I didn’t know that I didn’t know the geography of the East Coast. I’ve driven 95 from Maine to Florida and it all seemed pretty straightforward, just one exit after another.

Sailing the Betty Ann has given me the geography lesson I lacked. I now understand where Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx are in relation to Manhattan. Having ridden the powerful Gulf Stream up from Florida, I can appreciate why countless ships sank off Cape Hatteras. And who knew that North Carolina had so many wide rivers? (On one trip, we spent hours debating, and betting on, whether the Neuse River is the widest river in the United States — only to discover that our Googled authorities were inconsistent.)

I knew that Baltimore has a harbor and assumed it was on the Atlantic Ocean. Wrong. (It’s way up the Chesapeake, in case anyone else was in the dark with me.) And I now know the C&D Canal connects the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays. I appreciate the deep harbors of Penobscot Bay more than ever, having sailed the western coast of Florida with barely a port deep enough for Betty Ann’s 5’3″ draft.

In the last decade, we have sailed “outside” from Florida to Rhode Island without landfall (or indeed sight of land), we’ve sailed up the Intracoastal Waterway through North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware, we’ve gone into New York City Harbor at night (a bit terrifying), and we have hopped from harbor to harbor in Maine.

Below is a chart reflecting nearly 50 ports that Betty Ann has visited, many frequently. If you click here, you will be taken to an interactive map where you can see the names and locations of the ports.

I didn’t know that I needed a geography lesson, but I’m sure glad I got it. The East Coast is a lot more interesting and beautiful than I ever realized. And no child in geography class had a better teacher than Betty Ann.