Solomons - At anchor awaiting weather, water pump leaking

Hoolie is anxious to get back in the dinghy, eager as always

Since we may not have the time we wanted at Hampton, we decided to provision for the rest of the trip in Solomons. The nearby store (to north) that used to be a Food Lion is now Weis Markets. It's a step up from Food Lion, Ann liked it.

By the way, the inoperative genset turned out to be nothing more than a low battery. Once I got the  battery recharged, the genset started right up. I've since then rewired the charging system so it won't happen again. The error message put out by the genset panel was much scarier than reality. One message said, "Locked Rotor." That would have been  big  bucks.

So I got the genset running and the charging system rewired but the boat is never satisfied so it decided to reward me with a leaking raw water pump! A new water pump is one of the few spares I carry on-board so either I'll try to install it myself or have Zahniser's Yachting Center do it. They were very accommodating when I called. Just bring it in and they will do it the same day.

Meanwhile, the weather looks terrible with 10 to 15 kt winds and gusts to 20 kts and 3 ft waves, all out of the south. Throw in a little rain and it's a wonderful ride. We don't want that much enjoyment so we will hang around here until the weather is more to our liking. That may not happen until Tuesday at the earliest.

The inlets have not been standing still either. We can now add Brown's Inlet to the list of shoaling challenges along the ICW. I'll issue a new GPX route tomorrow. I've heard no reports of the markers being moved yet to show the new route through the shoaling. It's strange to see the same shoaling taking shape as last time before it was dredged.

Brown's Inlet as of 10/3/2017 - you can't just follow the old ICW channel, look at G61A!