North Carolina to Florida

We left Oriental on Sunday  November 5th after getting our transducer replaced.  We crossed the southern part of Pamlico sound and went into Adams Creek.  Adams Creek is a really nice stretch to get us down to Morehead City.  The weather was not all that nice out in the ocean so we continued down the ICW to Swansboro.  We were able to motor sail with 20-25 knots of wind on our starboard beam.  There we stayed overnight at Caspers Marina.

The next morning we left at 0625 with four huge power boats.  We had four bridges that we needed openings and two of them opened only on the hour.  If you get there even a minute or so late they won't open for you and you end up waiting until the next hour opening.  We lucked out and had the current with us the entire run of 45 miles.  We got to  all the bridges with minutes to spare. 

We stayed in Wrightville Beach Monday night and on Tuesday morning met for breakfast with Island Packet 35 Island Spirit owners Hayden and Radeen and Island Packet 460 owners Eric and Pat.  Hayden and I have been communicating through email for about eight years and this is the first time we have met in person.

Hayden, Pat, Eric, Radeen, Jeff, Sandy Photo courtesy of Hayden

Xperience IP380, Cutter Loose IP460


After breakfast we continued down the ICW where we anchored at Carolina Beach.  We stayed here for two nights waiting for a weather opportunity to go out into the ocean at the Cape Fear river inlet.  A cold front was about to move through the area so on Thursday we moved down to the Southport City Marina and get the boat prepared to leave on Friday behind the cold front.  Thursday night the wind came up to 25 MPH with gusts to 35 MPH but was forecast to calm down by Friday late afternoon.

We departed the Southport marina at 1100 on Friday and headed out the Cape Fear inlet.  The wind was blowing 20-25 with some higher gusts from the northwest.  That put the wind on our starboard beam and gave us a really fast ride.  The seas were running from 3-5 feet and were a bit confused so the ride was a little rough.  Clewie did not have a good afternoon as she barfed all over the bed.  Mercedes took it all in stride and rode it out in her kitty cave.

The wind did calm down some around 10 PM, a little later than forecast but we enjoyed the extra push it gave us.  We passed the Charleston, SC inlet outer buoy at 0400 on Saturday morning.  That was 114 miles in 17 hours.

We had to slow down quite a bit on Sunday morning so we could enter the St. Mary's inlet on the Georgia Florida border in daylight.  We stopped at the Fernandina Harbor marina to get some fuel at 0800 and are now tied to a mooring buoy across the ICW from the marina.  We will stay here a couple of nights and then continue down the ICW.  We hope to be at Vero Beach for thanksgiving.

We have moved.

However we are now a little further north.  We left New Bern on Thursday after waiting a couple of hours in the morning for the fog to dissipate.  We couldn't see the channel markers that are about 100 feet off the dock.

Once it did clear out we motored down the Neuse River to Oriental, NC.  We needed to stop at Deaton Yacht Service to do a short haul to replace our Airmar depth tranducer that quit working over the summer.  I had ordered a new one last week and had it shipped directly to Deaton's.  We were out of the water for only a couple of hours to get it replaced. 

We are now sitting and waiting for the rain to pass over.  Also there is forecast to have very high winds and seas for the next two to three days.  Winds to 45 knots and seas running up to 20 feet.  We have no business being out in that.  It looks like we may leave here on Sunday or Monday and head down the intracoastal waterway to Southport and see if we get a good weather window to head out for Florida.  If not we will continue down the intracoastal to either Wynah bay and exit there or go to Charleston and go out there.