As Brian has passed the blog "torch" back to me,  

I can't begin before posting

A Huge Thank You to Brian!   

A True Friend and Sailor who has been with us on most our adventures.   

Brian not only took on the first mate duties while Dixie stayed home

He signed on for the coldest/worst weather  legs of the trip

He kept up the blog 

and Brian did everything with a smile 

(and his cell phone)  

Brian - You are the Best!  

We left Wrightsville before sunup so we could make it past Marine Camp Lajune where they were having exercises and closing the waterway from 9-noon.  As we were passing by we saw all the marines and their equipment getting ready to go.

As you go along the waterway every time you come to an opening to the ocean the sand bottom shoals up into the waterway.  They usually put a small nunn buoy over near the shoal so you will go around the shoal.  At one of the junctions there were two green buoys moved over almost to the other side of the river.  I was at the helm and went over around the buoys but as I went around the second we found to a quick stop.  You can be sure John jumped up from below to see What the crazy Yankee driving the boat had done.  We tried to motor off but no way.  We called Towboat US and in about ten minutes a boat arrived and towed us off the hump of sand. 

 I learned the hard way that when you come to these junctions you have to really slow down and try and find the hole through the shoal.

That day was very interesting as it was one of the lowest tides of the year so at certain spots in the river we only had a foot or so of room under our keel and you had to wander back and forth in the river trying to find it.

The day was a long one and at about 4:30 we turned into the Lite Keepers Marina at Little river, South Carolina just north of Myrtle Beach where the boat is going to rest until John and Dixie come back after Christmas.  They intend to go down to the Florida Keys Nd then over to the Bahamas.

So this is where I get off.  It's been a wonderful 5 weeks going through high winds, cold and then nice warm weather and nice winds..lot's of rain and lots of sunshine.  Thank you John and Dixie for a great experience.  John you are a great person to spend that much time with and also a wonderful cook.  Talk about a great problem solver/mechanic/electrician John spent three hours at the top of the mast fixing a light yesterday.  To say that we haven't had a few beers, wine and rum would be an under statement.  I'll miss continuing on but I'm passing the responsibility for the blog onto Dixie.

Along the Adams River -- off to Wrightsville

We woke up to a beautiful sunny 35 degree morning. Dixie had changed our plan and suggested we go 40 miles to Swansboro.  That was the plan and then one of our neighbors said that the railway bridge in Moorehead City was closed for repair and only open from noon 'til one.  So we got underway and went through the railroad bridge which was actually open when we arrived there at 11:30.  We motored through and the remainder of the day was a beautiful motor down to Swansboro and Dudley's Marina.

On our way along the Adams River we ran into about four pods of Dolphins...such playful characters. Also along the Adams River were hundreds of houses with docks and their boats on lifts out front...my idea of heaven.

The amazing thing about Dudley's was the cost of the moorage plus electric plug-in was 0.75 cents per foot. The average charge is usually from $2.00 to $4.00 per foot so this was a bargain.  Not the most luxurious place but clean showers and bathrooms and they also give you a courtesy car to go into town to buy items.

We learned from one of our neighbors that there is a marine exercise area on the ICW near us and that it is closed due to marine exercises from 9-12 in the morning.  Nothing ever seems simple on this trip. We are off to Wrightsville early tomorrow to get through the Marine zone before it closes.

Down the Pungo River to Oriental, N.C.

There were three boats moored alongside of the quay near us.  We had met them all in the restaurant the night before.  So come 6:30 in the morning we all left within 15 minutes of each other.  One of the boat's crew had  told us about an anchorage on the Pungo River just after the Alligator Pungo canal which was a long 65 miles from where we started from.  This was going to be a long day crossing 14 miles of the shallow wavy Abelmare Sound and the down the long canal.  Going through Abelmre Sound we actually got to sail for a couple of hours.  At the end of the Sound is the Alligator River Bridge and the Bridge commander helps the bridge for our group and four other sailboats before he let us all go together. So after that it was just each of us following the other for four hours through the canal.  Just after sunset we all exited the canal and anchored in the Pungo River.

We had been having trouble with our alternator not charging the batteries, so on the way John wiggled some wires and found one of them was probably corroded.  After we anchored our handy John took the corroded cable off and cleaned and pounded it back together to solve our problem.  So we completed this task and went to start the engine to see if this solved the problem.  The only problem now was the engine wouldn't turn over.  So here we are in the middle of nowhere and no engine.  So 'Mr Problem Solver John' went to work and after two hours replaced another cable and, voila,  problem solved (it was one of those try everything and maybe something will work!).  So a good meal was had and off to sleep knowing the engine would start in the morning.

We were the last to leave in the morning but had a great day where we even got in a few hours of sailing.  We ended up at a marina in Oriental, NC.  The marina is part of a hotel and on our first night they had a band so it was quite fun...even though it was Halloween the Halloween party wasn't until Saturday night.  We decided to stay until Sunday since there was going to be high winds and rain.  So John worked on the boat while I walked about the town.  The Halloween party was interrupted with high winds and cold so there wasn't a huge crowd but we met other boaters heading south and some of the locals so a good time was had and the band was very good.

Toady I watched football while John again worked on the boat...I sound pretty lazy??  Tomorrow, Monday we are off for Beaufort/Morehead City which is an easy 20 mile trip.

Norfolk -- starting down the ICW

We spent a quiet night at Little Creek Marina catching up on our sleep.  The next morning we washed the boat and headed for Norfolk.  When we left the marina and started down the Chesapeake the water was flat calm, quite a bit different than the day before.

Norfolk is similar to San Diego in that it is a huge navy town with all sorts of navy vessels including aircraft carriers.  It has an amazing amount of marine traffic including tugs pushing huge barges.

We got a free spot in Portsmouth which is just across from Norfolk.  There four other sailboats at this spot so we had a "wee bit of chat" with them.  I was out of rum (poor planning) and we weren't able to find a liquor store....actually John went in search of a store and walked quite a few miles looking while I stayed back with the other sailors.  One of them said he had rum and gave me half a bottle!!!   The sad thing was John doesn't drink rum and he had lots of beer on the boat...what a great Captain and friend.  Just as an aside I've got a bad hip and am not so mobile.

Norfolk is mile one of the Atlantic Intercoastal Waterway.  Around 1 PM on Tuesday we started off on our trip down the ICW.  The interesting thing about going down waterway is that there are bridges with only 12 feet of vertical clearance that have to open for boats to pass.  These bridges are on different schedules to open so you have to time your trip and adjust your speed accordingly.  The ones near metropolitan areas are usually closed from 6:30-8:30 AM and 4:00-6:00 PM.  Some only open once an hour and others open on the hour and half hour.  So it's lots of fun figuring it all out.  Here's our first lift bridge.

We went as far as Great Bridge where there is a lock and then a bridge.   There is a beautiful spot to tie up between the lock and the bridge so that is where we stayed along with about six other boats.  We walked into the little town and got a few groceries and a bottle of Mount Gay Rum!!!  We keep buying groceries because we wonder when the next place will be that we can stock up.  As John said we keep buying more groceries than we use.  We figure we could almost make Florida with the groceries we have!!!!

Today, Wednesday we left Great Bridge at 8 AM with all the other boats.  Everybody was lined up in formation ready for the bridge to open.  Today's trip started in a narrow tree lined canal.  Etiquette on the waterway is that if a boat wants to pass another he radios to that boat and says he's going to pass him to port.  The boat to be passed acknowledges and slows down and then the passing boat slows and goes by so his wake doesn't rock the other boat.  It's interesting how you get a string of boats following each other.

We decided to stay at a marina tonight since there was quite a wind and anchoring in this shallow area is a bit tricky.  Tonight we're at the low end marina in Coinjock, NC.

The big power yachts are across the way at the higher end marina.

Manhattan to (almost) the Chesapeake Bay

The next day (Friday) turned out to be sunny with gentle winds so off we go to the East River that takes us right next to Manhattan and out to the ocean.  It's always interesting to go this route as you pass Rikers Island prison and for overflow they have the biggest prison ship in the world.  The best part is going past all the high rise apartments and office towers.  After going past Manhattan with ferries going every which way and low flying helicopters going from Manhattan to the airport we headed out to the ocean.

We got out on the ocean about 4:00 PM and headed down the New Jersey coast.  My watch was from 10-2 AM so I had a wee nap beforehand.  By my 10 PM watch I could see the bright lights of Atlantic City way off in the distance.   Our night went smoothly and as dawn approached we were starting to cross Delaware Bay.  The weather reports said we would have favoring winds that would be no more than 20 knots.  We had a nice day sailing but about 4:00 PM Dixie informed us that the weather was changing for the worse and that we should duck into Ocean City and ride out the storm for the next day.  I looked at the weather reports I had and they said we should be ok since the bad weather would be south of us.  So wanting to get to Norfolk and thinking we were ok we continued on...i.e. we didn't take Dixie's wise advice.

As darkness came the winds changed direction from what the weather reports said and also increased in velocity.  Well to say the least we had a wild night...huge waves and winds up to 30 knots.  We had a real problem making headway so progress was very slow.  We had both our sails up since we thought the winds were going to be reasonable.  The main sail was just flapping in the wind and causing real problems so we eventually decided it had to come down.  So poor John had to go out in this bouncing fury and pull it down and tie it up. The other problem was that on the Delaware coast there is no where to duck in and hide so we had to just keep going with waves breaking over the bow and coming right up over our dodger and then over the back of the boat.  Not much sleep this night.  We pounded on and by daybreak we were near the Chesapeake Bay.  Only problem was now we turned and were heading straight into the huge waves and the wind was still above 20 knots.

Slowly we made our way up the Chesapeake and decided to stop short of Norfolk at the first marina.  Were we glad to get into a nice quiet slip.  Captain John did an incredible job!

We left Newport Monday morning planning to do an overnight heading to Manhasset Bay just on the edge of New York City.  The forecast for the day was southwest winds of 10-15 knots.  About an hour into our trip the winds were hovering around 20 knots gusting higher which had us bashing into big waves and making slow progress.  So time for a new plan...we'll make our way to New London Connecticut about 30 miles ahead and overnight there.  We found a mooring ball close to the entrance and John cooked another of his gourmet meals so all ended well.

It's now Tuesday and the big "plan" is to leave around noon and slowly make our way the 80 miles to Manhasset Bay arriving there first thing Wednesday morning so we had daylight to enter the bay.  As we motored along in a light wind and consulted the weatherman we decided we needed to get there as soon as we could.  So we sped up realizing we would be entering in the dark.  As we motored along we had great lightning storms going on around us so it was quite spectacular.  As seems to be our luck just as we are entering the bay it starts pouring with rain.  We had John up on the bow with the spotlight and in we came among all the moored boats and found a good mooring buoy...3:00 AM in the morning...good night.

We knew Wednesday and Thursday were going to be windy and wet but didn't realize quite how miserable it really was.  We took the water taxi into town, did our laundry, food shopping and found a West Marine.  As you may know I love West Marine and love to wander about looking at things .......well, I have found my addiction is nothing compared to John's.  I think he could spend the whole day there.  I'm sure he did about 20 rotations through the store.  I think he knows more about the store and what they carry than the store clerk!!!

Another gourmet meal on board as the rain pelted down.  Nice and cozy.

I woke up late this morning and found John with tools spread everywhere having a wonderful time repairing all the little things that need to be done on a boat.

Our plans for tomorrow, weather cooperating are to go through a small canal to the East River which borders Manhattan and fuel up before going out on the ocean.  The next segment of our trip takes us down the coast of New Jersey past Atlantic City and on to Norfolk Virginia.  It's about a two hundred mile trip so we can only do it if we have a two or three day good weather window as there are not many places to duck in and hide.

One thing about sailing from point A to point B on a sailboat is that you really can't have a schedule as you just have to take what the weather man sends you.  We are sure learning the truth of that!!