Mallows Bay, Maryland

What is Mallows Bay?? The most common answer is that it is a body of water, and it is a body of water, but there is something special about Mallows Bay.? Most of you are thinking that it is just a body of water like the Potomac River and the Chesapeake Bay just much smaller.? When you make the journey to see Mallows Bay, you will discover that this is not just a body of water.

You enter the park, and you drive to the parking lot to park your car.? You get out of the car, and you walk to the first overlook.? What do you see?? You see a body of water called Mallows Bay.? As you look over the water, you see something.? You wonder what it is.? As you study it, it appears to be a large, rusted piece of metal in the water.? You walk down the road to the boat launch area, and you are closer to the water.? You look around and see more rusty pieces of metal in the water.? What is this?

What you see in the water are the remains of old ships.? As you stand on land, you see a handful of these ships, but if you can take a boat into the bay, you can see more of these shipwrecks.? You find yourself in the middle of the largest ship graveyard in the Western Hemisphere.

The ships which are mostly submerged are abandoned steamships and warships from World War I.? Commonly called the ‘Ghost Fleet’, many of these ships were built to response to the threats and attacks from the German U-boats that were sinking ships in the Atlantic Ocean, but most of these ships were never used in battle as World War I came to an end before they could be used.? They were brought here to Mallows Bay to be part of the sanctuary that it is today.

Today, Mallows Bay remains a sanctuary from old ships and for nature.? Where you see it from the shore or from a boat, you see what is special about this place.? It is located on Maryland Route 224 in Southern Maryland south of the naval town of Indian Head, and it is jointly managed by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration, the state of Maryland, and Charles County.? You can learn more about the bay at https://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/mallows-potomac/.

There is something special about Mallows Bay in Southern Maryland.? When you make the drive, you will see what it is.? The Ghost Fleet will come alive when you see Mallows Bay.