Weird VHF channel reception

[Sid at SailAway]

Ok, this is for you radio guru's out there. We left Annapolis and are heading south for Myrtle Beach. After clearing the second lock on the Dismal Swamp, this is when I started receiving these weird receptions. I have my VHF, a Standard Horizon with a RAM mic, programmed to scan 9, 13, 16, 22A, and 68. The radio would stop on 71 and the voices were in Chinese or Korean, not sure, but I didn't give it much thought. Then I remembered I don't have 71 programmed into the scan memory. Strange. Then I reprogrammed to exclude 68, only because it was close to 71. I dunno what I was thinking, bleed over maybe? Radio still stopping at 71. The surprising thing is that 71 is supposed to be a one watt channel and I was receiving broadcasts, Loud and clear, all the way to the Alligator River Railroad bridge! That's gotta be 30 miles or so. Then once past the bridge, no more transmissions.

My question is what was happening? Were they hijacking 71 with a high power transmitter. Is 71 close to some other frequency that was bleeding over? Even when I reduced the scan channels to just 16 and 13 the radio would still stop at 71 every time they transmitted.