Norfolk, VA

[Kevin's Post]When we originally got to Hampton they said we had to leave by this morning as lots of boats were scheduled to arrive for the Caribbean 1500. The Caribbean 1500 is a race of cruising boats from Norfolk to the British Virgin Islands, a 1500 mile trip taking 8-14 days. It starts in early November, but boats are starting to arrive to provision and get their boats ready. We left Hampton this morning and traveled 12 miles down the Elizabeth river to downtown Norfolk, VA and anchored off Hospital Point. The Norfolk piers are packed full of Navy vessels, including a couple of aircraft carriers. In fact if you look on Google Earth and follow the Elizabeth River north looking to the east side you'll probably see a bunch of big Navy warships. The last two times we went through Norfolk we didn't stop so this time we were determined to go ashore. We dinghied across the river and tied up at Waterside marina. There is a pretty cool naval museum (I know we said we weren't going to go to anymore, but we did anyway) which is worth going to. The museum has an actual battleship, the USS Wisconsin, that you can walk around. This particular battleship was used in WWII through Desert Storm. They said it is still in reserve and can be redeployed if necessary. The Wisconsin had retired navy volunteers aboard, some of which had served aboard it as far back as the 1950's. After the museum we went to see the movie 'Departed', and then to Outback for some beers and a bloomin' Onion.

We're anchored at mile 0 of the intracoastal waterway, which as we've probably already explained, is an inland waterway of rivers, bays, and dredged canals stretching from Norfolk to Florida allowing you to travel the entire distance without ever going out to open ocean. This time we hope to go outside some of the distance from Beaufort to FL, weather permitting. 987 miles to go to Stuart, FL.


Where we are:
Location=Norfolk, VA
Lat= 36 50.729 N
Lon=76 18.068 W