Thursday, October 20, 2016

Day 17 - Beaufort to Southport, NC - Westward Ho!

Beaufort to Southport, NC.


So, piracy is a main theme of this town.  Beaufort is where Blackbeard reigned and his ship, Queen Anne's Revenge, is shipwrecked just off the inlet.  
Blackbeard and me

Check it out on Wikipedia or whatever.

Weather permitting, the plan for today was to run outside. Not only does it move the voyage along if the weather is fair, it also makes sense because the ICW has a number unsettled issues remaining from hurricane Matthew. The waters are still high from the storm and we are just coming off a full moon so the tides are running extreme. In fact, tomorrow we have to deal with a bridge that is still unable to open until the waters recede some more.


We lucked out with another beautiful day and left Beaufort after breakfast at 0730. Beaufort Town Docks are so conveniently located to the inlet.  We were in open ocean in no time.


Flat calm outside for once

Outside the inlet we had only 2-4 foot swells at 10-12 second intervals and light winds. We set a course for Masonboro Inlet on the autopilot and started to take watches.  We ran about 5 to 6 hours outside, the first half of a very long day. 
Dolphin watch


Making time

We went back into the ICW through the Masonboro Inlet and proceeded down around Cape Fear to Southport for the evening. 


After going through the inlet, which was exciting in and of itself, (we wished we'd had pics of that). But then again there's a reason why we don't have many pictures of the exciting times -we're dealing with the exciting times! :)


Heading 240 WSW


Nearing the Inlet- Wrightsville Beach

Once we were back in the Intracoastal Waterway, we still had 2-3 hours, depending on current, traffic, etc.  Some tricky spots but relatively easy motoring.  At one point we were running with the current at over 15 knots at only 2300 rpms.


Remnants of Matthe

After fueling up at Southport Marina, (no vacancy) we made our way down to South Harbor Village Marina, quite a nice spot with two restaurants.  Right after showering, as we returned to the boat, a really fun thing occurred. We had visitors from Chebeague!  It turns out Jen (Putnam) and Ian Cummings live down here now and saw our whereabouts on this blog and came by to visit!  We had a beer aboard and made connections.  Fun!

Might try to make Georgetown tomorrow but it's a greater distance than today's of 90+nm. However, there's some talk of rain and increasing winds in the afternoon so we'll play it by ear.






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