Friday, May 25, we drove to Annapolis. We were last here in the 80's. John Paul Jones' crypt in the basement of the Naval Academy chapel:
We went to the Naval Academy Museum, had lunch in the Officers' Club, and wandered around the campus. Then we looked for the navy marina. It is pretty, but much more expensive than Patuxent, and REALLY in the middle of nowhere. We looked for a Sharp's Point Lighthouse which is on the Maryland state map, but not on the signs at other lighthouses or in our (actually Mary's mom's) lighthouse encyclopedia. We finally found it:
The only information we could find was an on-line (not sure of the veracity of the site) photo and indication that it was decommissioned, turned into a b&b and is now a private residence. This is the Maryland WWII monument:
Saturday we went on a lighthouse ride. We knew Point Lookout light was near the Potomac River, but hadn't been able to spot it from the water. We found it at a state park that was the site of the largest Civil War prisoner of war camp. It was a Union site and more people died here than at Andersonville.
While heading to the next lighthouse, we found this monument. One of the boilers was bad on the ship and the captain had been told not to fire it up but he wanted to move quickly away from Confederate ships to the Washington Navy Yard for repairs so ignored the orders.
We drove through St. Mary's, the first capitol of Maryland. We knew that there is an historic reenactment village there, but tend to not go out of our way to see them because, after all, we have Greenfield Village in Michigan and how could you top that? In fact, there is an historic site on the navy base that was the location of a farm and the marker indicates that Henry Ford bought the house and outbuildings and moved them to Greenfield Village! Anyway, St. Mary's looks like an English village and we accidentally visited. We parked the car to look at an old church and the reconstruction of the first capitol building:
A couple was standing on a hill overlooking the Potomac and Mary wandered over to see what they were looking at. There was the replica of the Dove, one of the ships that brought the English settlers. Before John could get there with the camera, the ship's cannon fired:
We continued our stroll and came to the gift store and a sign that said "purchase tickets here" and realized we'd already toured part of the site without paying. We decided to find someplace to eat lunch then return, buy tickets, and continue exploring. We could not find a single eating establishment in St. Mary's and by the time we drove 10 miles and found an A&W, we decided to just continue to the Piney Point Lighthouse:
During our extended stay at Pax River NAS, we discovered Red Box movie rentals. We had, of course, seen them lots of times, but decided to take advantage here, as there are a couple of movies we had been hoping to see. We rented Cowboys and Alien (do NOT bother with this one), Puss 'n Boots (we both enjoyed it) and Tower Heist (pretty funny). Descendents and Muppet Movie were both out of stock each time we checked, so we'll have to keep those on the list.
We drove across the river to Solomons Island to see Mary and John and the Calvert Maritime museum. This picture shows the "screwpiles", which many Chesapeake Bay lighthouses have, as there was not good foundation material to build on in the water. As the lighthouse leaned, different screws could be tightened to level it out.
Bret Michaels is in this picture. Really! He was giving a concert here and there were so many security people around this bus that it had to be his. Taken from the Drum Point Lighthouse, on the grounds of the Calvert Maritime Museum.
We had stopped to see Mary and John before we went to the museum, met them for lunch, then we traveled together to AnnMarie Garden. Mary knew she loved it as soon as she entered the grounds!
The garden was featuring fairy and gnome houses:
This Chesapeake waterman is near the front entrance to the museum. There are several modern sculptures on permanent display, but we all liked the fairy houses better than those.
We sat on Passport's top deck for drinks and good company and said our goodbyes until the next time our paths cross.
We left by car Memorial Day to visit Baltimore. We drove a little way off the highway to see the Cove Point lighthouse:
We drove a LONG way off the highway (didn't look so far on the map!) to see a museum in a railroad station, but it was closed. We drove past Baltimore to Aberdeen Proving Grounds, where the army tests a lot of equipment. There is a lighthouse on base, but it's in a restricted area so we didn't get to see it. We had a very nice suite in the DVQ:
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