CHAPTER EIGHTY NINE: THE DELAWARE BAY AND A TASTE OF CAPE MAY

CHAPTER EIGHTY NINE: THE DELAWARE BAY AND A TASTE OF CAPE MAY

It was hard leaving the Delaware City Marina. Tim, the owner, was at the dock at 6 a.m. on Tuesday, July 30, to see us off. He also helped with the lines. We were really spoiled by his daily kindnesses and his attention to our every need. But we still have the Erie Canal in our sights this summer, and we had to press north. But actually, I learned that in going from Delaware City, Delaware to Cape May, New Jersey, we were heading south all day on the Delaware Bay. I tried not to appear confused, as I kept looking at the compasses and checking and re-checking our direction. Sure enough, we were heading south southeast the entire 60 mile trip. Yes, I know I’m supposed to be the navigator, but who ever thought that any part of Delaware was north of any part of New Jersey? Put your hand down, Marlea. Yes, of course, you knew that. And you have a job as full time navigator on Slow Motion any time you can drag yourself away from your granddaughters. I thought so – my assignment is safe, for now anyway.

Delaware Bay is the bay of legends, the bay that carries more flotsam and jetsam than the entire Atlantic Ocean, the bay that shows no mercy to amateur boaters who are unprepared for 30 foot logs that suddenly appear portside. And on Tuesday, July 30, when we dared to take Slow Motion out on to this treacherous body of water, Miss Delaware Bay greeted us with a certain calm dignity and carried us on her powerful currents to Utsch’s Marina in Cape May by noon. But that was only because the Admiral had prepared so assiduously day and night for a long time to ensure our safe passage across this bay. He plotted out the whole journey with way points, and we hit every way point, never drifting on to the narrow shoals that surrounded us nor entering the forbidden zones that held dark military secrets (or something). Part of the planning was learning everything you could about the currents and the tides and leaving early enough (but not too early) in the morning to get the benefit of both. One boat left the Delaware City Marina a few minutes before us, but he was a speedy Nova Scotian, who traveled at 14 knots no matter what the conditions. He must be very wealthy, because his fuel costs have to be stratospheric. This boater, in a trawler named Tosca, arrived at Utsch’s Marina about an hour before we did, but who cares? It was not a day that you had to cruise “lights out” to get away from bad weather, stiff winds or wicked currents. It was a remarkably smooth day on the bay, and you could comfortably save fuel and cruise at no more than 10 knots, but get the benefit of the current to kick that speed up to nearly 13 knots. Hats off to the Admiral (again!) for figuring this all out and making our introduction to Delaware Bay so beautifully uneventful.

Since we arrived at Utsch’s so early in the day, we took the Huffy bike off Slow Motion, and I rode into the heart of Cape May looking for a bike shop to either fix the front bike basket or to sell me one that works without flopping up and down on the cables and the front tire. I have been in Cape May twice before, once to climb the lighthouse and more recently to check out possible marinas and visit Rhythm of the Sea, the B and B where my BBs and I will get together in October. But I had never been in the heart of town. I started out on a very busy highway (109), but quickly found a tree-lined street (Washington) that must have more Victorians per square foot than any street in America. This street is beautiful as it is, but a bike path would make it even lovelier. As it is, there is parking on one side of the street, so you have to share the center part of the lane with the cars. Fortunately, there were not that many when I ventured forth in the early afternoon. Lucky for me, as I was rubbernecking, swiveling my head from the left side of the street to the right side to check out every house I passed. Then I had to stop for the houses with names, like the Emlen-Physick Victorian, which provides tours and has a tea house. I think the BBs would enjoy themselves here.

As I rode on to the center of town, I had an address for a bike shop. It was still my intention to fix the front basket situation. But by this time the charm of Cape May was leading me astray. And when I reached the town center at Washington and Ocean, I couldn’t help but notice beaucoup boutiques that stretched as far as the eye could see. Oh yes, the BBs will love this place. This area was pretty crowded on July 30, but I bet we’ll have it to ourselves, almost, in early October. And there should be SALES! There are great shops for baby clothes, for women’s handbags, for shoes, for jewelry, for saltwater taffy, for all kinds of artworks and gifts galore. Oh yes, the bike shop. I asked a police officer if he could direct me to the intersection of Lafayette and Emlen. I said Ocean turned into Emlen. He said I was on Ocean, and the next street over from Washington was Lafayette – “where that bike shop is”. Bingo. That’s how I found my destination so easily. “Emlen” was not the street I was looking for – I had it in my mind after seeing the Victorian. It’s Elmira and Lafayette for the bike shop, should you ever need one in Cape May. And this bike shop is a very good one. They pronounced my front basket dead and attached a new, stronger front basket and sent me on my way.

With the business part of the trip over, I took the opportunity to walk my bike past just a few of the shops that had caught my eye. The salt water taffy shop must have a very powerful magnet, because suddenly I was inside the store buying several boxes of salt water taffy. With my new bike basket, it was going to be easy to get them to the Post Office to mail them off to the lucky recipients (you know who you are). After sending salt water taffy around the world, I biked back down Washington Street with a glorious breeze swirling around me. This has to be one of the most beautiful streets in the United States. Certainly, it is one of the shadiest. There were a lot more bikers on the street as I headed back to the marina, whole families riding single file along the row of parked cars. It appears that Cape May drivers are quite tolerant of us bikers, as no one beeped a horn at me or crowded me over into the gutter. This was not the madness of the streets of Charleston, South Carolina. Cape May seems to have it all over Charleston when it comes to gentility and street etiquette for visiting bikers.

I had not ridden my Huffy bike for a number of weeks, so I expected some muscle soreness. But that night my legs didn’t cramp up and the next morning I was ready for my next adventure in Cape May. This was the day I was going fishing out on the ocean for four hours. The last time I was ocean fishing was this past winter in Key Largo, when the Admiral and I went out for an afternoon, trolling a fishing line off the stern. We caught one (1) fish, a baby bonito, which we released back to the turquoise waters of the Atlantic. The fish was beautiful, and it was a thrill to have it tug at the line. It was also a great relief to see that it was too small and we would send it home to grow up and die a natural death – from pollution or being slashed by a propeller – no, I mean being eaten by a predator fish.

This time in Cape May on the Cape May Lady I expected to catch a fish (or fishes) that the Admiral and I could keep and make a meal out of. At one p.m. on a sunny Wednesday, the last day of July, we set out from the charter fishing boat docks in search of some legal sized fish – croaker, kingfish, weakfish – hey, I don’t make these names up. There was an outside chance one of or intrepid group of thirty might snag a flounder, but they have apparently been overfished. There are still flounder to be caught in the Inlet, but not so many where we were going at the mouth of the Bay near the Cape May Lighthouse. Captain John and First Mate Jim (who works for tips) took us out to a depth of 25 feet and we all threw our lines in the water. There were a lot of bites. Over the course of the next four hours I fed a whole school of fish enough squid and mackerel meals for the whole week. Early on I caught a very small croaker. The young man next to me noted its tiny size and offered to put it back in the water. With no time for a photo op with my first catch, he took the hook out of the croaker’s mouth and threw it back. The fish swam away to “croak” another day. I couldn’t resist. Sorry.

In the meantime, other fishers on the boat were catching kingfish that were keepers and also some croakers that had enough meat on them to make them edible. Then the fun began. One guy caught a tiger shark, about a foot long. Even a shark this small is a wonder to behold. There is no mistaking any member of the shark family. Plus, the theme song from “Jaws” always comes on whenever and wherever a shark appears. Really. There was a young boy who was just peeing in his pants excited about the prospect of catching a shark. And he did. Sharks have to be released, and this one was, but not before the boy memorialized his first shark catch with a smart phone camera. That was the high point of his afternoon. Back at my line, I felt a very strong tug, and as I carefully raised my pole and reeled in the line, I discovered that I had “caught” another fisher’s line. Great – my first time fishing with a group on the ocean and a catch an illegal croaker and a fishing line. A fresh fish dinner was not looking good at this point.

But we still had two more hours to plumb the waters of the mouth of the Bay. And Captain John moved us to different “fishing holes” when the fish stopped biting where we were. Someone on at the front of the boat caught a flounder, which looked huge to me, but which was apparently too small by flounder standards to be kept. This raised the morale of everyone on the boat. I threw my line in again and on the next big pull on it, I reeled in a spot fish. This is a fish with a spot near its eye, of course. Unfortunately, say it with me, my spot fish was too small – caught and released, again. The young boy who had caught the shark next reeled in a large kingfish. So I knew there was still hope to catch at least one legal fish. By this time, I had lost some of my eagerness to fish and was throwing the squid bait high into the air for the sea gulls to make their acrobatic catches. First Mate Jim was not pleased with this careless misuse of the bait he had so diligently cut for us. But he works for tips, so there was no reprimand. He reacted to my diversion by offering me better bait – mackerel – which he said was sure to catch a big fish. I baited both hooks with mackerel and threw the line back into the ocean. Sure enough, there was a strong tug on the line, and I was sure I had hooked dinner. But when my catch reached the surface, you guessed it, it was a baby shark. The sharks, even the small ones, must intimidate the other fish and get the good bait all to themselves. I couldn’t resist a photo – lawyer and shark, you pick which is which – but then Sharky went back into the drink with the faint sound of “Jaws” in the background. Boy, I would love to get the royalties for that little ditty.

We arrived back at the charter boat fishing dock at 5 p.m., and I was fishless – not even a croaker. So were most of the other fishers on the boat. I wasn’t the only person pulling up lines instead of fish. In Cape May the charter fishing boat captains do not promise you that you will catch fish. Many of the captains in the Keys make this promise. Good thing that the Cape May captains are more circumspect. They just take you to “beds” where fish were caught before. Then you’re on your own. I knew when I paid the $40 that there were no guarantees. We had hamburgers in the freezer should I come home empty handed. I had watched Jim cut up the legal sized fish for their captors, and I didn’t really have much of an appetite for fish, especially after he pointed out that ALL of the fish that were caught were female, pointing to the “roe” he had chopped out of each one’s carcass. I know the female fish were all mothers, who pushed away their babies and took the bait to save their children’s lives. I just know that. Each one was an unselfish martyr. The male fish? You can make up your own stories about them, but let’s just say that they will get no medals of honor or father of the year awards.

I have to say that the Admiral was not surprised when I returned with no fish in hand. He had said all along that I should have gone out on a charter boat that went to the Inlet. Then he was sure I would have caught a flounder or two for dinner. Well, maybe I’ll take his advice – next week. This week I’m all fished out. But if you ever come to Cape May to fish, please keep in mind that fishing in the Inlet is better than fishing at the mouth of the Delaware Bay – at least at this time of year. And now it’s time to say goodbye to July. See you in August.