for the trick or treating that could have been.  In the end, though, I think it was just that they still got lots of candy.  Happy Halloween!

A beautiful day and a lollipop -- this is the life!

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WHERE WE STARTED:  Anchored in the south end of the Alligator River around one mile east of the canal heading south.  The Alligator River is part of the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge which protects the pocosin ("swamp on a hill"), a unique wetland habitat type.

WHERE WE ARE:  Anchored in Crabtree Bay, the headwaters of the Pungo River.  Good hold, protected in all directions.  Ample room, and there were five sailboats anchored in the area by the end of the day, all seeking shelter from the big gusts expected tonight and tomorrow.

THERE TO HERE: 27 miles, motoring down the Alligator River Pungo River Canal.  Peaceful and beautiful like the Dismal Swamp Canal but wider and with more traffic.  Important to stay in the center of the canal.  Nancy at the helm.

Feeling fancy and "boo"tiful!

 

Albemarle Sound: Peaceful...Not!

These pictures of the Albemarle Sound are unaltered.  It really was stunningly calm, serene, and peaceful…

               

…for Jamey.

For some reason, Jamey and I tend to not switch off at the helm during the day, each preferring to take the wheel the whole time.  We've always done this.  When it's good sailing, I will guard my position as captain and forego potty breaks, eating, and drinking for as long as ten hours.  This may have been a practice that developed many years ago when I was starting to build my sailing skills and was afraid of Jamey altering my course or trimming my sails (which I would perceive as undermining my small accomplishments or as patronizing-- typical male/female dynamics, huh?)  We may have fallen into this way of working as a team because Jamey is willing to do the long stretches of boring motoring, more capable of handling difficult conditions, and more tolerant of uncomfortable weather.  Today Jamey was at the helm. 

It was NOT a peaceful day for me.  Imagine four active children waking up in a small and limited space.  Needing breakfast, homeschooling, snacks, lunch, entertainment, attention, attention and more attention. 

Don't get me wrong.  Phoenix is super proactive with her workbooks and is teaching herself all sorts of things.  For example, I did not know that my way of doing long multiplication is the "U.S. Traditional Method" and is considered by Phoenix to be outdated and more difficult to understand than other "algorithims."  My biggest problem with her right now is keeping her from reading all of our Kindle library books straight away.  (She averages two per day, and putting library books on the Kindle is dependent on good WiFi access for us). 

Nevertheless, it was a day of constant multi-tasking for me.  Setting up activities and lessons for one kid while another one finished theirs, delegating chores, keeping the inevitable mess at bay, trying to get the little ones to nap (totally unsuccessful!), ensuring that life jackets and harnesses were on when up above, satisfying their insatiable appetite, breaking up quarrels and fights, etc.  At one point I celebrated Indigo taking a long nap in her fort under the table, but then found out she had been happily hiding out, "daydreaming", and avoiding doing schoolwork.  She later redeemed herself, and wrote a great essay imagining herself as a Jamestown settler (posted below). 

Cheerios have this insidious way of spreading everywhere even on a boat

Everyone's favorite hangout place

 Dancing on the deck

I love being a stay-at-boat-mom, but tomorrow I'm taking the helm!

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WHERE WE STARTED: Mariner's Wharf, Elizabeth City

An early morning departure from Elizabeth City.  At least four boats left before us.

WHERE WE ARE: Anchored in seven to eight feet of water at the bottom of the Alligator River, a mile east of the Alligator River-Pungo River Canal entrance.  Great protection from southerly winds. This anchorage would be horrible in anything coming from the north.  There are potential snags in the area.

The peaceful view from our anchorage

THERE TO HERE: Around 50 miles. 9 hours. There were at least ten other boats migrating south across the Albemarle Sound and down the Alligator River today.   Due to its shallow water and long shape, the Albemarle Sound can apparently get quite nasty with choppy seas under even just a little wind.  We saw boats that had intended to stay longer in Elizabeth City conceding to the enticingly calm conditions and heading down with us.

The Albemarle Sound is the closest that we will get to Roanoke Island on this leg of our journey.  We have an interest in visiting Roanoke Island because it is where the British first attempted to build a colonial settlement in 1584 and 1587.  The fate of the final Roanoke colonists, a group that included a handful of women and children (and Virginia Dare, the first child born in America to English parents),  is one of history's great mysteries.  Supply ships who returned to the settlement in 1590 found an abandoned settlement with no signs of a struggle and only a couple of clues carved into a fence post and nearby tree.  Despite much effort by historians, archaeologists, and scientists, there has not been sufficient evidence found to determine what the ultimate fate of the Roanoke colonists might have been.  The theories are many, and recent efforts have looked at Albemarle Sound as a possible source of more clues. 
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INDIGO'S ESSAY:

My name is Julia Richard, a kid. I am going to Virginia on a sailboat to make town.  I come from England, and it's a 100 day sail.  I don't get to change clothes for all that time.  When we arrived after 100 long days, we went on shore.  Then we found Indians.  They were dressed oqwardly.  They brout goods and water.  They had a town, and their leader was named Powhatin.  They did not have guns or sowrds.  They had spears and arowws.  Their spears were made out of chipped rocks and they cooked deer meet.  They had a hut for animal furs.  They had a lot of meat.  We had forts made out of wood logs. 

Doing the Dismal: The Dismal Swamp Canal

PHOENIX'S POST:  ROBERT AND THE LOCK

We motored into the lock. The day was warm and sunny.  The lock was like a giant elevator for boats. When I stepped outside I got so excited because across from us there was a bunch of kids!

Waiting for the Deep Creek Lock to open.  We tied up to a dolphin (marine piling) while waiting.

The lock opens at 8:30 am, 11:30 am, 1:30 pm and 3:30 pm.

A bow line and a stern line each hook around a yellow post above on the lock walls.  We can pull tight or let out slack as needed when the boat rises. 

We had to tie on using ropes so that we wouldn't float away from the wall.  A nice man named Robert helped us.  There were a couple of other boats with us in the lock.

Robert asked if any of the boats knew any history about the Dismal Swamp Canal.  None of us did, so Robert told us all about the founders of the Dismal Swamp Canal, the reason it was created, and the reason the water in it is the color it is.

When Robert finished telling us about the canal, he started closing the doors.  They were very slow.

The beautiful ketch on the other side of the canal is Aliento.  It was the family on this boat that Phoenix was excited about.  Check out their mission at heartofthestorm.org.

When the doors were all the way closed, water started coming in from the other side.  We were rising!

The lock gate blocks the high water on the other side.  The water is let in slowly.

As the water comes in, it can create a lot of turbulence.  Jamey was directed to hold his line tight to avoid the stern moving out and the bow crashing into the wall.

When the lock was full, Robert got his conch and blew us a a couple of different sounds and tunes.  He asked dad to get his conch, and Robert gave dad a couple of tips.  Then Robert told us that he was having breakfast at his office and invited us all to come tomorrow morning!

Robert played scales and When The Saints Come Marching In on his conch!

Robert opened the gates, and we all motored through.  On the other side the river level was much higher, and there was a free dock that we spent the night at.

After we were all settled we walked to the park that was right next to the dock, and we played there for awhile.

The next morning we really did go to Robert's office for breakfast.  We ate and drank fruit, donuts, crackers, chocolate milk, orange juice and coffee.

We all then said goodbye to the other sailors and walked to our boats promising to see each other again on the way to the Bahamas.  We motored through the bridge that Robert opened for us, and I blew the conch horn loud and clear!
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DOING THE DISMAL

Do you ever feel like you are moving through a beautiful painting?  That was us today.  The Dismal Swamp Canal is serenity embodied in a still strip of tea-colored water lined by vibrant swathes of cypress and juniper.

Whether we are the discordant spilled drop or the deliberate touch of color in this painting is a philosophical question to be discussed elsewhere.

The cola colored water in the Dismal Swamp comes from tannin, a substance released from the decaying cypress and juniper trees.  Tannin prevents growth of bacteria, and this combined with artesian water that spills into the canal makes this water so clean that sailors used to bring this water with them on long journeys.  Tannins are found in other plants and are part of the reason cranberry juice can help prevent urinary tract infections. 

The history of the Great Dismal Swamp stretches back to colonial times when it provided a major route of transportation.  George Washington made the initial proposal for the canal, and it was started in 1793 and dug completely by hand with most of the work done by slaves.  The swamp was dense and thick enough that it provided isolation and sanctuary for the Great Dismal Swamp maroons, freed and escaping slaves who lived in these marshlands from around 1700 to the 1860s.

This marks the fork where you can choose between two very different routes: the deeper and busier Virginia Cut or the Dismal Swamp Canal.  At times, the canal is closed due to water levels or other reasons.  We would not have been able to go through last week due to the high level of duckweed, a free-floating plant whose claim to fame includes being the smallest flowering plant and clogging the strainers in engine cooling systems.  The sign says "If you haven't done it yet you don't know what you're missing.  The Dismal Swamp Canal is lovely and worth much reminiscing."

It was a warm and gorgeous day, and we spent a lot of time on deck playing games. Dismal is a misnomer if ever there was one. 

Thank you, Robert and the Dismal Swamp,  for a beautiful day!

The pretzel eating contest.  Skye wins the prize for most mellow player.

Pretzels were the goal of the girls' journey around the deck.  They could only step on small "stones" to avoid being eaten by alligators. 

Sage's prehensile toes working hard for those pretzels. 

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WHERE WE STARTED: Deep Creek Lock Pond, free docking.  Short walk to convenience stores and a Food Lion across the bridge.  There is also a pizzeria and Japanese restaurant close by. 

WHERE WE ARE: Mariner's Wharf, Elizabeth City, NC, also known as the Harbor of Hospitality.  Based on a tradition started by a couple of sailors long ago, there are wine and cheese parties and roses that greet sailors here.  We heard that the gatherings are held if there are five or more boats, and there was a party held yesterday.  There is free docking here for 48 hours.  The Museum of the Albemarle on the waterfront is free.   We took a stroll around town and saw a lot of cute shops.  There is a CVS close by where we stocked up on Halloween party provisions.

THERE TO HERE: Mile 10.5 to Mile 51. Around 6 hours.  Navigating the canal was fairly straightforward though it was important to keep a careful watch for logs and other such flotsam floating on the surface.  Robert, the lockmaster (and the epitome of southern hospitality) opened the Deep Creek Bridge for us after his amazing breakfast gathering.  At Mile 28 we passed the Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center.  There is free overnight docking here, and other mariners have told us that the Welcome Center and adjoining Dismal Swamp State Park are wonderful.  My vote was for us to stay there and do some hiking, but I was outvoted by Jamey and the girls.  We caught the Mile 33 South Mills lock opening at 1:30 pm and the Bascule Bridge opening at 4:30 pm.

PLAYGROUNDS AND PARKS:  The playground at Deep Creek Lock Pond has a large play structure, swings, an exercise course, observation towers overlooking the water, and some beautiful trails.  There was a volleyball net set up and lots of green space for the kids to run around.  At Elizabeth City there was a beautiful patch of soft, green grass right by where we docked.  There were some students studying on the lawn and an impromptu gathering of everyone docked.  The girls were able to practice their flips, and we played a lot of tag.

Mile Zero

Today we reached ICW Mile 0.  An hallelujah moment for Jamey!  He has been yearning for Mile 0 for some time due to his fear of cold weather creating misery for us if we don't head south quickly enough.

Red buoy 36 marks Mile "0"

The Intracoastal Wateray (ICW) is 3,000 miles, starts from the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay and runs down along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts.  It is sort of like a continuous dot to dot connection of rivers, bays, canals and other bodies of water.  By traveling on the ICW, you can save yourself the dangers and discomfort of open ocean travel as you head south.
 
In colonial times, these waterways were super important in offering protection from rough seas, weather and enemies.  I imagine that discovering and/or making each portion of it navigable must have been really significant milestones for the country's expansion and invaluable for the development of transport, communication, trade and defense.

Entering Norfolk and Portsmouth where Mile 0 is located surrounds you with a cacophony of sights. Even before the early colonists, the Chesapean and Powhatan Indians were already battling over these river banks that hold the strategic location of being at the entrance to the Chesapeake Bay.    The world's largest naval base is located here.  As we motored along the Elizabeth River, there were impressive ships and massive industrial sites all around us.  It was a marked contrast to the relatively empty James River we had left this morning.

Nauticus is a huge science and maritime museum that we hope to visit one day.  Jamey's schedule had us just passing by today.

Boats have to keep at least 500 yards from these Navy ships with no unauthorized vessel allowed closer than 100 yards.  We saw lots of patrol boats guarding the ships.

We love anything and anyone named Indigo! 

Right after we saw the catamaran named Indigo, we saw this cool boat named Phoenix.  Like the sisters, the boats are very different but both so amazing.

 

Having learned about tugboats at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum two weeks ago, it was especially cool to see this.  

This reminds us of a scene out of WALL-E.

Jamey liked the humanoid-like throwing action going on here.

There are six bridges in this part of the Elizabeth River.  Some mostly stay open, some open on signal or at set times during the day.  There are restricted hours for openings during rush hours.  Jamey had planned our arrival here to coincide with the 1:30 pm scheduled opening. 

This is a vertical-lift bridge.   A span of the bridge rises to allow us to pass underneath.

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WHERE WE STARTED:  James River, our peaceful anchorage across from Jamestown.

WHERE WE ARE: The Deep Creek Lock Pond, free docking -- more on this in tomorrow's post.

THERE TO HERE:  60 miles, 9 hours, motoring all day, minimal wind, an awesome current on the James River that helped us go 8 mph.  Jamey at the helm with some help from the girls.

Phoenix, Indigo, Sage and Skye.  Today's entertainment involved markers.  

Jamestown: Would You Have Survived?

In hindsight, it's now known that the early Jamestown colonists did not make the best of choices.

In search of maximum defense against the Indians and other enemies, they settled on a piece of land that was almost completely surrounded by water and located at a bend in the river such that they could look both upriver and downriver for oncoming enemy ships.  Unfortunately, being on land that was nearly an island meant that there weren't as many roaming animals for them to hunt.  There was also limited fresh water access, and the settlers often had to drink brackish water.   The marshy land surrounding them bred mosquitos, and malaria was apparently a huge killer.

There were several other factors that set the colonists up for failure.  Many of the first arriving settlers were "gentlemen," unwilling and unable to do the work required in creating a settlement out of wilderness.   The Indians though at times friendly and willing to trade with the settlers more often were hostile, and the settlers became trapped within their fort.  Tree ring analysis has also recently shown that in the first few years of the colonists arriving, there was a severe drought.

All of these reasons and more led to the deaths of most of the first settlers and their replacements.  The numbers are roughly 50 or so survivors out of around 500 colonists in the first few years of the settlement.  There was a particularly bad time from 1609-10 called "the starving time" when there are reports of the survivors eating excrement, shoe leather and the flesh of those who had died.

Just this past summer, anthropologists revealed evidence of this cannibalism after study of some bones from the Jamestown site revealed cuts and marks consistent with this act.  Analysis further revealed that the bones were from a 14-year-old girl who was English and likely of a higher class due to evidence of a high protein diet.  She is believed to be the daughter of one of the settlers and was probably already dead before she was eaten.

As the girls and I discussed all of the above, we wondered if we would have been one of the few survivors. Indigo immediately said yes.  Phoenix at first said no.  We know that we would not have been of the "gentlemen" class and would probably have been one of the laborers.  We reckon that we are strong and smart enough to have figured out some survival skills.  Definitely my intolerance for clutter and messiness would have been helpful.  In the book Richard of Jamestown we read about how some of the gentlemen were so lazy that they would dump their pee and poop just outside of the doors of their shelter.  When it rained, it got super yucky and when it got hot, it got even stinkier and horrible.

What do you think -- would you have survived?
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WHAT WE DID TODAY:  We motored upriver and anchored just offshore of where the replicas of the Susan Constant, Discovery and Godspeed are located.

Looking through the Susan Constant's rigging to where C.Spirit is anchored

I took this picture of a bosun's chair because it looks exactly like the one I used to go up the mast last week.  Some things don't change even after 400 years.

There is no public access via boat to the National Park Service Historic Jamestowne site or to the Jamestown Settlement grounds.  We rowed the dinghy under the Jamestown-Scotland ferry bridge to the public beach just upriver of the ferry.  Jamestown Settlement was then a short five minute walk up the road.

We had originally planned to walk to the NPS site, view it and then return to Jamestown Settlement, but realized that the girls' interest would probably wane after one site.  We opted for Jamestown Settlement with its "living history" actors and replicas of the boats, Powhatan village and Jamestown fort.  The actors were entertaining, and were able to answer all of our questions.

Sage would definitely have survived

Skye grinding corn

We found out that on the boats, the sailors went barefoot as shoes at that time were treadless and too slippery to wear on deck.  (Sailing in the cold without Gill boots?!!)  One of the actor's interest in history was evident as he talked to me about his own research trying to prove that the Indians did eat a certain type of artichoke.

The inside exhibits and galleries at Jamestown Settlement were less interactive than ideal for the younger girls, but the rest of us found them interesting.

Though we didn't use it this visit, there is a free shuttle that goes between Jamestown Settlement, the NPS Historic Jamestowne site, Williamsburg and Yorktown.

The public beach where we landed our dinghy has nice sand, picnic tables and looks like a great swim area. 

Turkey vultures -- those birds are enormous!

This is what the turkey vultures were crowded around

WHERE WE ARE: We motored back to the same anchorage as last night across the river from Jamestown because it is so peaceful and beautiful.

Up the James River In Search of A New Home

Our route today up the James River was the same one travelled 406 years ago by the Jamestown colonists.

True, they did not see the giant aircraft carrier under construction at the major shipbuilding yard in Newport News.  (We must get one of these for the king!).

The U.S.S. Gerald R. Ford is the U.S. Navy's newest aircraft carrier and supposedly the most expensive military equipment ever built.  It will reportedly have "a new electromagnetic aircraft launch system" and other amazing innovations.  Under construction since 2005, it was moved to the water two weeks ago and will be christened on November 9.  It is not due for commission till 2016.

Nope, they did not pass the lonely but stately posse of decommissioned Navy warships parked along the riverbanks. (U-turn! The Spanish armada is much bigger than we thought!)

The James River Reserve Fleet, known as "the mothball fleet".  Need scrap metal anyone?

Yes, they definitely had much taller old growth forests through which they peered thinking about their new neighbors. (Wonder if we can borrow their lawnmower to clear some land for a fort?)

So why did they leave England to sit in stinky, crowded boats on a dangerous ocean crossing for four months?   The 105 men and boys and 39 crew members had many reasons.  A desire to get rich, a need for adventure ("I think you and dad would have gone," says Phoenix), a drive to colonize.  

The mandates of the mission were "God, Glory and Gold".  They were to spread England's Protestant religion, stake England's place in the New World with a settlement, find natural resources for profit making and find a northwest passage to the Orient and its treasures.  Motivation was fueled by wanting to do this before the Spanish, Dutch or French did so.

The settlers were directed to find a place to settle that was 100 miles upriver, far enough inland to shelter them from immediate attack from the Spanish. The settlement should also be on a northwest orientation in hopes of finding the elusive Northwest Passage.

Thus, they found themselves on the river we sailed up today.  We imagined them looking at these same waters and shores, feeling the sun and wind on their cheeks.  We thought of their relief at ending their harsh ocean crossing, their excitement at finding the place of their new home, and their anticipation of all that lay ahead.

I hope that their day was as beautiful as ours.  I wonder if they said, "We are here!"

Approaching the site of the Jamestown settlement up ahead on the starboard side

Post-sail outside playtime!

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WHERE WE STARTED: The Hampton Public Pier, Hampton River

WHERE WE ARE: A peaceful anchorage across the river from Jamestown, off the shores of the Chippokes Plantation State Park, a working farm plantation since 1619.  This state park has a museum, a mansion, and gardens to tour.  There are also cottages and a campground for overnight visitors along with a pool and trails to bike, hike and ride horseback.

THERE TO HERE:  34 miles, around 6 hours.  Great sailing mostly across the wind with SW winds averaging in the mid-teens and gusting to the 20s.  We were flying even when just the jib was up. Jamey at the helm.

HOMESCHOOLING:  There is a wealth of Jamestown curriculum material online on the Jamestown Settlement's site, historyisfun.org and on the National Park Service's Historic Jamestowne site, www.nps.gov/jame/index.htm.   We explored why the settlers would have wanted to leave for the New World, how they decided which route to take and where to head, and who the Powhatan Indians were.  There is a great online book at www.heritage-history.com called Richard of Jamestown by James Otis that follows the journey of the ten year old Jamestown settler.

A sunset dance performance