This is where I left off.  We are now officially in the Great Dismal Swamp Canal.

It is 10:15am and we are now entering Virginia!!  I still don’t feel any different than in Florida.  Although, the trees are definitely different than the palm trees there.

 

I believe I mentioned that there are a couple of feeder ditches that the Corp of Engineers use to maintain the Dismal Swamp Canal water level.  Here is one of the signs.  I figured anything called “Big Entry Ditch” deserved a picture.

This is what I saw!!  I am sure amongst all that foliage, the ditch is big?!  Maybe it was really big at some point in the past and the name stuck.

We were going slow enough not to disturb these fellows…

 

You may not be able to see these guys.  We almost ran them over.  A mother duck and her 3 little ducklings.  The babies were paddling so hard but just couldn’t get out of the way.  Wayne swerved, hit some tree limbs, and barely missed the little guys.  Whew!!  And we didn’t hit anything under the water.  Everyone survived.

Tree in the middle of the channel.  We had just enough room to go around this obstruction.  See it really does happen…trees falling in the forest when no one is around.

A local resident has designated himself as the Swamp Commander.  Say Hello!!

Is this not the best picture?  We saw ripples in the water up ahead and never could figure out why.  Wind maybe.  Or something under-the-water.  I did see bubbles rising from underneath the water at one point.  Alligator??  The boat makes enough noise to scare away most critters.

Just Gorgeous!!

As we approached the most northern part of the Great Dismal Swamp Canal we encountered the “Deep Creek Bridge” followed by the “Deep Creek Lock”.  The man who opened the bridge is also the lock master.  In this case we had the bridge first and the lock afterward.  We lost the 6 feet we gained in the morning.   I was getting fenders out and lines ready for the lock that I almost didn’t get a picture of the bridge.

We slowly went forward to give the bridge tender time to jump in his car and race to the lock.  There was something going on.  A camera man was filming us as we went under the bridge and through the lock from a local TV station.  We assumed it was going to be one of those “the life of a bridge tender” kind of stories.  Maybe it was Wayne’s beard?

 

Thus, we traveled through the Great Dismal Swamp Canal!!  We were abruptly back in civilization.  For the past 6 hours we heard birds and an occasional car.  Rather quiet and solitude.  We moment we left the canal we heard sirens, honks, bullhorns, and excessive chatter on the VHF radio.  Goodness.  We are back in the thick of things again.

We decided to go to the Atlantic Yacht Basin for 2 nights.  It is right around the corner from the Dismal Swamp exit and it looked like a good stopover.  However, we need to negotiate another lock and bridge.

This isn’t it.  This bridge is a newly constructed bridge.  They are still removing some of the construction supports and old bridge remains.  We knew it was tall…. but

This should be tall enough for almost any tall boat or small building can go under.

Just beyond the Veteran’s Bridge is the Great Bridge Lock and the Great Bridge Bridge.  Really.  The lock helps to control the confluence of the different rivers coming into the same location around Norfolk.  The Great Bridge Lock just had new fenders put on the south side of the lock.  Really nice rubber bumpers.   We were asked to tie up just beyond the midpoint.   We went up about 2 feet.

The other side doesn’t look very friendly, at all.  The Lock Tender put all the boats on the rubber bumper side.  How thoughtful!

This is the reason we couldn’t tie closer to the front of the lock.  A goose has decided to lay her eggs right at the edge of the lock.  She gets ornery if the lock tenders get too close.  The lock tender kept apologizing for not letting us move all the way forward.

 

Then we had to wait for the top of the hour for the Great Bridge Bridge to open.  Wayne had to keep the boat in the middle of the lock.  No current to speak of for about 45 minutes.  ugh!  We had just missed the opening.  There are separate folks that manage the locks and bridge.  There is only 6 ft of clearance under the bridge.  I don’t think anyone can sneak by if they wanted to.

 

 

We are on the Elizabeth River at the Atlantic Yacht Basin in Chesapeake, Va.  We are docked along a long wall.  Shortly after we arrived, the Chesapeake City Fire Department was out on the water exercising their water cannons.  Very cool.

Exhausted after a very long day, we bid you all goodnight!