Weather and Tides on Middle Chesapeake Bay
The tides on Rockhold Creek are profoundly influenced by wind strength and direction, perhaps even more so than lunar gravity. Low tide occurred at approximately 1340 on Sunday. It was not predicted to be an extremely low tide. However, with winds from the west and northwest at 15-20 mph, the result was an exceptionally low tide. Rockhold Creeks runs northwest to southeast, so this was the perfect wind to blow water out of it.
Low tide - the boats that wintered over in the marina were grounded
Sorry for the photo with glass glare. It was too cold to go outside without my coat. What you see here is 20 – 25 feet of mud beyond the bulkhead. This is why I don’t leave my boat in the water through the winter. The bottom is fairly firm in my slip, and it’s one of the deeper slips in the marina. But with only 2.5 feet of water under the boat during a tide this low, she’s going to list pretty far towards pilings, which inevitably means damage to something. So out of the water she goes in December, to return in late March.
Dawn on Rockhold Creek, with a dusting of snow on the ground
This photo was taken at about 0715. I love the light at this hour, and I love how the sun falls on the upper stories of houses and tops of masts as it rises over the trees behind the camera.
middlebaysailing 