Trip to Reedville and Tangier Island

I'm back from a trip to Reedville, VA and Tangier Island which the wife and I took 7-12 Aug 2007. I don't publicize my departures for obvious reasons but sure did miss being home. I did, however, get to eat plenty of seafood, went to Tangier Island, visited the Reedville Fishermen's Museum and did some boating. Had an interesting time driving Missus Hobie (who returns to school today). This photo shows a typical Tangier Island crab shack and working boat. You can't see the dwelling portion of Tangier Island in the photo as it looks out away from "town" and the wharf.

Tangier Island is an interesting place. Discovered by John Smith, there are now 600 year-round residents, it now gets it's water from 5 artesian wells, electricity from the mainland, everything else by boat. The policeman (one) is a retired Marine who just moved to the island to take the job. There are a couple of places for sale and you too can move there. Watch for flooding in September but not too bad a place. Folks are friendly. There is an airfield but no shooting range...

One goes about on foot, bicycle, golf-cart, moped or Kawasaki Mule type vehicles. We saw TWO (2) actual vehicles. One was a compact truck and the other was a compact car that was the Police car. The streets are just two golf-carts wide and there really isn't anywhere to go but the heavier vehicles are used to move loads of soft drinks and such to the restaurants.

The food was excellent! I think that some of the ladies spend quite a bit of time cooking. There are several choices for the tourist. The restuarants are likely open mostly when the tour boats are in port. Tour boats run out of Crisweld, MD and Reedville (Fairport), VA. Arrival times are staggered to aid management of the tourists on the island. There is also a "mail" boat that carried passengers out of Crisweld, MD.

There is a school on the island with 8 students per teacher. A new medical facility is planned and will soon be built. Air evacuation, if required, is provided free to residents. As I said before, there is police presence and we saw a Coast Guard helicopter at the air field. So, if you want to move there, there are facilities and it is great for boats (drawing less than 6'). I told you the streets weren't wide so if you like you can do without a car on the island and do as the other residents do maintaining a car on the mainland.

Reedville was also a fun place, if you like relatively slow paced life! We ate at the Cockrell Creek Deli and Crazy Crab which are two places with a slightly different take on presentation of the same excellent seafood. We certainly ate our fill. Scallops, crab, oysters, and flounder were all devoured with gusto. We also ate at Lee's Restaurant in Kilmarnock and it was another great meal.

Ok, so I've talked a lot about the food. The weather was just so hot, heat index was 112 degrees a couple of days, that we just didn't go outside more than necessary. But the short story is that we'd like to go back and we were looking at properties there. That might be a done deal if I win the raffle of a boat from the Fishermen's Museum!

I've just returned from a jaunt to visit my brother-in-law (together with my lovely wife) in Green Cove Springs, FL. Because he had just built and was still finishing a new home we intended to help WORK but all we did is play.

Ok, so I helped get his drag racer ready for this weekend. Well, that was PLAY. And I did help get his boat ready for floundering, MORE PLAY. And I did help him on a shakedown floundering trip. EVEN MORE PLAY!!!

The truth is that all I did was play. We ate at a crab shack, local pizzeria, and home (fresh fried flounder!). We played on the race car and boat, fished (gigging flounder is nothing BUT fun!). My wife talked and shopped and ate and slept. We had a great time!

Gigging flounder is great fun. My brother-in-law works for the Navy managing maintenance/rebuilding of fleet aircraft. He travels a lot and enjoys hands on projects. His boat and floundering are two things, aside from drag racing, that he really enjoys. You should see his eyes light up and I guess mine do, too! Anyway, he has a 14' flat-bottomed aluminum boat (like the 1440D in the link) with a 25hp Honda 4 stroke (now that is a quiet motor) and no center seat. He has mounted a bank of 6, 500 watt halogen work lights on the bow and powers them with a 3KW Honda generator. Depending on which bank he's working and which side of the boat needs to be lit he uses the center 2 lights and 2 lights on the shore side of the boat (not all 6 at once). It is pretty cool as you pole down the coast in 4-8" of water, following the tide and spearing the fish as you spot them on the bottom waiting for their dinner. Of course, this can only be done at night so no couch potatoes and no direct sunlight! He knows his stuff and we got our limits both nights (10 each or 20 total each night) or 40 fish all together. At more than 1½ lbs each (we got several whoppers as well as several 14" fish), we had many lbs of good eating in the freezer (3 gallons of meat ready for the frier). He figures that those fish would have cost us $400 in the store.

It is great fun and sort of combines hunting with boating and staying out all night. One doesn't need to invest a lot to participate but of course some folks do. I'd forgotten how much fun it was to be out on the water after dark and to navigate by the navigational markers. Technique and timing count for a lot and I can see how some folks wouldn't be as successful as others. At first I couldn't see the fish until they were pointed out to me, by the end of the second night I was seeing fish my brother-in-law didn't see or before he saw them. Of course you get to see lots of other fish as well, such as needle-nose gar, rays, small sharks, sheepshead, mullet (the principle prey here), redfish, and crabs. That alone is interesting and exciting. You certainly don't, and can't, see all that during the day.

Now, if I can just get him to take me shrimping...


Hobie (left) and Brother-in-law (right) in front of boat with one night's catch. The small boat is easy to handle with a single pole even in a tide that brings in 4 ft of water in 3 hours.