THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, June 26, 1996 TAG: 9606260366
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SERIES: Destination Hampton Roads
Staff writer Paul Clancy, aboard the Galatea, ends his report of the
two-week trip up the Intracoastal Waterway as the boat hits "Mile
Marker Zero" on the Elizabeth River.
SOURCE: BY PAUL CLANCY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ABOARD THE GALATEA LENGTH: 97 lines
A gentle current rocks our tall sailboat at about 1 a.m. Tuesday at her berth in Coinjock, N.C. We're an easy day's sail away from Mile Marker Zero and home.
POW! BOOM ! KERBANG! Thunder surrounds us. Lightning flashes. A meteorological temper tantrum has come calling - one last lesson for those going to sea.
We had escaped a tropical depression out in the Atlantic. This seems worse. It is one of the nastiest electrical storms I've witnessed. And we're tied to a dock under a 63-foot aluminum mast. Forget the ``cone of safety'' - how lightning flows around the cabin to the keel - that sailors talk about. This is scary.
But as soon as we really start to worry, it's over. It is another brief adventure on a trip that began 1,200 miles ago at the other end of a lifeline, the Intracoastal Waterway, that ties Hampton Roads to coastal communities up and down the Atlantic seaboard.
We started June 15 at Marathon in the Florida Keys, sailed out into the Gulf Stream for three exhilarating but rocky days at sea, then ran 100 miles to Charleston and safety after witnessing the formation of Tropical Storm Arthur.
The Intracoastal is a series of broad canals and narrow ditches, with barely enough passing room, tying together the natural bays and rivers running parallel to the ocean. Although the waterway continues in a broken fashion all the way to Boston, the real Intracoastal begins and ends at Mile Marker Zero off Town Point Park in Norfolk.
It has as much variety as a department store - from meandering creeks running through wildlife refuges to intensely developed waterfront communities to wide-open bays like Currituck and Albemarle sounds. We went from long stretches of motoring to open-water sailing.
We had wanted to take the Dismal Swamp Canal because of its mysterious beauty, but couldn't make it with our 6-foot keel and chose the busier but no less fascinating Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal running from Currituck Sound to North Landing River and then into the Elizabeth River.
Either way, the trip runs a gantlet of bridges and locks that adds drama to the last day's sail.
Tuesday finds us cheek by jowl at the Coinjock Marina with other sailboats and several mega-yachts going north.
Carl Davis, owner of the marina, tells us that business is off from the peak in the late 1980s, when credit was easy and fuel was cheap. But taxes on yachts and then a hefty federal fuel tax slowed things down. ``We went from 600 boats in May of 1990 to 400 the same month in 1996,'' he says.
``The taxes have made it a big man's game,'' he says, pointing to the gleaming trawlers hugging his docks along the narrow cut in the waterway at Milepost 50.
And because the larger boats carrying more than 500 gallons of fuel can cruise several hundred miles a day, there are no ``must stops.''
Norfolk and Portsmouth compete for the business of thousands of boaters.
Tidewater Yacht Marina in Portsmouth boasts of offering more services, especially fueling, than the more lively city-owned Waterside Marina in Norfolk.
``They're scared to death if we get them over here for fuel we'll tie them up, too,'' says Tidewater's Gordon Shelton.
``We're too much fun,'' says Michael Evans of Waterside. ``People in the marina business would kill to have the kind of activity going almost year-round that Norfolk has.''
After several days of dawn leavings, we take our time Tuesday morning, sponging down a wet cockpit, drying out cushions and shoving off at 8 a.m.
One of the treats of the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal is the pristine wilderness on both sides. Hundreds of ospreys take little note of our passing as they feed their young in channel marker nests.
At North Landing Bridge, we're greeted by a John Spradlin, the bridge tender.
``Welcome, Galatea,'' he says as we pass through. ``We've been reading about you all week.''
But our luck starts running out. We're a few minutes late to the Centerville Turnpike Bridge and the bridge tender can't hold it for us.
``You're too far back and I've got too much road traffic,'' she says. ``Take your time and enjoy the scenery.''
Like dominoes, that means we'll miss the 1 o'clock opening at Great Bridge and propably get caught for an hour and a half at the Jordan Bridge when rush-hour restrictions go into effect.
Bridge after bridge swings or lifts open as the Galatea steams ahead. The tender at the Gilmerton Bridge also recognizes the Galatea and says the series of stories should mention that his city, Chesapeake, includes not one but two Intracoastal Waterways.
We're almost 10 minutes late for the Jordan Bridge. The Norfolk skyline is visible just beyond. We'll have to wait 90 minutes in the hot, sultry sun.
But thanks to a Moran Tug coming the other way, the Jordan rises. We're home free. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by MARTIN SMITH-RODDEN, The
Virginian-Pilot
A hot, tired John Hussey, owner of the Galatea, lets the weariness
take over as he reflects on his crew's long and sometimes stormy
voyage from Florida to Norfolk's Waterside. by CNB