Thursday, December 4, 2008

Gypsies Travels 3

Hello once again my little cherubs.

Colleen here to tell you about the last few wonderful places we've discovered during Gypsies travels. Last we left off we were in Kent Narrows going to watch our best of buds musician Mr. Scott Kirby play at the tiki bar.
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Scott did play our favorite song "Little Blue Boat" along with many other of our favorites from Scott. The music and weather was great and the view was perfect. john-and-view.jpg We had a terrific night and the next morning we were off to St. Michaels, just south of Kent Narrows.

St. Michaels (not the college in Vermont) is a very pretty and unique town that has kept a lot of the old houses from the early years. As told in the early blog by John, during the war of 1812, (how long did that last again) legend has it, the villagers hung lanterns in the tree tops to fool a marauding British fleet into firing its cannons over the town. But at least one cannonball must have found its mark. The fine old residence known as Cannonball House took a direct hit: A 12-pound ball punctured the roof, rolled down the stairway and exited through the front door. No one was hurt but it was an unwelcomed visitor. The Town is most famous for the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum and Marina that sits pretty on the point of St. Michaels as we came into the harbour.
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We had a terrific couple of days and the next morning we were off to Solomans Island, on the western side of the bay. We had a wonderful time checking out the beauty of yet another harbor town. We also had a visit from a friend that brought us lots of fresh fruit, candy, peanuts and some cold beverages. They also took us out to dinner at a very nice restaurant right on the water. Their daughter Lizzy put in a bag of jelly beans that were much appreciated!

After a few days of unseasonably cold weather and no fish to cook we headed out to find a nice little anchorage spot just south of Baltimore, Maryland to cut our trip to Baltimore a little shorter. The area was just below Annapolis in a cove called Eagle Cove. The anchorage area had a very pretty view of a house farm in front of us.
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It was Saturday night of a holiday weekend and by the end of the day there were about 30 boats that anchored in the same small cove. It was very tight but we managed not to hit any other boats through the night while Gypsies swung around on her anchor.

By early morning we headed back out of the cove and up the Chesapeake Bay to the city of Baltimore, Maryland. Baltimore has a vast amount of history and great old city to walk around in. We got a slip in Fells Point an area a mile outside the Inner Harbor area. We enjoyed walking around to see the famous sights along with Baltimore's baseball and football stadiums.
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Do you know the names of those teams? DO you know the most famous baseball player who was born there?
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How about his real first and middle names?
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Then we made our way under the Francis Scott Key Memorial Bridge. Francis Scott Key is famous for writing the poem originally called "The Defense of Fort McHenry". Can you tell me what it is now known as? Francis Scott Key is so popular in Baltimore they also have a memorial buoy in the harbor and have named the bridge coming into Baltimore after him.
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At many of the waterfront docks there are many old schooner sail boats that offer sailing trips in the harbor.
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There is also an old lighthouse named "Gateway to Baltimore" that used to mark the opening of Chesapeake Bay.
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It has been moved to land to preserve it. This lighthouse is the oldest lighthouse on the bay.
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There are many fun attractions and things to do in the Inner Harbor. They have small boats you can rent and paddle around and even some "Cheesy Dragon" paddle boats that looked like lots of fun! We went to the top of a hill and got some great pictures of the city
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including a large guitar on top of the "Hard Rock Cafe"
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and the Dominos Sugar plant.
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Can you tell me how Dominos sugar got its name?

Well that's all for now, we are going to be at anchor for a while as we head south to the mouth of the Potomac River to DC. Until then...may your nose and toes always be warm.

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