Saturday, November 11, 2017

Beaufort NC to Southport - 2017

--Blogpost written by Bob



Stay Over Day in Beaufort NC



We decided to stay two night at Beaufort Docks.  It was a nice break from anchoring out, even though we don't sacrifice much and we both enjoy the beauty and solitude of anchoring out.



Beaufort's waterfront is full of restaurants and shops.
The boat docks are to the right of this image.


The 100-foot long s/v Minisk hailing from the Cayman
Islands was in port at Beaufort Docks.


The tidal current through Beaufort Docks is quite swift
as seen here around the pilings.

Wednesday, November 8, was overcast bands of light rain came through the area—it rained last night and rain is forecasted for Thursday (the day we leave).  In fact, there was a light rain all afternoon.

We went out for breakfast at the Beaufort Cafe, a place where the locals go out for breakfast and lunch at Beaufort Grocery Company, a very nice restaurant. 

We caught up on some chores: laundry, checking engine fluid levels (they were fine at 470 engine hours), grocery shopping, filling water tanks, window shopping, etc.  We really enjoyed our stay in Beaufort, NC.  

One of the little things that I noticed in Beaufort is the grackles, large black birds with a very distinctive chirp. They hang out near the waterfront and they seem to outnumber seagulls. 




Beaufort NC to Mile Hammock Bay





We woke up early (6:15 AM) to leave at slack low tide so that we didn't have to deal with tidal currents leaving our slip at Beaufort Docks.  We left Beaufort Docks at 6:45 AM.  We put up the side windows of the enclosure (all the way back past the helm seat) and we donned our foul weather gear to deal with the continuous light rain.



We had most of the side windows up on our cockpit enclosure,
as well as wearing our foul weather suits
to stay dry and warm.



Looking backward coming down the ICW today.  There
were 3 sailboats behind us at this point.

We anchored in Mile Hammock Bay which is on Camp Lejeune, the marine base.  The range that crosses the ICW was not live today but we could hear what seemed like 105mm grenades going off in the distance.



There is nothing like grilling hot dogs for lunch with
105mm grenades going off in the distance.



The entrance to Mile Hammock Bay on Camp
Lejeune, looking from the inside
toward the ICW.


Only one bridge had to open for us today, the Onslow Beach Bridge, which was about 4 miles before we anchored for the day.  It was a short travel day.  We anchored at 1:15 PM, just in time to make lunch.  We traveled a total distance of about 44.5 statute miles in 5-1/2 hours.  At times today, we bucked a heavy opposing tidal current and, at other times, the tidal current gave us a big boost in boat speed.  Even though it was a very wet and rainy day, we were dry and warm--it really pays to be well prepared for bad weather.  I really like getting up and underway early and then being able to anchor in the early afternoon.




This is a view of our enclosed cockpit
from the companionway.




Mile Hammock Bay to Wrightsville Beach




Seven other boats shared the Mile Hammock Bay anchorage area with us. There was room for a lot more boats. It’s hard to tell whether there are fewer boats traveling south this year or if we are slightly behind the peak travel time. (We think most boats left the Annapolis area in mid-October, about 2 week’s before we left.)

We left our anchorage at 7:15 AM, (November 10) our latest start in quite a while. It was overcast and raining lightly, similar to yesterday. It was difficult to see the day marks with the rain drops on our front window.

Shortly after leaving our anchorage, the ICW went past the New River Inlet and it was low tide. We were very careful in this area because we went aground here when we returned last season.  We came upon a red floating red marker (#72) with an ICW yellow triangle on it—the marker seemed way out of position. We did not honor it, instead following our waypoints, correcting for last season’s grounding.  We went aground!  We were able to get off by motoring in reverse and then, slowly going forward, feeling our way into deeper water. (I may have backed onto the shoal with my rudder—I have to check for damage at my first opportunity, using our GoPro fastened to our longest boat hook.)  We added to our note on our flip chart not to go through this area at low tide again.


At 9 AM, just like on cue, the sky cleared
and the sun came out.


The first opening bridge of the day was the Surf City Swing Bridge (MM 260.7)—we had to wait about 25 minutes for the 10 AM scheduled opening.


A new fixed bridge is being constructed just south of the
Surf City Swing Bridge, shown above.  This was the
first of three bridges that had to open for us today.


We investigated the bottom of our rudder by fastening our GoPro
camera to the longest boat hook we had on board and
lowering it into the water after we anchored.

This is a still shot from our video.


We arrived at our selected anchorage at 2:15 PM.  Our first task after anchoring was to investigate the bottom of our rudder to make sure that there was no damage from the grounding we experienced this morning--there wasn't!  On our way down the ICW today, we talked to another sailboat on the VHF radio, Celestial Melody, and he honored the red #72 that we ignored--he did not go aground.  He found out about the buoy issue in advance by following ActiveCaptain, which is a crowd sourcing app for boaters.


This is the Wrightsville Beach anchorage area.  The ocean beach
is on the right side of this image.  The area to the left is
an island full of marinas, condos, and restaurants.
The bridge in the center is a causeway
between the two.


A scene from our Wrightsville Beach anchorage
at dusk on November 10.
 


Wrightsville Beach to Southport




We experienced some very high winds (15 mph, gusting to 25 mph) out of the north last night as a cold front came in to drop the outside temperature dramatically—to 35 degrees F. We had to run the propane fireplace in the morning for about an hour to take off the chill inside the boat. 

With only a 26-mile day (about 4 hours—marathons are actually run faster) ahead of us today, we decided to leave a couple hours later than usual—9:00 AM. At this time today the tide condition is “mid-tide and rising” and reduces our risks of going aground. High tide is at 1 PM, about when we should arrive in Southport. We have no bridges that have to open for us today.

s/v Rainy Days tied up at Southport Marina. 
We arrived about 1 PM.



By sundown, the transient dock at Southport Marina was
full.  I'm glad we made reservations!


We will be staying here in Southport Marina for two nights before proceeding down the ICW further.  More about our stay in Southport will be in our next blogpost.


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