Mon Sept 7: A drive to Cape Charles

In which we enjoy a real bed.....

To celebrate our anniversary, and since we are still waiting around for the boat yard to open on Tues and fix the windlass, we used our car to drive over to Cape Charles and spend the night in a HOTEL!!

Right away our 29th year of marriage was tested when I got us lost so that we had to drive the long way around to get to the Bridge/Tunnel.  But that sweet guy just said 'it's a great chance to see some of Norfolk', which it was.  So I feel cautiously optimistic about our chances for another 28 years.

I was annoyed by the fact that we were driving to something called the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. I really felt they should be able to decide - is it a bridge OR a tunnel.  That's just lazy indecisiveness.  But then we got to it and I understood that SOMETIMES I don't know everything.  It's both...  It crosses the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay where the Bay meets the Atlantic Ocean and carries traffic over to Cape Charles (yesterday at First Landing Park we were on Cape May - so we will have done what are called the Virginia Capes.  In case anyone is keeping track).  The road travels above the water except for two tunnels, which allow very deep barge and Navy traffic to come into the Bay. It's still being improved with toll money - but since there was not info on the cost of the toll I will be waiting for a $1,000 bill because it can't be cheap.

We stopped at Cape Charles Brewery on the way in for fish sandwiches and crab bites, and the Labor Day crowd was still very present.  Thankfully VA is very clear that masks must be worn in all indoor spaces so there is no nonsense.

We were too early to check into the hotel so they loaned us some bikes and we were able see all of the sweet little town, and then some.  We have seen a lot of coastal towns by this point, and were very impressed.  Most of the old architecture, some of it original Sears and Roebuck 'kit' houses (they came in 30,000 pieces and with a 75 page manual) has been kept and there is clearly money steadily coming in.  A few houses still need fixing up, but it isn't like many of the towns we have seen where only the occasional house, or just a couple of blocks, were nice.  The town is a 'front porch' town and just adorable, with the plus of being just over the high dunes from a great beach and fishing pier.  I suspect that it is at that 'just right' point of being nice but not too discovered yet. 

Local bookstore!

I need to read up on Crape Myrtle trees - in this area the trees are clearly mature, in full bloom and everywhere.  They are gorgeous - we even saw a farm field completely bordered by them. So, according to this thing called the internet, the first director of the Norfolk Botanical Garden set a goal to make Norfolk the Crape Myrtle capital of the world and planted more than 40,000 through out the city.  Today they are the most common tree in Norfolk.  (And were introduced to Charleston SC from Asia in 1790.  An interesting fact that I will, undoubtedly, forget by the middle of next week.)

 

 I LOVED our hotel.  Maybe just because it wasn't the boat and I could use as much water as I wanted and Rick was very far away from me in the bed.  But, probably, mostly because it was a lovely boutique redo of an architecturally interesting space and very minimalist (with a touch of industrial), with a balcony that overlooked the only main street.

After 28 years we have had a good Return On Investment (ROI) as there is more of both of us!

 We had front row seats on the pier, with an entire community of Japanese families fishing, and watched the sun go down.  And be dwarfed by a huge container ship.