May 18 through 20, 2018
We left our marina on the Neuse River on Friday the 18th at about 4:00 pm. As some of you know we originally planned on leaving Tuesday, but boat work is never fast since much of it requires squeezing into uncomfortable and awkward spaces. Once in the space, the sad realization comes that the part in your hand is actually not the right part. This raises the need of having to run out to get the right part. Friday, however, we finally had all the “mission critical” things done and we decided to leave before we found something else. We said goodbye to our friends, gathered our dock lines, backed out of the slip and were off! David serenaded our departure by playing “When the Saints go Marching” on his trumpet! The wind was blowing out of an unfavorable direction (on the nose), so we motored for a couple hours and dropped the anchor just before the rain started. Dinner was ready so we sat in our new cockpit enclosure that Mary Beth has been laboring over for the past three weeks and enjoyed dinner listening to the patter of the rain, but dry and snug in our new “outdoor room”. It was a delightful quiet night on Clubfoot Creek on the south side of the Neuse, just us and the seagulls, reminding us of why we love cruising.
We awoke Saturday morning to “boisterous” winds out of the SSW which was ideal for our path north and east. The winds were very strong, with steady winds in the low 20’s and gusts into the mid 20s. It felt great to be back on the water under sail and making good progress toward our destination in the Chesapeake. We anchored in Slade Creek Saturday night which is on the Intercoastal Waterway (ICW). We slept well after our first full day as cruisers since we got back from the Bahamas in June of last year.
Today, Sunday, we continued with good winds and were able to sail much of the day making good progress north. The part of the ICW we were in today is quite remote and primitive. However, it is very pretty and unspoiled. For about half of the day we were in the Alligator Canal which was built by the WPA during the depression. The shoreline is totally undeveloped and it probably looks much like it did in the late 1920s when it was built. It’s fun to think of the commerce up and down the east coast that the ICW enabled before the days of interstate trucking. I could picture the barges and small shallow-draft cargo ships that would have plied these waters moving merchandise, passengers and goods back and forth along the east coast of the USA.
Tonight we are in a small marina in Tyrrell County NC (Alligator River Marina) right on the ICW which affords us a quick out in the morning. We also spent a night here when we bought Regina Maris 4 years ago and brought her to NC from Deal MD on the western shore of the Chesapeake. They have the biggest and blood thirstiest mosquitos here, but we are down below with screens in all of the ports/windows and hatches. We have about two more days of traveling north before we pop out at Norfolk/Hampton Roads VA. At that point we will be in the Chesapeake Bay! So far the trip has been very fun and enjoyable, with just a few things discovered as needing repairs!.
It looks like we will not have cell service until we get close to Norfolk. We have nothing here except their spotty wifi. But that is a lot more than we’ve had the last two nights!
Highlights of these last three days:
Above: our new hatch cover MB made
Life is good!
A few of our favorite things:
D & MB: being back on the water in Regina Maris.
D & MB: Sleeping at anchor in our “private” anchorages the last two nights. The temperature was nice, a good breeze was coming in through the hatches, the sounds of fish jumping, the gentle motion of the boat, and waking up on the water are all some of our favorite things about sailing.
Today was really windy and blowing from the ideal direction for much of today’s travel. MB’s favorite was hitting almost 10mph with just a single sail up as we surfed down a wave in 20mph winds. David’s was sitting at the helm under sail while playing music on dulcimer, trumpet and recorder.
Regina Maris in her slip on the Alligator River