Engine Type/Horsepower – Twin John Deere Diesels
Economical speed – 9 knots
Starting Location – Brunswick, GA
Destination – Herrington Harbour, MD
We are quite familiar with this Kadey Krogen 58 and have already done a few trips with her. The owners of this ocean going trawler left her in Brunswick, GA. They were cruising north in the midst of the rainiest season on record in the state of Florida. Crying “uncle” after a waterlogged week aboard they decided to tie up the boat and drive home to PA. In steps Captain Chris Yacht Services to the rescue! We are asked to pick up the trip where the owners leave off and bring her the rest of the way to the Chesapeake.
After a one-way car rental drive to Brunswick Landing Marina, we scuba dive on the bow thruster and main engine propellers to clean off barnacles and OYSTERS! Fortunately the parasites just had two weeks to grow so the buildup is not much.
After fueling the boat at a commercial shrimp dock we cast off and head out to sea through the ship channel. The ocean is flat calm and the forecast is great for the entire voyage. Because of the calm water we can photograph many different type of dolphins running alongside and in the bow wake of the boat. We even pass a turtle the dolphins nearly ran into!
This Kadey Krogen 58 recently had an AIS installed, making navigation much easier. We can watch other AIS equipped vessels on our radar or chart plotter. The target icon is ship shaped with a long nose showing the vessel’s heading. This allows us to predict the direction of travel and our projected interaction with that vessel. If you want more details on the other vessel just click on the target icon and an entire information page will pop up. There you will see the vessel name, MMSI#, SOG, COG, size including length, beam and draft.
Our weather is terrific and we arrive at Cape Henry and Cape Charles during daylight making this a pleasurable entrance into the Chesapeake. The commercial marine traffic is light and we enjoy the easy passage into the Bay. A moonless night is soon upon us. We plot our course outside of the ship channel so we will not be run down from astern. The ships cruise at 14 to 22 knots and we can not outrun them so the best idea is to stay out of their deepwater channel.
One of the ships we see during our night passage up the Bay is the “State of Maine” the Maine Maritime Academy training ship. Three cruise liners complete the parade with ALL their lights illuminated. You can not imagine how pretty these ships are until you see them on a black night with no other lights on the horizon.
Moonrise is at 4.30 AM and then the eastern sky starts to brighten when the sun comes up at 5.30 AM. As we near Herrington Harbour North (just below Annapolis) we make our turns to enter the marked channel. Coming from Florida we noticed how cool the weather is, in the low 70’s in mid June. The wind blew from the West during our four day cruise and now it has blown the water out of the Bay. There is NO extra water in the channel for us. We never touch bottom but it is scary watching the depth gauge quickly drop to single digits.
A quick bath to wash off the ocean spray, a load of laundry and tidy up the interior are in order before we can take a much needed nap. But first we are greeted by the owners and off we go for lunch….then we ALL catch 40 winks.
This was a beautiful cruise, perfect weather and a comfortable boat. We’re looking forward to being asked to help return the boat to FL next season.