Saturday 31st October Little River, SC mile 345 (0 miles)

Day of boat repairs and cleaning.

Mark the electrician arrived at 08:00. We spent a couple of hours trying to figure out what the problem is. Thanks to Mark for his hard work, darn alternator still a mystery………………………

The current theory is that the Balmar Duo Charge is not doing its job.

We’ll press on to Charleston by Marina hops (shore power) and try to get it looked at there.

“Cruising is repairing your boat in exotic places” Bob Bitchin

I hardly call Myrtle Beach exotic but it’s definitely becoming warmer. The pelicans are becoming more numerous and seem fatter than the ones in Chesapeake Bay. The palm trees aren’t scrawny looking either, having some meat on their bones, like the ones you buy at the garden center before they have chance to die.

His lighthouse...



Her lighthouse...



Swishy Yacht Club...



Happy Halloween Everyone!


Querencia standing by one six ... out.

Friday 30th October Little River, SC mile 345 (62 miles)

Another early start, left around 7:15 and followed Dana out of the anchorage into the ICW.

The Irish woman did some cool maneuvers around a dredger and private channels upon entering Cape Fear River, trickiest bit of driving so far. Having an out going tide with us we scorched down Cape Fear at a steady 10 mph. We topped at 12 mph before hanging a sharp right back into the ICW before being swept out to the Atlantic Ocean (go Cha Cha! this turn is definitely an easy miss).
After a couple of hours, I did a routine check on the Battery Monitor only to find out that we were draining about 10 Amps per hour while under motor.
Something’s fishy here; we should be putting amps into the batteries not sucking the little buggers out. Alternator appears to be on strike.

We did a quick pit stop at Southport marina to have en electrician check it out. Thanks to Gene and Steve at Southport for taking a look at the alternator, great guys.

When we re-started the engine, everything was of course working as per the brochure.

Oh well, of we went for another 45 miles down to North Myrtle Beach, we decided to take a Marina since we did not want to anchor without alternator charging capabilities. We called an electrician who promised to take a look at the problem first thing Saturday morning. Got in to the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club around 17:30 and after a precision docking job by the Swedish helmsperson, cocktails were swiftly served in the cockpit.

Had a nice dinner at the “Officers Club” at MBYC, yummy grub.

Slept like a felled forest.

NAFB..... At least this was a pontoon bridge ... new varietal to us...



We met Lt. Dan...



The stimulus package at work...

Thursday 29th October Wrightsville Beach NC, mile 283 (58.5 miles)

The bridges of sighs:
Left the Anchorage early in the morning 07:30, apparently not early enough as we did not make the first bridge opening, missed it by 8 minutes and had to sit around for a 52 minutes. We had to really gun it to make the next bridge opening (only opens every hour), 18 statue miles in 2 hours. Motor sailing with Jib we made a steady 10 mph over ground and made the bridge opening. After that big push we had a cruisey cruise to the next bridge 5 miles down the ditch, no worries, even a kayak would make it.

Made it into a rather packed anchorage at Wrightsville Beach, after a couple of circles the Irish helmsperson said, “Feck it, lets drop the hook” so we did.

We dropped the Dinghy and headed into W Beach, went for a walk thru town and on the Beach. Jim and Bonnie from Dana, a 38’ Morgan, came over for cocktails. We had met Dana at the visitor’s center on VA NC border and had a great time with them.

Oh, the saltwater wash down pump crapped out. Seems like the pressure switch has had enough. Out comes the bucket to wash 10,000,000 years of duck goulash of the hook!

Early morning start ... I love the smell of Jameson in the morning...



Suns up - time for another cuppa...



Bridge to nowhere ... errr - Wrightsville Beach



The fat boat Q at anchor in W Beach



Some say she sleeps upside down... we call her The Maria...

Wednesday 28th October Mile Hammock Bay NC, mile 244.5 (42.5 miles)

Left Beaufort around 09:00 and it was still blowing snotty, creating challenging conditions for undocking the boat. With 15kts on the beam, the fairway narrow and being surrounded by multimillion motor yachts, we had to think this one through. These are one of the situations that cruising becomes challenging. After some serious planning of undocking maneuvers, we went for it and let the wind blow the bow off, gunned it and backed out into Taylor’s creek – without any go faster stripes on big arse power yachts, wheeeew!!!

The exit from Beaufort is a wee bit tricky; exiting easterly we followed the short channel to the Atlantic Ocean and then hooked back west to continue on the ICW. 1 minute later, just as we really depended on our electronics, the chart plotter crapped out, could not find a GPS fix, I hate that.
We grabbed the handheld GPS, one of our many backups, so in true Murphy’s Law style our Master Chart plotter kicked in – go figure, but hey, I’m not bitching!

We cruised on through the very busy commercial port and played twiddley winks with large Army and commercial vessels we survived the gauntlet, no worries mate we play in Norfolk traffic.

On to Bougue Sound, we traveled 20 miles in a narrow channel with skinny water with dunes to the east and beach to the west. The weather varied from .5 mile visibility to bright sunshine, very enjoyable stuff.
Later that day we traveled thru the Marine Corps firing range at Camp Le Jeune, thankfully the lads were not out practicing on this particular day. Semper Fi!
We pulled into the Mile Hammock Bay anchorage around 16:00 and set the Rocna (anchor). Interesting place to Anchor – the Marines have a practice ground here – saw lots of helicopter taking of landings it wore off after 2 hours, a fine meal and a bottle of wine. It seemed as the night drew in they got closer and closer to the mast, ouch that wouldn’t be fun. Slept like logs at this peaceful anchorage (with the exception of Goose and Maverick)

Banana - breakfast of champions...



Comin' up to the bridge...



Love the smell of napalm at night...



Sunset at 6 Mile Hammock Bsy...

Tuesday 27th October Beaufort NC, mile 202 (20 miles)

Left Oriental at about 8:30 this morning. The sky was grey and we felt a mild drizzle of rain. Visibility was down to about a mile as we crossed the Neuse river to head into Adams Creek and onto Beaufort, NC.

Pretty uneventful 20 mile trip. Missed the opening of the Bascule bridge at Beaufort at 11:00 and had to hang around for 30 minutes until the next opening.

Docked at Beaufort docks (we needed to take on diesel and they can refuel you in the slip, pretty handy)

Here we are amongst a bunch of huge powerboats feeling a bit our of place...

Just before departure from Oriental...



Bit of a grey day...



The lovely Maria at the Beaufort boardwalk...

Monday 26th October Oriental NC, mile 182 (0 miles)

Eventful day!!!
We walked 2 miles up to Deaton’s to collect our life raft which was shipped there.
Thanks to Rich for letting us borrow his Jeep!
Did some provisioning, laundry, lunch and coffee. Off to Beaufort tomorrow.



Snakes and Ladders...

Sunday 25th October, anchor at mile 127 to Oriental NC, mile 182 (53 miles)

Made a break for Oriental, headed down the Pungo River, across the Pamlico River, through Goose Creek into Bay River then finally turning into the Neuse River and into Oriental. Had a great motor sail steady 8 knots for most of the day and into a slip at the Oriental Harbor.

We had drinks on board sv Dana with hosts Jim and Bonnie. Went to M&M's for dinner.

Moira the navigator...



Downhill the Neuse River hitting high 8's motorsailing.

Saturday 24th October, remained at Anchor, mile 127 (0 miles)

Decided to stay put this day as the winds were building from 15 to 20 up to 35knots. Our anchor was well dug in, so we decided to do some housekeeping and chill out. We cracked our latest investment a hand cranked pressure washing machine and decided to give it a whirl. To my poorer judgment I should have tried to tackle a smaller item, but decided to wash our duvet cover, bad move. No soon was the doonner washed when the winds really kicked up, the spinnaker that Jorgen had been dreaming about come to fruition. The life lines soon became a spinnaker pole and the doonner cover ballooned to life. Folks don’t try this at home stick to the laundry facilities at the marinas.

Pink sky in the morning, sailor HTFU...



Trying to dry sheets in 35 kts - brilliant idea...

Friday 23 October, E City to Pungo River, mile 127 (77 Miles)

Up at 6:00 as usual and left the dock at dusk around 7:00. Tim and Diane apparently saw our running lights disappear on the Elizabeth City Harbor Cam. It was a glorious morning and the conditions were perfect for crossing the Albemarle Sound, which is notorious for being nasty in a blow. Fantastic crossing over Albemarle Sound steaming at 7.5 knots under motor blowing past everyone, go motor boat Querencia. Making good headway we decided to push through the Alligator - Pungo River Canal for a good nine hour trip.

We decided to anchor that night in a little creek at the end of the canal as we were running out of steam and a stinker storm was brewing from the South.

Getting out of Dodge:



They call me the wild rose...



Sham wow...



Crispy skies - nice hat dude...



Mad woman boat driver...

Thursday 22 October, Visitor center – Elizabeth City (20 Miles)

Up at 06:30 for another early start. Cast of at 07:30 and headed for South Mills lock about 3 miles up the canal to make the 08:30 locking time.

The dismal swamp canal is sort of a three dimensional navigation experience.

The canal is narrow so you have to make sure you stay in the middle.
It is also shallow so make sure you do not run aground. The third dimension is the trees which you have to keep and eye on so the mast or the rig does not hit any branches. We bumped several submerged logs which felt like running over some large road kill. The water is so dark from the tannins that visibility is approximately 1.5 inches

Another smooth locking, we headed to Elisabeth City like ducks in row.

Got to Elisabeth City around lunch time and docked at the free city dock only to find out that the fat boat Querencia is hard to squeeze into 14’ wide slip. With our beam being 13’6”, we had 2” to spare on each side of the boat. Oh well, out we backed and re-docked the ship in a wider and longer slip, skipper needed the practice anyhow.

Elisabeth City will let you stay for free at the city dock for 48 hrs and they are extremely hospitable to cruisers. They have a 25 year old tradition were the serve wine and cheese on the dock and the Rose Buddies give a rose to the Lady on each boat.

That night we had Kevin and Karen over for dinner on Querencia. They tasted great with some fava beans and Chianti, only joking Clarisse, we still had provisions. Roast lamb with sweet potatoes and a couple of bottle of wines were consumed.

Quack, Quack - All duckies in a nice row:



Gettin' locked, Dude:



Where the feck are we?:



Hey, who's driving?



Double Bascule, anyone?



Moira in E City:



Thanks to Fred and Joe, the original Rose Buddies:

Wednesday 21 October, Portsmouth – Dismal Swamp Visitor Center mile marker 27 (30 Miles)

We cast off around 07:30 and headed down the Elizabeth River to catch the bridge openings at 08:30. Perfect timing, we got there just as the bridge opened. Just after the high bridge over Interstate 64 we hung a sharp right in to the Dismal swamp canal.

The dismal swamp canal is man made and maintained by the Army Corps of Engineers.
The canal stretches for some 30 miles and you have to pass thru two locks.

We got to the Deep Creek Lock early and anchored in the canal to wait for an 11:00 locking procedure. The locking was uneventful but the lock was packed to the gills with boats, I think we had 13 boats in the lock. Talked about getting locked!

Once through the lock we steamed for the VA/NC visitor center were you can tie up for free to a bulkhead. The bulkhead is only 150’ long so we had to raft up to other boats. The raft was 3 boats deep for a total of 9 boats, now that’s the makings of a party!

Cocktail hour at 16:30 were we for to meet the rafted cruisers.

We were rafted up to Stan and Judy on Rhumb Runner and sandwiched between had Kevin and Karen on Dream Seeker (a beautiful Tayana 37)

Kevin won the most Coordinated Cruiser award with his orange bandana and orange crocs! Go Kevin

Norfolk at Dusk while sippin morning Irish Coffee:



Mad dash out of Portsmouth / Norfolk to make the bridge openings:



The bridge gauntlet:



The Wife waiting for the Deep Creek Lock to open:



Rafting chaos at the visitor center:

Tuesday 20 October, Norfolk – Portsmouth VA (20 Miles)

We finally managed to get going! Yeeehah!

Our first day was an easy one from Norfolk down to Portsmouth we planned to stage for an early departure the next day to head down the Dismal Swamp Canal.

Passed mile marker 0, the red buoy 36 on the Elisabeth River, which marks the start of the ICW (Intracoastal Water Way), just before Portsmouth. This is the statute mile marker for our 1090 mile trip south to Miami.

We got into P-town pretty early around 13:00 and enjoyed a walk around historic downtown in the beautiful sunny weather.

A couple of pics of us leaving Bay Point Marina, courtesy of our neighbour photographer, David Hook:

Sitting at the dock of the bay...

Righto, been sittin' around here for a while.

I went to School a couple of days in September. Slowed us down and made me remember why we're doing this crazy thing.

Most things are done now, Jameson is on the boat and the Wife provisioned a lot of tucker today.

Emptying the remnants of a once decent wine cellar tomorrow and tranferring the contents to Q.

Looking forward to those 2000 Barolos. And the vertical of Almavivas!

We hope to leave on on Thursday but a cold front is coming thru so we might delay a couple of days.

Cabin fever....

Querencia out and back to one six.

PS Next couple of posts should have more pictorial content. Bear with us. Cheers. DS

Annapolis Boat Show

What a show - we hooked up with Magic,Chessie,Painkiller and Quantum Leap for an exciting time of musical boats. Having cheated by driving to Annapolis we got the experience of dragging anchor on other peoples boats (sorry Magic). Note to self, don't take your boat to the boat show, unless you have plenty of bubblewrap.

Jorgen here. OK - next boat - Outbound 52. Good ship that one!

Made a few minor purchases such as Viking Life Raft (Go Danes!). Thanks Karen for looking after us.

Had a lot of fun in NAP. Got to se Andy's new ship, Painkiller.

Again, Thanks to T&D for your fantastic hospitality!!!

The Shake Down & Adventure Preparations

To our faithful followers - It's been a while since we posted new information, but frankly we've been running around like headless chooks (ie:aussie chicken, for you gringos). Anyhow, we packed on the necessary gear and headed down the York River for our shake down cruise. Our intent was to head up north from Yorktown once we had expired our livers at the Fleet 30 session. Trapped by bad weather and lack of availabilities at the Betty Ford clinic, we were stuck at York River Yacht Haven for 5 days, crack out the Monopoly lads!

Jorgen here,the good thing is we had a club race. Crewing under the steady hand of Skipper Shanks on the smallest boat in the race, Thrillseeker, we took line honors and won the race. Go Andy!

Thanks Jorgen - that explains part of the liver expiration. Looking for creative ways to spend our time Maria decided to make a quiche for breakfast. Without even cracking an egg we still managed a mini gas explosion. This was the quiche that saved our arscisicous, (arse- gringos). Thanks to the local boat yard we had the expertise of gas guru John Phillips, it turned out we had a whopper leak in our gas line - close call and new underwear was required soon thereafter. Thanks John for sorting out our major gas problem.

Jorgen back, after the mini nuclear blast we were ready for some grape consumption. Met a lovely couple of SAC's (South African Charmers)on ZURI, a Prout catamaran, and according to Estelle we had a few bottle of red that night ;-)/.

Finally we departed hotel California AKA York River Yacht Haven and spent a couple of lovely nights on the East River in Mobjack Bay before returning to Norfolk.