Hilda Crockett’s Chesapeake House

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A final post re our paddling trip to Tangier Island, VA. So many photos, so much left to tell. The title of this post is Tangier-speak for “I mean what I say.” Here, Tangierman (?) Sonny Forbes gets the last word in this ode to his home 🙂 🙂

To the Stranger Who Walks Our Shores
Step not lightly upon these shores nor cast lighthearted gazes upon our isle… take not a dim view of our dwellings nor laugh at our narrow roads…

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Hilda Crockett’s Chesapeake House

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…do not misunderstand our language nor make joke of our native tongue… do not mock our walk or look down upon our quaint ways…

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…for upon these shores have walked men of God, made of fibre woven close for age…

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…and inside these dwellings laughter and love have flowed to make mansions of our homes…

Everyone knows everyone here, so one invitation fits all

…our language is that of times past and ages still unknown and our native tongue speaks with truth, understanding and compassion…

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Cellphone reception is practically nil here

…our walk is that of pride and labor—bent somewhat from our toil but never from shame…

…our quaint ways may be misunderstood as slow but time is abundant here and we wish it not away…

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…and fear not our streets, as narrow they are, for they are roads of welcome to strangers, highways to let all visitors come into our lives, and exit for those who misunderstand us, or mistrust us or wish not our love…
—Sonny Forbes

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Best wishes to our hosts on Tangier Island! Read our other posts about this very special destination here and here. And “make a hurry” to plan your own paddling trip! 🙂 🙂

There’s only way to get your hands on a blue crab: Go out and catch one. (Or dozens, day after day—as our new friends on Tangier Island, VA, explained, when we paddled there in June.) Here’s a little photo essay from our visit to a “crab house” with local waterman, Denny C.

Besides churchgoing, harvesting blue crabs is what shapes life here. A typical workday finds watermen up at 3:30 a.m.

Besides churchgoing, harvesting blue crab shapes life here. On workdays, watermen are up at 3:30 a.m.

The “crab houses” that line the harbor are essentially “shedding pounds” where the molting of the crabs can be monitored (by hand, of course!).

Now we’re really feeling like silly city folk: Denny explains where soft-shell crab comes from (duh, it’s a hard shell crab that’s completely shed its hard shell—claws and all). But act fast! That rubber crab will have a new suit of armor in just a couple of hours.

US Capitol Building? A female. The Washington Monument: Male.

Soft crabs bring the highest prices. Crabbers quickly remove them from the water before a new shell starts to form and pack them in grass and ice for shipping to Crisfield and NYC’s Fulton Fish Market.