Hi Flite: Spending time in North Carolina

We are back in North Carolina.

We left St Augustine June 3rd with intentions of sailing to Charleston. The wind gods once again were not with us as we motored the 206 miles. We never saw any winds above 9 knots until we were entering Charleston Harbor when it jumped up to 15 knots. Once again it was a long boring motoring trip. Once in the harbor we debated where to anchor and decided to go through the Wappoo Creek to the Stono River. This put us further away from downtown Charleston but we had no plans to go there. The next day we took the dinghy a short way up the creek for lunch, WiFi, and a quick trip to the grocery store. There was a strong current in the river and a fair amount of weekend traffic but we spent a couple of days just chilling on the boat. On Monday we dinghied to the nearest marina for WiFi and our friends Bo and Allison picked us up for lunch and then gave us their car to use for the day. We made a run to Trader Joe's and a couple of other stops and then back to drop off the car and another visit. Bo and Allison are friends we met in the Bahamas and met up with them again in the Virgin Islands. Since then they have moved to Charleston, sold the boat and set down some pretty deep roots (swallowed the anchor as we say). It was great to get caught up again and really appreciate their hospitality.

On Tuesday we pulled the anchor to try and catch the tide and current in Wappoo Creek and moved out to the main harbor and anchored not too far from Fort Sumter where the Civil War began. Wednesday morning just as the sun came up we pulled anchor and headed to Beaufort NC. The winds were light so again we were motoring until about noon when the winds showed up. We had a nice comfortable sail until about 5:00 when the winds picked up to 20 knots and the waves started building. During the night they stayed between 20-25 with waves breaking over the bow. We couldn't change our angle to the wind and waves until about 2:00 am next morning when we cleared Frying Pan Shoals and tuned more downwind on our final leg to Beaufort. The boat settled down on the new heading and smoothed out considerably. At this point we were sailing along at 7-9 knots. We arrived at Beaufort Inlet earlier then we had expected and instead of anchoring we continued on planning to anchor further along in Adams Creek. The trip up the ICW (Intra Coastal Waterway) to the Neuse River didn't take as long as we expected, we had a favorable current, and since there was still plenty of daylight we continued up river to Clubfoot Creek and anchored. It had been 36 hours traveling 243 nautical miles averaging 6.75 knots.

We closed the circle. It was from this creek in November of 2016 we left for our trip to the Caribbean. This year we traveled 2619 nautical miles or 3013 statute miles equal to traveling from Portland ME to Los Angeles CA. The circle of NC to the Caribbean and back was a total of 6658 nautical miles or 7662 situate miles or about a quarter of the way around the earth.

Once in the Creek we hunkered down for several days of rain going in from time to time to visit friends. This is where we lived aboard prior to going cruising, we were home. After a week we pulled anchor and motored up the river to New Bern where we anchored for a couple of days getting ready for housecleaning and projects. On Friday we moved into the marina and picked up a rental car. We started offloading stuff, some of it we took with us and would not need again, some we picked up along the way and it all went into the storage unit we rent here. We had previously bought some used sails from other Pearson 424 owners and we swapped out our old sails for new to us sails. We have not replaced the sails that came with the boat when we bought it in 2004. We have been enjoying going out to have lunch or dinner at some of our favorite spots and visiting friends we left behind.

Several projects are getting done while we are tied up to a dock with electricity and transportation. I found when changing the oil and servicing the engine that the water intake pump was failing. This is the pump I had rebuilt in Trinidad before starting the season. We planned to just stay a week at the marina but can't go anywhere until the new pump arrives and is installed. Cori is making a new set of chaps for the dinghy, they protect the tubes from the sun and had ripped out during the last two years.

When the pump is installed we will be leaving the marina and starting downriver. Once there we plan on turning north and following the ICW up to Norfolk VA. Once there we will proceed to Annapolis with a variety of stops along the way. Annapolis is a destination to pick up some parts for our water-maker that I have ordered. After that we intend to continue north with a final destination of Maine or possibly beyond, depending on timing. In the fall we will turn back and head for the Bahamas again. As always "plans are written in sand at low tide", meaning they can and will change several times.

A few photos: