Day Ten - Wednesday, 28 November

Tonight we ended the day tied up to the dock at the Sanitary Restaurant in Morehead City, NC...a run of 45 miles. There is room for only three boats and Marisol and Windreka are tied up along with a classic wooden schooner that pulled in after we did. We passed under the US 70 and Beaufort and Morehead City Railroad Bridges and arrived at the dock at 2:30 PM. Woody and Joe got a ride to the Morehead City West Marine store furnished by the manager, Steve. Woody needed Racor filters to keep cleaning the dirty fuel he took on some time ago and Joe needed a new VHF cockpit microphone and a new rechargeable handheld VHF radio to replace the broken and aging ones we've been trying to use, missing calls, etc.

Windreka departed Bear Creek anchorage at 7:15 AM and followed Marisol who had departed the R.E. Mayo dock and passed us as we were raising our anchor. Windreka makes a little better speed than Marisol and so we caught up with her toward the end of the day.

We spent most of the day on the Neuse River with the NE wind either on our port side or behind us. It was a rocking rolling trip down the river but at least we were going south instead of bashing into the waves like the tug and barge at left. We were happy to turn into the Adams Creek Canal and Adams Creek where we had the shelter of the surrounding trees. At the end of Adams Creek we emerged into a strong tidal current at Core Creek. We crossed the shallows surrounding the channels leading to Beaufort, NC to the north and Morehead City, NC to the south. We made almost a U-turn around the Terminals to find the channel on the south side and the Sanitary Restaurant dock on our Starboard side. With the wind trying to push us away from the town dock, we tied up at the restaurant and squared away the boat.

This Boat Discovered A Really Bad Way to End the Day

After our trip to West Marine, we had a fresh seafood meal in the restaurant and returned to the boat to get ready for departure tomorrow. It's a simple life we are leading now and our schedule is driven by the need to move the boat during daylight hours...hence the early rising and early to bed...and the urge to keep warm now that the temperature has shifted to more seasonal cooler weather again...fair but cool.

Our floating "village" today consisted of only Marisol and Windreka and respective crews. We remained in radio contact with most of them, but their destination was Oriental, NC...a popular stop for ICW cruisers. Our schedule is driven by the need to get Windreka to Dataw Island Marina so we can get home for the holidays.