Our First Day of Our Rally Was A Success.

All 21boats left Hampton this morning at 7:30 with the light of day. It was a lot of fun all leaving together in a long line. The channel was very busy with barge traffic and Navy traffic and many other boat making there way south to Florida.

We all crossed the bay and went by the Norfolk Navy ship yard and saw a lot of ships.

 

USS Comfort Hospital Ship

USS George Bush 

 

Going under bridges with all the group was like driving down the 401. Very busy!

 

We have stopped at a small town Great Bridge. Tomorrow we will be in Coinjock North Carolina.

                                   "So Here's Interesting Tidbits" S.H.I.T. for short!

 Great Bridge Virginia

The Battle of Great Bridge was fought December 9, 1775, in the area of Great Bridge, Virginia, early in the American Revolutionary War. The victory by Continental Army and militia forces led to the departure of Governor Lord Dunmore and any remaining vestiges of British power from the Colony of Virginia during the early days of the conflict.
Following increasing political and military tensions in early 1775, both Dunmore and rebellious Whig leaders recruited troops and engaged in a struggle for available military supplies. The struggle eventually focused on Norfolk, where Dunmore had taken refuge aboard a Royal Navy vessel. Dunmore's forces had fortified one side of a critical river crossing south of Norfolk at Great Bridge, while Whig forces had occupied the other side. In an attempt to break up the Whig gathering, Dunmore ordered an attack across the bridge, which was decisively repulsed. William Woodford, the Whig commander at the battle, described it as "a second Bunker's Hill affair".
Shortly thereafter, Norfolk, at the time a Tory center, was abandoned by Dunmore and the Tories, who fled to navy ships in the harbor. Whig-occupied Norfolk was destroyed on January 1, 1776 in an action begun by Dunmore and completed by Whig forces.

I did not know that!

Black Beard

If your interested in pirates Hampton is where the pirate Black Beard made his final journey but not by choice. Royal governor Spots Wood of Virginia sent LT. Maynard and the Royal Marines to capture Black Beard. They cornered him in Ocnacake which is on the outer banks of North Carolina. They beheaded him and brought the head back to the governor of Hampton.

 His head was displayed on the mouth of the Hampton River to warn pirates away. No further pirate raids where reported after that. As you head down the Inter Coastal Water Way you hear a lot about Black Beards raids in the ports of the Carolinas and Georgia. On June 1st, 50 thousand want a be pirates invade down town Hampton for the Black Beard festival.

 

I did not know that!