The "Pearl of the Chesapeake" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Found myself sitting on the rear deck of Waterman's Crab House in Rock Hall, MD having a crabcake sandwich, fries and a bowl of cream of crab soup.  Our friends from State College, PA, Jerry and Just Sue, made a weekend visit to our home in Lancaster and we all decided that we hadn't made a trip to Rock Hall for quite a few years so today would be a great time to take that trip.  Rock Hall is known as the "Pearl of the Chesapeake."  

This moment is located along the waterfront in Rock Hall.

The water- front town was founded in 1707 and at first was a tobacco port which was visited many times by George Washington as he traveled from Virginia to points in the north.  Today the town is best known for it's fishing and seafood industry with Maryland blue crabs, oysters and rockfish as some of it's major offerings.  

Deck at Waterman's Crab House.

We made our way from Lancaster, south on MD Rt. 213 to Rt. 20 which we picked up to the north of Chester- town, MD.  As we approached Rock Hall we noticed cars parked along the sides of the road.  Something big was happening in the town today.  Happened to be the annual Pirates and Wenches Fantasy Weekend which featured the Grand Buccaneer's Ball as well as live entertainment throughout the town.  

A Pirate made a visit to our table to make
sure that we were behaving ourselves.

The Ball just happened to be at Waterman's Crab House later in the evening.  We were treated to not only water views of the Chesapeake Bay and the Chesapeake Bay Bridge off in the distance from our table at the restaurant, but sightings of many a pirate as well as many wenches dresses in their ..... well barely dressed in their rather revealing tops and wrap-around whatevers.  Our neighbors, a group of six guys at the table next to us, were celebrating the birthday of one of their group and eating dozen after dozen of blue crabs.  Have been celebrating the gentleman's birthday at Rock Hall since 1998 with crabs and beer.  

A friend at the table next to us displays his blue crab.

They were nice enough to share some conver- sation and crab eating tips with use during the course of the hour we spent with them.  After a walk around the dock area to admire all the fabulous marine craft, we found our way out of Rock Hall and headed back home.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy. 

Removing the plate on the bottom of the crab.

Cleaning the lungs and the innards from the crab.

The results you can eat.  I find it so much easier to order my crabs as a sandwich so I don't have to go through all of this. 

As they finish another dozen arrive at their table.  

This one seems to be trying to escape.