Charleston

Well we are once again in Charleston, one of our favorite cities. We are docked at the Maritime Center this year which is a terrific location for shopping, dining, and nightlife. Harris Teeter is about 3 blocks away and a liquor store and hardware store are next door. Tomorrow morning, Sunday, we plan to a Greek Bakery for brunch.

I have included a number of pictures and can't figure out how to properly integrate the text so here the captions:

Mi T Mo an unusual pleasure craft on the Cape Fear River. They were anchored near us in Wrightsville Beach. Yes that is a Honda CRV on the deck.

A Spritsail Skiff in the anchorage at Wrightsville Beach

A fine wood turning for a X-mas Tree ornament at the Charleston Sat. Market

Ashley Harwood artisan - We bought 6 cherry salad bowles

Carol Feeling Witchy

The Traumerei in her slip at the maritime center

Another day on the ICW

Today we left Mile Hammock at first light. A mistake since we had to wait 45 minutes for the Surf City bridge. Our fellow cruisers had this figured out pretty well as they joined us just as the bridge was about to open. We'll have to get back into the bridge schedule planning mode!

Here is a view of the cockpit and what we look at and through while driving. This year we have an air card for the computer, so we can surf the net, check emails, and update the blog while underway. It helps with the boredom of the ditch.

Heading South Again

Carol and I are taking our second boat trip to the Florida Keys. We are anchored in Mile Hammock Bay which is on the grounds of Camp Lejeune. It is a beautiful fall day and the south bound cruisers are pouring in. We have loose agenda of spending Thanksgiving in Vero Beach, Christmas in Marathon, and maybe Easter in the Abacos if the weather is favorable for a passage across the Gulfstream.

The newly improved Traumerei is performing well except for a couple of plumbing problems. Air leak in the washdown system and an air bubble in the engine cooling water loop to the water heater. Seems like we've seen these before so we should have resolved in a day or two.

Home

Our last few days were big mileage ones for us and yesterday afternoon we found ourselves in Ceder Creek tucked around back where almost nobody goes. It was a good thing because last night big thunder storms and winds to match rolled in around midnight. By 2:00 am I was wide awake counting the interval between flash and bang. It was always quite a few seconds. Traumerei did a little dancing on the end of her chain and our sleep was pretty spotty.

This morning we left as soon as we could see the crab buoys and got into our slip at Blackbeards just before the winds on the Neuse turned northwest - the worst direction for heading home.

In our travels people we have met a number of cruisers who have a great respect for the Neuse River - acknowledged as one of the two or three worst patches of water on the Atlantic Intercoastal Waterway. Today Carol and I both wore our PFD's for maybe the third time in over 3,000 miles of travel which included 140 miles off shore in the Gulf of Mexico and some pretty wild sounds in Georgia

Wrightsville Beach Again

We "enjoyed" a slow motorsail up the Cape Fear River today. It was against the current all the way with a brisk following wind. Boaters will understand that this means some spectacular following waves. Fortunately we were able to get a pretty comfortable ride with varying amounts of jib sail rolled out. With 6 hours of adverse current, you are pretty stuck with duking it out, traveling at night, or waiting about a week. Anyhow we pulled into Wrightsville Beach the scene of our big anchoring scare last fall. We stopped for some diesel fuel and it was fairly easy to dock against the current with 20 knot winds blowing us into the dock. Carol and I looked at each other and decided to spend the night pinned to the dock and not anchor out.

Homeward Bound

We are now in North Carolina - Saint James Plantation Marina and feel like we are almost home. The long pennant below the Blackbeard Burgee is the Homeward Bound flag. It was a long day very much out of phase with the tidal currents. Tomorrow we need to wait until about 11:00 to catch a favorable current on the Cape Fear River. We are now paying for the sleigh ride we had through Georgia and most of South Carolina.

It is pretty cold here and we are happy to have shore power and electric heat.

We were lucky to make the Sunset Pontoon bridge before they shut it down for low tide. We stressed our 25 year old Westerbeke at top speed for about a half hour to make the noon opening. The bridge was then shut down until 3:00. Some people in a small power boat were going the other way. They must have been listening to our radio conversation with the bridge tender. They gave us a cheer as we passed through the bridge.

We passed by Lockwood Folly Inlet just after low tide. The new dredging was great 16 ft all the way!

Homeward Bound