Well... Red skies at morn?

I guess we were warned.

We told our friends at Solomons Island Yacht Club goodbye last night. Wednesday night is All You Can Eat Crab Legs Night and it seemed like a fitting event for an Adios Dinner.
Everyone told us to come back anytime and we promised we would.
We do like the Yacht Club a lot and it's on our short list of places to return to.

Leaving the harbor this morning, as usual, I used my thrusters to get away from the dock. I stepped back into the pilothouse and grabbed the wheel to steer toward the channel... It felt peculiar... like the autopilot was engaged. The wheel would turn the rudder, but it felt different than usual; no resistance at all.
I engaged the autopilot and used it to steer out to the bay.

Well...

Long story short, we blew a seal in the steering system. I could still maneuver using the autopilot, but had no manual steering.
It could easily have been a TowBoatUS day... but we managed.

So, we've returned to Solomons sooner than we'd anticipated.

Now we're tied up at Spring Cove and via a friend of a friend, we're already being repaired. John called Don and Chaz is pulling the pump as I'm posting this.
That's how Solomons works.
It's good to have friends.

All in all, it could be worse... if we have to be stuck somewhere, we're very happy it's here.
Plus, I was up early enough to take in this beautiful sunrise.

Thanks for checkin' on us.

Cheers,

Istaboa