Thursday Oct 22: Annapolis

     Wednesday afternoon, with a heavy heart, we bid farewell to cousins Denny and Laura and Rock Hall, and to Tommie, may she have found a wonderful new home with people who love her.  Our crossing of the Chesapeake was fairly uneventful, and the sun setting as we went under the Memorial Bridge was colorful, heralding the warm day we would have in Annapolis.

     We dropped the hook up in Spa Creek, arriving at the bascule bridge just in time for the last opening.  Annapolis is known for boating;  to accommodate boaters, most streets that dead-end on Spa Creek have a dinghy dock.  So handy!  On Thursday we rowed over to Market Street and tied up for our walk into town.

     Annapolis is Maryland’s state capital and also home to the US Naval Academy, where we spent much of our day.  They welcome visitors.  Dan and I watched the inspirational fourteen minute movie of the academy students’ fours years, then set off to explore the campus on our own.  Only a handful of the buildings are open to the public, including the Naval Academy Maritime Museum, housed in Preble hall.   The elderly volunteer at the museum desk asked if we were interested in Noon Formation, and advised us to turn around and go to watch the students gather in companies before we entered the museum.  Good advice!  We went over to the parade grounds outside Bancroft Hall as students began to form up for their noon inspection.  Every day at noon all the students on campus (some 3,000 +) stand with their classmates while the Naval Academy band plays cadences.   When the swordsmen had sheathed their weapons and all the students had filed into the Hall (presumably for lunch), the band marches to the center and played the Navy theme, the Marines theme, and God Bless America.  It was quite impressive to watch.  We thanked the volunteer at the Museum for making sure we got to see it.

     The Museum too is impressive.  The first floor is a historical overview of the role the Navy has played in America, from its conception in the Revolutionary War to present times.  The second floor contains an incredible collection of models, very intricate and some of them over two hundred years old.  There is an entire room devoted to the models and other art work produced by French POWs held in England prisons in the nineteenth century.  The POWs, using materials found in the their prison yard or gathered from their daily rations, built ship models, cases for glasses, and other small works of art and their captors encouraged their sales at open air markets.  Some of the ships are entirely made from the bones leftover from their meals.  Really something to see, if you ever get to Annapolis.

     After our tour of USNA, Dan and I walked across the bridge spanning Spa Creek, to the town of Eastport, where we met up with my friend Janie Meneely.  Janie is Annapolis born and bred, a local folk musician who also works as managing editor for Chesapeake Bay Magazine.  We had a great evening together.