Charter a Sailboat for Your Reunion Adventure

For our reunion my daughter and her husband decided one summer to treat us to a sailing charter on the Chesapeake Bay.  She found the charter company online and we four decided on a date in July.  My husband and I traveled from West Virginia and they traveled from Pennsylvania. 

We met in Deltaville, Virginia to board the 35 ft. Loreley.  Once there, we shopped locally for supplies of boat food, especially the requisite Old Bay Seasoning and raw chicken necks (which we salted down in a tightly sealed  glass jar) for the blue crabs we were sure we'd catch!   When you charter it is important to have one or two people aboard that know how to handle a small boat and read a sea chart.

I can imagine this method of visiting with family and friends extending to anywhere in the world - think Mediterranean coastal sailing, barging down the Thames - for a marvelous memory-making reunion.  Parties of 2, a thirty foot boat would be fine.  Two to four people, at least a 35 ft. boat for comfort.  Five or more start thinking over 40 feet.

To preserve our reunion memory I wrote this poem.

Chesapeake Bay

Pittman's Cove is silent, wooded,

The sundown sky colors up apricot, violet

As silver moon timps, pulls

On the water under Loreley.

Topside we laugh, eat pesto with Sun Chips,

lazily plan our supper,

Breathe in wonderment

Of this life on the water.

Years ago, with the prescision of sailors' tools

And compass rose, fate chartered our course.

These slowed moments together

Challenge our hearts to grow.

We catch blue crabs with a chicken neck on a string,

Put them in a pot with Old Bay,

A little water, some beer,

And - quick! - pop on the lid.

Magically then, a heap of bright orange crabs

Hot on the table in the cockpit.

Fingers sticky with drawn garlic butter,

We eat and talk softly in near dark.

Chesapeake Bay is from No Name Harbor, Poetry of Barbary Chaapel

For more information on No Name Harbor and Journey of the Snow Goose please visit me at  http://barbarychaapel.eveusa.com.

Estuary, Poetry of Barbary Chaapel, published by Lost Hills Books, will be available August, 2008.