South Carolina and our favorite anchorage

Yesterday we motored the 25 miles or so down past Myrtle Beach.  South of there, we came back to the area we had considered the prettiest part of the waterway.

And about 2:30, we came to the anchorage we had stayed at on the way up that we liked so much.  It is just a ways down a river that twists back and forth out of the Waterway.  This is all in the middle of a wildlife preserve.

First I took a nap in the sun while Tom made some vegetable quesadillas.   Then we took the dinghy down.   While Tom trolled for fish, I watched and took pictures.   

Now, at about 11 am, we have taken up the anchor and are heading to Georgetown, about 25 miles away.,   I've had several packages sent there.  

Since we were there a couple of months ago, a fire took out several of the historic buildings along the waterfront.  Cruisers are urged to go; by, give them their business so they won't feel like they've lost the world.  We remember it as a very pretty place where we had lunch at one of the best lunches along the way at a place called the Bistro.  Hope to do that again while there.

What a difference a day

makes . . . . .' 

It was rainy and dreary yesterday and today it was clear and in the 70s.

So we dinghyed over through Snow Cut to Carolina Beach State Park and walked the 6 plus mile hike through a  variety of ecoclimates.

We first walked along Cape Fear River where we saw boats going on down the waterway south in the distance.  That should be us tomorrow.

We didn't see the Venus flytraps and other insect-eating plants that this park is known for.

We did see so many things that typically live in dry climates like these dryish clumps that seem related to Spanish moss.

And beautiful grasses that had a horizontal band of pink about midway up.

And a lily pond where ducks were grazing.

And late flowers where butterflies were gathering nectar.

We may have a better opinion of the area today than yesterday.   Many of the buildings are painted happy colors, making the town cheerful.

We'll probably leave tomorrow to motor the 12 miles south down to Southport.  There we can see the historic town or take a ferry across to an island where there is a small scattered community and where all the beaches are public and relatively untrammeled.

it's kinda nice to know we don't have to be to our dock for a week or so.   I can learn to find ways to slow down and see stuff.

North Carolina shore

These birds hitchhiked when we left the anchorage our first night out from Beaufort.



Some colorful machinery/boats as we left Beaufort.



For the last four days we've been motoring and motor sailing south.  It has been mildly raining off and on and dreary.

 We stopped Sunday and Monday nights in Wrightsville Beach.

Wrightsville Beach was not so attractive as we'd hoped.  All three-story-tall plain buildings set for constant visitors to come to the beach.  No charm, no history, and populated by mostly college-aged kids.  

We anchored  along with a lot of other boats that were obviously just stopping on their way south.

Then we took our backpacks, got in the dinghy and walked along the beach.  Then back along a main street to a grocery store and picked up some fruit and potatoes.  Then stopped at a coffee shop/bar/lunch place and had tall frozen shakes/coffee drinks.

Horses and Birds

We got to Beaufort, NC two days ago and are leaving here today to go south.  This turned out to be a good stop in  a couple of ways. 

Yesterday, when we thought we had a day to spend for fun, we noticed that our bilge was way full and discovered that the bilge pump just wouldn't work even when Tom connected it directly to a battery.   While Tom was mechanicing,  I bailing out the bilge, by taking cups of water, putting them into a bucket, then dumping them out.  I bet I got ten buckets.  I eventually got ALL the water out of the bilge by sponge and cleaned it.   Meanwhile, Tom, after calling around, found that the marina, just 200 feet from where we were anchored had the exact replacement bilge pump.   I went over and got it and Tom installed it so by 1 p.m., we had a new pump installed and a lovely clean bilge.

And the sun was out!  So we took our newly refurbishsed dinghy around to the river running through Beaufort.  On the other side of the river is a Rachel Carson Nature Reserve.  Apparently this is a place Carson frequented.    

The first things we saw were about 12 tall white birds with orange hooked bills.  We later learned they are white ibises.

Our most fun discovery was the horses.   About 90 years ago, a man let his five horses roam over here and later just left them.   They have become a herd that is now protected.     We saw two groups of five and the single one grazing by the shore.

 We took the dinghy to shore several times to see what we could, including having lunch out looking over grasses, waters and many birds.

Albermarle to Beaufort

The weather finally cleared up enough to leave the town docks at Elizabeth City, NC.   A flock of sail and power boats had spent several nights there during the rainy days occasionally running their motors to keep their batteries charged and, once, stringing all their hoses together so that all the fresh water tanks on all the boats got topped off.    It was like a flock of birds taking off when the weather broke.

The wind was favorable so we sailed a good part of the way across Albermarle Sound and  later in the day started seeing boats anchored to our left and right along the way.   We finally found our spot,  back in and protected.   After following a channel most of the next day, we anchored again just behind a jut of land that was protecting us from the wind that had been from the south.  That evening was the quietest we'd had for a while and reminded us of an anchorage back in the hinterlands of Georgia.

But during that night, the wind came up and was blowing from the north!   We were sure we'd have to hunker in for a few days to let all that pass, but looked out at the channel and saw SAILBOATS with their foresails out, heading right out in the the Pamlico River.  We realized it was okay to do and just joined the parade.   

It was only a few hours through that river and over into the Neuse River (the big one that fronts Oriental). We had made reservations at a resort/marina we'd heard about called River Dunes where rates are not too high and where two men will come to work on boats for $25 an hour.    

They came by on that Monday morning and saw our long list and just got busy.  It was wonderful.   

We took the courtesy car for our alloted two hours each day and did errands and had lunch.   There at the restort, we did laundry and after hours, hung out in the hot tub and steam showers.

The weather never did get nice though so it was good to be holed up.  Today the sun came out and today we left, motored to Beaufort, NC and are here anchored.   This evening, we dinghyed to the main drag and had drinks/dinner watching the waterfront.   If it's nice, we may go back tomorrow and then explore islands past there where one should see wildlife, including wild/tame ponies.

My camera has not come on in the last few days so I used Tom's for a few pictures.  The dismal weather also has not made scenes very attractive.  So you get a few of the River Dune scenes scattered through this post.

I'll work on getting a camera back on line. 

A Definite Turn South

We stayed a couple of extra days in Deltaville 'cause our batteries got so low the boat would only start in the middle of the day when the sun was straight on the solar panels.  Somehow the batteries would not stay charged overnight.  So we started worrying, had the two-year old batteries worth about $1,000 gone bad. An electronics guy came on board and said, yes, they probably were, and was all set to get us some new different ones.   We took up the offer of our new friend to tie up at his dock so we could fully charge the batteries to see what they'd do.  It didn't take too much testing to discover that the charge was not getting to the batteries.  Tom discovered a wire behind the instrument  panel that wasn't connected to anything.  When that wire got reconnected, electricity was going everywhere, even to the batteries!   So they rejuvenated and we got to get back on track towards the south.

The picture below shows the view from the lovely bench swing that I sat in at Bob's house, looking out toward our boat while it was still anchored.



We motored and sailed to Cape Charles where we docked at the city marina.   There we fixed one problem, almost too stinky to tell about, and caused another one.  We discovered that our boat has a filter on the air vent to our waste tank and that it had been clogged because a previous pump out station apparently didn't pump out completely and the waste tank got too full.   After researching a bit, we decided that rather than replace the filter, we could remove it and reestablish the vent line straight so the tank could always vent freely.  You can bet that was a messy stinky job, but one we were so pleased to have finished. 

But while there, we motored over to take on fuel and get the tank pumped.  We have a very large inflatable dinghy and motor that hangs several feet each side of the stern.    When leaving that fuel dock, the dinghy got caught on piling after piling and finally a 2 inch slit opened on it, immediately deflating the dinghy.   

Tom has put a large patch on the slit and it holds for a while, but then the dinghy deflates, so now we are deciding whether to have it repaired or whether to buy a smaller dinghy and motor.   We often thought we'd like that better anyway, because of lightness and shortness.  Stay tuned for what we come up with this newest concern.

In the meantime, we've been enjoying some new places.  Cape Charles is on the inside of eastern bank of Chesapeake Bay, down near the southern end.   It was a very early planned community.  A whole town was planned to accommodate  workers and riders at a railroad terminal here where railcars were ferried over to Norfolk area.  One man designed all the houses and his company built about half of them.   They are cute, neat two-story houses set close together with small front and back yards.  Now they are mostly summer rentals.   

This goofy guy put a wing over an inflatable dinghy !!!!! and was landing and taking off and buzzing the marina the first day we stayed there.

We had lunch at an old fashioned drug store that had a counter and ice cream.

This hardware store had anything and everything and was also a local hang out.  Much fun to be patrons of. 

From Cape Charles we sailed about five miles down the to an anchorage we heard about that has the clearest water in the Chesapeake.  It is behind a band of about a dozen metal Liberty ships that were grounded there to provide a barrier to the beach and the state park behind them.

It was so calm the next day that we motored with the foresail up over to Norfolk.  As we passed Mile 0 of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway there, we noticed that many boats were anchored there across from downtown Norfolk.  So we did, too. 

We enjoyed watching boat traffic coming by, including this obvious tourist boat that upon which apparently as wedding was taking place.

Internet was so good there, that we enjoyed city life by streaming a movie and occasionally looking out at the bright lights.

We had planned to come back down via the "real" intracoastal waterway rather than the Dismal Swamp.  But when we remembered how pretty and peaceful it is, the proximity to groceries and the free docks at Elizabeth City at the end, we turned west instead of east and came back down the Dismal.

Did you know that the Army Corps of Engineers has a sense of humor?  Who would have guessed?

This time, instead of being the only boat along the way, there were many others.  We spent one night rafted up with about 12 other boats at the North Carolina Visitors Center in the canal and got to know many of the other boaters.   We can see already that this trip down is going to be much more social than the one up.  

The prettiest part of the trip is a few miles below the last lock of the canal.   The leaves look more "fally" than they did last time.

Now we're docked in Elizabeth City, where the city had us last evening to a wine and cheese party and gave us each roses - a tradition they've continued since 1978 for times when there are seven or more boats in their docks.
It's cloudy and windy so many of us are hanging here for a couple of days.  Now there's talk of a potluck tonight.

You can see us at the city docks on the web cam link below.  If you want me to come out and wave at you at a particular time in the next day or two, just call, text or email and we'll set up a time. That'd be fun for us - we're missing our home folks.

http://www.midatlanticengineeringservice.com/harborcam.html