Neabsco to Somers Point, NJ in April...guidance please!

CG, you may want to consider joining marinalife its a great cruising resource and has a great cruise planning feature that I used on a number of occasions. I made the Chesapeake to NJ trip early spring on several occasions, call ahead to get a heads up on when fuel docks are going to be open, l found that some are not open on a regular schedule. Most importantly enjoy the trip and your new boat great way to start the season.
 
Thanks, AboveBlue. We are starting to figure out our exact fueling options and have identified some marinas comfortably along our route that will allow for fuel stops...2 weeks out! Will have pictures to post!
 
If things go according to plan, I'll be bringing the 390 I just bought up from middle river md to bass river nj next weekend as well. You'll probably be passing me along the way.
 
So did this trip ever happen? I pushed mine back a week due to the lousy weather, and I'm planning my run up for this weekend.
 
Well, we did it!

Sorry it took me so long to post the updates...

Key Stats:


  • 245 miles in 2 days
  • 4 states
  • 4 fuel stops ($1200.00)
  • One Tiki Bar
  • One entire box of Keurig coffee pods
  • One BoatUS towing service about 14 miles from our final destination on the ICW.
  • One attempt to go into the ocean from the Cape May inlet, which we quickly realized was a bad idea...


Me, my father-in-law, and 2 neighbors left Philly for Woodbridge, VA on Thursday, April 14th in the evening arriving around 9:30 PM. We then prepped the boat, returned the rental car, and were asleep by midnight after a couple pre-game libations.


We fueled up at 6:45am the next morning at EZ Cruz Marina (shout-out to Mike, Linda, and the entire gang there, they were helpful in ways I couldn’t have imagined). First fuel up was about $415.00, which was a sign of what was to come...We topped off and hit the Potomac at 7:05 am with warmish weather, no wind, and calm conditions, which we were lucky to have over the course of the entire trip. We traveled at about 4000 RPMs most of the way through the Potomac and fueled up at Tall Timbers Marina, getting there about an hour before I planned to be there. Topped off, used the facilities, grabbed a granola bar, and headed towards Annapolis.


The mouth of the Potomac dumped us into a fairly calm version of the Chesapeake, but it was neat to see where the 2 bodies of water changed hands, and I’ve heard many a tale that this particular leg of the trip can get pretty nasty. Once again, the transition was minimal, and we were able to sustain 25 knots on average all the way up the Chesapeake to Annapolis.


We arrived in Annapolis somewhere around 1pm, and were literally hours ahead of our intended arrival time. My crew and I were planning to hang in Annapolis for the day on the 15th, but it so warm, flat and windless we figured it’s better to keep going rather than end up squandering the daylight hours in a bar. I made the decision to keep going and head to Bohemia Vista Marina in Chesapeake City, which put us about 55 miles further north and would hopefully make the next day a shorter trip. Fueled up and did a pump out in Annapolis and headed to Chesapeake City for a wonderfully scenic and pleasant leg of the trip. We slipped at Bohemia Vista at about 4:30pm.


Chesapeake City was magnificent, and the Bohemia Vista Marina was clean, hospitable, and there was plenty of room for us. We had a great night ashore at The Chesapeake Inn and hung out the rest of the evening on the boat, where a number of folks ended up aboard and gave us their insights on fuel, the Delaware Bay, and verified the route we were planning. Turned in pretty late that night, and my crew was pretty salty in the morning...as I suspected they might be.


We left Chesapeake City around 8:30am on the 16th and grabbed gas on the C&D Canal at Summit North Marina, which was just about 30 minutes away from Bohemia Vista. C&D was flat, and we made the run through the Delaware Bay all the way to Cape May in the best possible conditions, cruising at about 27 knots most of the way.


We came into Cape May through the rear canal where the Ferry docks, and slowly made our way to the Cape May Inlet. I could see from a distance that the decision to go through the ocean was going to be questionable, and once we got through the rough stuff to the bell buoy, our fortunes hadn’t improved much...it was going to be 2 hours minimum of hell, and when I realized there were no other boats out there, I made the decision to bring her back around and head back into Cape May to grab the ICW, which was going to be slow going, but so was the ocean along with added risk...


The ICW was pretty rough in Cape May and started to calm down a bit as we headed towards the northern shore points. We were moving along quite nicely and then, at marker 433 on the ICW, we went from about 18 feet to about 18 inches. The boat went from about 10 knots to 0 knots...and my crew quickly said, “What happened?” I said, “Well, that’s the bottom, and we’re on it...” I radioed BoatUS with my freshly-minted membership (glad I did that about a month ago) and a friendly captain helmed the small boat to ours from Cape May, arriving about 40 minutes after our initial communication. He explained that this particular area is known as the “football field” and had not yet been dredged, and there was a lump on the bottom that we apparently found. The tide was coming in, so we probably would have floated off eventually, but I was impressed with the quick work he made of our 14,000 lb boat and pulled us off like we were sitting in a toy. He then let me do a couple of runs up and down the channel to make sure nothing seemed out of place (it didn’t) and led me to the 96th Street Bridge in Stone Harbor, which of course we needed to open. Luckily, the bridge operator was standing by and we got a quick response.


From there, the tide was largely incoming and I’ve traveled the ICW from Strathmere to Somers Point many times. This leg went very smoothly and we arrived at our slip in Harbour Cove marina at about 5pm on Saturday, celebrating with a few cocktails and somehow, a bottle of Patron appeared...


It was a fantastic trip, and I wanted to thank everyone for all their insights. I wouldn’t have been able to do this trip as confidently as I had without all the help I received from everyone here on the forums.


As an aside, I used my Ipad and an Iphone 6 Plus running Navionics for all the primary navigation, and it performed flawlessly both days. It never crashed, and with 2 devices, I had different zooms running with my Iphone chargers plugged into the phone charger at the helm. The Raymarine C80 was actually a “backup” for the trip, with a zoomed-out view to see the larger picture of our trip as we made our way from port to port.


Thanks again for all the assists everyone. Glad to be back in “Joisey.” If you’re in the Somers Point area, come say hello!

I am also trying to attach images but am getting all sorts of exclamation points...looks like I don't have much space to do that here...
 

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Congrats! I used to take the ICW to Cape May from Ocean City and back all the time but in the last few years the shoaling has been killer. In 2015 I saw depths of 4.5 feet at high tide in middle of channel behind Sea Isle City. Never again!

We left Harbour Cove two weeks ago for Seaview, but will look for you next time we visit which is often. You in South Basin?
 
Hey James,
Yep, Seaview is awesome. I actually looked at a couple of boats that were slipped there when I was shopping for the new boat. Really nice there. Yeah I'm in South Basin, slip L10. Stop by!
 
Nice write-up. Interesting to see that you used the ipad as the primary nav device.
Nothing worse than coming out of an inlet and getting slammed like that. Experience has taught me to 'just turn around'.
Welcome back to our 'little drinking town with a fishing problem'...and I hope to stop-by if I'm down your way at HCM.
 
Nice write-up. Interesting to see that you used the ipad as the primary nav device.
Nothing worse than coming out of an inlet and getting slammed like that. Experience has taught me to 'just turn around'.
Welcome back to our 'little drinking town with a fishing problem'...and I hope to stop-by if I'm down your way at HCM.

Hey, Gerry,

Yeah I have to say, I wasn't really planning on relying on Navionics but instead just see how it performed. By the end of our first leg, it became the primary navigation tool and I used the Raymarine to validate what Navionics was telling me to do...when you consider the app is like 10 bucks and a year of map updates is only another $50.00, it certainly is an interesting alternative, even if only as a backup. Not to mention, you can take your Ipad on other people's boats and get the same features :) Point to Point directions for under 100 bucks? It's worth a look even in the name of experimentation!

Stop by HCM...would love to say hello.
 

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