Hooper Islands
Stash the Brompton bike in the trunk, strap the Hobie-Mirage 11 to the roof and store the binoculars and “Birds and Marshes of the Chesapeake Bay Country” by Brooke Meanley in the glove compartment for a road trip to the Harriett Tubman Underground Railroad National Historic Park and the Blackwater Wildlife Refuge, over on the Eastern Shore.
The only way to get to our destination from DC is via Route 50. The first part of the trip requires patience because of the backups at the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and speeding cars heading for the Delaware beaches. Once you are past the traffic lights at Highway 404, the drive is more relaxing, and you can enjoy the vast fields of soybean and corn and make notes of roadside vegetable markets to stop at on the way home.
Just at the other side of Cambridge take a right onto Highway 16, Church Creek Road. Now you are really “on the Shore”. The first stop is at Emily’s Produce for tomatoes, cucumbers, a honey dew melon, pulled BBQ pork, coleslaw, and an assortments of deli salads for our picnic lunch, later in the day. Next stop, The Harriett Tubman Underground National Historic Park.
The museum is a series of volumes, that some suggest, might represent farm buildings or stations on the underground railroad. It was named A.I.A. Maryland public building of the year and offers an excellent interpretation of Harriett Tubman’s life and how she found freedom for herself and some three hundred other slaves whom she led north during The Civil War. To get a true sense of her life and leadership rent “Harriett” (BTW, the movie was shot on the James River in Virginia). Near the beginning of the movie, there is a scene where a shopkeeper throws something and hits Harriett in the head, causing lifelong pain. Well, you can see where it happened at Bucktown General Store, the intersection of Greenbrier Road and Bestpitch Ferry Road. Also on the Greenbrier Road is a plaque near Harriett’s childhood home.
After your tour of the museum and the gift shop, enjoy your picnic lunch in the well-equipped pavilion that overlooks the black water marsh. Speaking of black water, the next stop is Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge. Using you cell phone’s browser, go to www.fws.gov/refuge/Blackwater for hiking, biking and canoeing maps, then enjoy the beautiful vistas of the marsh and the Chesapeake Bay in the far distance.
I thought something was odd. The Bay was on my right as I started my drive home. I took a right when I should have taken a left and realized I was heading south on Hoopers Island Road (Route 335). It turned out to be a road back to what life on the Bay was like, not that long ago. The road is, maybe eight feet above the Bay and rises to let say, fifty feet at the crest of the bridge / causeway at Ferry Point that connects Upper Hooper Island with Middle Hooper Island. The road ends at Dicks Point.
Along the way, old family and seasonal homes are tethered to Route 335. I suspect the main source of employment on the islands is working for crab and oyster wholesale companies. There appeared to be only two restaurants, Old Salty’s and George W. Hall & Son. The original Phillips Seafood is still operating here supplying its restaurants in Baltimore and elsewhere and there is an Edward Hopper like church, Hoopers Memorial.
It’s an island of marshes and docks for watermen’s boats. Its history goes back many centuries. I highly recommend a book that I read when I was 17 to get the sense of what it is like in this part of Maryland. That book is “Chesapeake” by James Michener. I will be going back especially to investigate St. Marys Star of the Sea Church and the nearby original Tubman Chapel. May I also suggest that you go to YouTube for beautiful drone videos of the islands.
