Century Club: Tim Ford

Got a message around 6:30 a.m. that I should come down and check lines and spreader separation from the boat next to mine. I was not there when they tied up, and it looked like, from the Lawn Camera, our masts were perfectly in line, which is a no-no in any sort of a raft-up situation. 

So I drove down. 

And as it turns out, the camera angle from the fixed point on shore made it look like the two masts were perfectly in line (see photo), but actually they did have some level of separation.  I wanted a bit more, of course, so I cranked in the spring line and gave it about foot or so of fore and aft separation.  Adjusted the breast lines and fussed aorund with the fenders.  This took about an hour.  Maybe more.  

Then it got windy. Peak gust a few miles away on Gibson Island was 46 (mph) and it was due to get windier. So I went below and ate breakfast, or "brunch" by this time, and listened to the puffs roar down the creek.  Then I went to the floating dock abeam of RAINBOW to see how it was riding in the big breeze.  I wasn't satisfied so I tweaked the lines a little more. 

Let's face it, when you know it's going to howl, are you ever completely happy with how your boat is secured?  

Ostensible purpose was to let the boat inside me, of the pier raft-up, out so that they could cruise to St. Mike's.  But it gave me a whole day to mess around with kayaking, fishing and tourism.  The tour took me all the way to the back of the creek's western cove, and I finally ran into enough shallow water and snags to turn around.  It was a rising tide, so I wasn't that worried about getting stranded back there and then having to slog 400 yars in knee or thigh-deep mud. But the surface indications showed an ebb and it was definitely getting shallower.  So I breathed a sigh of relief when I reached deeper water. 

Caught (and released) a couple of chain pickerel.  This spinner spoon and paddletail rig is a killer for pickerel. They seem completely unable to resist.  It's basically a Hopkins lure that I inherited so I guess the original fisherman added the short Hopkins lure to a copper spinner.  At any rate, it is highly effective!

Lunch on the sandbar was interesting with all kinds of tracks in the clear, shallow water: deer, raccoon, fox, dog, heron and human.  

I sincerely doubt I'll get anywhere near 100 days for 2025, and if I do, I'll not count this day...but I'm recording it for a "pat on the back" and as evidence of having performed a mitzvah.  I dove into my local estaurine environment, with the intention of fishing (no pier available unfortunately) but when I left the house I grabbed a big plastic bag. I've been bothered by all the plastic crap littering this section of Baltimore County and the fact that it feeds into an urban drinking-water reservoir. 

After I got to my "spot" (where I see another human being maybe 1x out of a hundred), I put down the rod and looked around for some discarded litter.  This spot is pockmarked with hundreds of old, disgusting single-use water bottles along with other trash. After a while, with the bag about half-full, I recognized this as being an Exercise in Futility and went back to fishing. But from now on, every time I go to this spot, I'll carry a big plastic bag and grunt it out. Not that it'll make much of a difference, but...

Ain't I a mensch.

Went down to prep the boat (fenders and dock lines) for moving off the mooring this coming Sat. A lot of rowing, a kayak paddle back into the skinny waters of the creek, and a trip to the beach in the dinghy.  A fantastic day on the water in the best time of the year!