23-25 Jan Fernandina, FL

 

   We arrived at Fernandina, Fl, just before sunset on the 23rd and quickly anchored inside the inlet off the paper mill in protected waters. The next day we ended up just sitting, reading and resting onboard as the wind and waves were just strong enough to promise a wet ride to shore so we decided to just recuperate after the 36hr transit from South Carolina.

   It was also nice to enjoy the 70 degree weather, just sitting reading in the cockpit enjoying the sun.

   The next day we moved down the river and anchored off the city marina. Its a short dinghy ride from here to the town dock and the wind was down enough to give us a dry ride to town.

   We've spent enough time in Fernandina, back when we had our transmission rebuilt over 30 days, then our heat exchanger replaced over 7 days, so we know our favorite spots to hit during our short visit this time.  It was nice to visit Fernandina and not need anything fixed on the boat this time.

   First stop in the morning was the Aloha Bagel shop. We had a toasted bagel for breakfast and picked up a half dozen jalapeno cheese bagels to take with us.

   Next stop was the farmer's vegetable market (sorry, no photo) where Sue picked up a few items, then on to the Amelia Island Coffee shop. Outside the coffee shop you can sit at a nice park and use their free wifi to download more Kindle books and Netflix shows, while drinking their great coffee. 

      Lunch was at Timoti's, our favorite eating spot. They have outdoor seating which we need since we have Rivah with us and great seafood baskets and sides. I had the shrimp basket and Sue had black beans side dish. 

   It was a sunny day, 70 degrees. Nice to finally be warm and wearing one layer of clothing. Soon it will be shorts and t-shirt weather.

   After lunch and a walk around, it was on to the Amelia Island Brewing Company and a flight of their choice drafts. 

   If we had another day in town we would visit the First Love brewery and restaurant and have their smash burgers and drafts, but we are moving on to St Augustine in the morning.

   A couple of interesting sights at the marina - one being the Spanish Nao Trinidad which is a replica of Magellan's flagship which he embarked on to sail around the world in 1521. The Nao Trinidad actually didn't make the whole trip, it had to be abandoned in the Pacific. Only the Nao Victoria made it back to Spain.

   We had previously seen this ship in St Augustine a couple years back and took a tour onboard. I would much rather cross the ocean in our 38ft Island Packet Tides Inn than on this boat. Even the crew members told us this boat was a terrible sailing experience providing a very uncomfortable ride in any significant wind and waves. 

   The other interesting boat was the Ohana ocean rowing craft. We watched the crew rowing this boat out in the river a couple times. It is designed to row across the oceans. In 2023 a team of 3 rowed from California to Hawaii in 36 days. This year they plan to row from Texas to Florida in the Spring and then from Portugal to Florida next winter. It has 3 rowing stations and 1 sleeping area.

Again, I would rather be crossing the ocean in Tides Inn.

21-22 Jan - Ocean Transit to Florida

    Heading out to sea at the Winyah Bay Inlet at Georgetown, SC on a very cold, clear day. This was the coldest day yet this trip with morning temperature about 26 degrees. The sun is starting to heat our enclosed cockpit area and it is about 42 inside. Not looking forward to this evening when the sun sets - but at least the ocean temperature will be about 50. 

   Its about a 36hr trip to St Mary's Inlet on the Florida/Georgia border. This ocean leg lets us cut 330 miles off the ICW trip which winds it way through the SC and GA marshlands and saves about 6 days of transit time. 

   The good news was we timed the outgoing current well and rode a 2kt push all the way down the Waccamaw River. The bad news was we arrived at the inlet too soon and had wind against the current raising 3-4ft waves on the nose. Not as bad as a previous trip but still had a few instances of green water coming over the bow. 

   As we got out to sea the winds were 15kts from astern but the waves were flowing against the outgoing tidal current and the 4-5ft waves had very steep faces. It was a rough ride for a few hours, but we did get some sailing in.

    After a few hours, and a change in the tidal current direction, things settled down and the sun heated our cockpit up to a comfortable 50+ degrees.    However, as the wind diminished and clocked further astern, we had to restart the engine and motor to keep our speed up and arrival time before dark tomorrow.

   With the winds astern it was still a rolly ride, not very comfortable, but we were still heading on course towards the sun and warmer weather.

   A very pretty sunset, "red sky at night, sailor's delight", and we did have good weather all the next day as predicted. Actually, I was watching the weather and wind forecasts carefully before departure and had picked this 2 day weather window as the best time to transit offshore to Florida. By the 23rd the wind comes around to the south and not conducive to sailing southward. 

   Sailing (motoring) downwind has been very rolly and we are not feeling all that great, but no contributions to Neptune over the side so far.

   With no sun and no heat its the coldest night we have spent at sea ever, temperature in the low 30s.

    How tight can a Lab curl herself up to stay warm? We did bring her blanket up so she could avoid the cold fiberglass. She has 2 beds down below but she wants to be wherever we are so its the cockpit for the night. Sue and I were huddled up on the other settee opposite Rivah under multiple blankets and layers of clothing. 

   The autopilot steers the boat as we huddle under the blankets. The main issue is cold feet as all the cold air settles to the bottom of the cockpit where your feet are.

   We had to maneuver to avoid a merchant ship heading into Charleston but that was the only close encounter while offshore. We saw a couple ships coming and going from Savannah but none came close by. 

   We got to use our new red LED lighting below for our transit. It was very useful to be able to see clearly below but keep your night vision in the cockpit. The light bulbs alternate between white and red each time you turn them on, so they serve dual use. Nice new technology.

   After a long, cold and rolly night the sun was out again and warming up the cockpit. We were able to take off several layers and return to one long sleeved jersey in the 60 degree cockpit. We could also fold up the 4 blankets and store them away for the next trip south next year. No need for those (we would hope) in the Bahamas.

   By the end of the day, the outside temperature was nearing 60 degrees as well. We have finally made it to the land of the warm. I'm sure Florida residents think 60 is pretty cold but we thought it was great.

   We still have all day to motor to reach St Mary's and the waves are still uncomfortably rolling us side to side but we will be in before dark if all goes well.

   Anchored off Fernandina, Fl. We got in at 1800, just before dark and anchored right away off the paper mill. It was great to jump into bed with the temperature a balmy 55 degrees. We got a good 12hours of sleep after the 36hr passage. 

   Today its warm and rainy (versus clear and cold) and a good day to just rest on the boat and get caught up on the blog and restoring gear and items thrown around down below with all the rocking and rolling. Overall, a successful passage with no untoward incidents. The best kind.

   We'll tour Fernandina tomorrow then continue our trek southward. Next stop is St Augustine. And we're finally in the 60-70 degree weather for the next 10 days of forecasts. 

18-21 Jan Wacca Wachee, SC

    Heading south out of Holden Beach, its first through the Calabash crossroads, then Little River, then Myrtle Beach congested areas. We had to motor fast to get through the Barefoot Landing swing bridge at 1100 which is on restricted hours due to maintenance, but we just made it - a few minutes late but they waited for us as we were the only boat going through at that time.  Its unusual for a bridge to delay the opening but it was 3 hours to the next opening and the operator said they were trying to be very accommodating. 

Soon we were in the Waccamaw River, the most scenic section of the ICW.

   In the Spring this is a beautiful passage when the leaves and buds are out. In January, its a bit grey but still has its unique beauty. 

   We're down south with Spanish Moss hanging from the cypress forests. Spooky on a grey day, but scenic on a bright, blue sky day.

   We anchor at the intersection of the Waccamaw River and Cow Island oxbow. In the spring, we usually anchor behind Cow Island in the oxbow to get away from the ICW traffic but, in January there is almost no traffic and plenty of room to anchor just off the ICW. We anchored just to the left of the small power boat which has been in this same spot the last 5 years. 

   The anchorage is directly across from the Wacca Wache Marina where we refueled up as they have the cheapest diesel prices on the ICW. We also needed to fill up the water tanks as we will be heading out to the ocean and on to Florida when we leave here.

   We were fortunate to come in just a couple hours before they turned the water off as it is forecasted to go well below freezing the next couple nights.

   We anchored for one night then noted that the nightly temperatures for the next two nights were 28 and 26 degrees. That's a bit cold with no heat onboard and we have to be careful the cockpit shower hoses and nozzle don't freeze, so we decided we better head over to the marina and plug into shore power.    It was a nice stop and nice to have heat and hot showers. They had a good restaurant onsite so it was beers and appetizers each night. 

   Sunday morning we're off for Florida. We'll be leaving in 26 degree weather and arriving in 66 degrees.

15-16 Jan - Holden Beach

    Another blue skies morning with crisp temperatures but no wind. I tell Sue, you can have it "clear and cold" or "warm and rainy" on these winter trips. Your choice. 

   One change, now that we are retired and not on any schedule, is we can sit at anchor or in a marina when the wind and storms blow through and wait for the good transiting weather. This has significantly reduced the stress level of traveling the ICW.

   Here we are entering Snow's Cut which connects the ICW along the Outer Banks with the Cape Fear River. This used to be a quite treacherous section with strong currents and a winding old river bed path but, it has been dredged and is plenty deep now. You just have to follow the buoys and take the current into consideration as you maneuver through. 

   We came through the cut and entered the Cape Fear River. This can be a tough section of water when the wind is against the current but today we had basically no wind and only 1kt of opposing current.

   As we entered the river we had a tug and barge alongside, both of us traveling downriver at about 5kts. Fortunately the river is plenty wide.

   There was a lot of traffic on the Cape Fear River. In addition to the tug and barge next to us, there were two different ferries shuttling across the river and three large merchant ships that came up the river during our 3hr transit down to Southport. 

   Getting to Holden Beach requires successfully passing through the Lockwood's Folly inlet area where there is always bad shoaling and navigation buoys out of position. Normally, green buoys go down your port side and red buoys on the right as you proceed southerly on the ICW. But this Green buoys ahead is not an ICW buoy. It is a Lockwood's Folly inlet buoy that has been blown off-station into the ICW, so you need to disregard it. 

   The great news is that new internet technology is letting boaters collaborate on sharing information on the safe channels along the ICW. There is now a "safest course track" available on the internet you can load on your tablets and chartplotters and boaters share information to keep you informed how accurate the track is. There is a complex track through Lockwood's Folly that you follow that takes you safely through the shoals. Also, we came through just after high tide so we saw deep water the whole way through our transit.

  At Holden Beach we were able to meet up with two of my brothers and their wives. Can you see any family resemblance? We had a great time snacking, reminiscing and playing dominos. 

   Sue loves Holden beach for the shells. She was up at 0630 to walk the beach at low tide and came back with a bucket full of shells. We then walked again that afternoon and picked up another bucket full. 

   Tomorrow we are off for the Wacamaw River. Weather reports say we have a couple of cold nights ahead. At least tonight (forecast for 27 degrees) we will be plugged in and have our heater running. 

12-15 Jan - Beaufort, Hammock Bay and Masonboro, NC

 

   We stayed 3 days and 4 nights at Mayo Seafood waiting out the passage of the major winter storm with multiple embedded tornados in the south. 

   After the storm front had passed and another day waiting for the strong westerly winds to die down we headed out and up the Neuse River for several hours before turning south into Adams Creek.

   The sun was out and the winds were light. We were able to sail for a couple hours before we had to turn and head up into the wind up the Neuse.

   We spent a quiet night anchored off Sugar Loaf Island off Morehead City in the Beaufort, NC area. It was a bit cool jumping into bed, about 50 degrees. The nighttime temp was about 45 but once you have the bed warmed up it is toasty under all the blankets. The next morning when we raised the anchor we had a hitchhiker clinging to our anchor. 

   The next morning we were off for Hammock bay, our anchorage halfway down to Wrightsville. There is one shallow spot in Bogue Sound along the way and as we approached it we saw this tug, basically stopped, right at the shallow water spot. There is not room to go around him so we had to wait for him to clear the area. 

   It took him awhile to feel his way through the shallow water. We asked him what water depth he was seeing and he told us he has a 8ft keel and was plowing through the sand. We only need 5ft so once he cleared we were able to proceed through without any problems.

   Passing through Swansboro. Sue loves this tiny house on the island off Swansboro. You can only access by boat. Not sure what they do, if anything, for electricity. 

   There's one opening bridge to pass through today, the Onslow Beach bridge. They are putting a new bascule bridge in to replace the old and slow swing bridge. Sometimes the barges are blocking the waterway but we didn't have any problem getting through.

   We arrived at the Hammock Bay anchorage in the mid-afternoon. No other boats in sight. That's good as there are strong winds coming tonight and we will have to put out 150+ft of anchor chain. In the Spring, this anchorage is always crowded and that much anchor chain and resulting swing room could be a problem. 

   The wind did blow at 20-25kts all night and most of the next day, so we stayed put. Fortunately the temperatures were not bad with 60s in our enclosed cockpit and 40 at night. We decided not to bother getting the generator set up to heat our blanket. We do have a small 12volt electric blanket that Sue heated up and put in the bed and quickly jumped in before it cooled off. I guess next year we should mount a 12v outlet up in the bedroom.

    After waiting a day for the winds to die down, we were now off for Masonboro. It was good we waited for the winds to die down as there were two shallow and complicated ICW sections to pass through and I would not have wanted to go aground with 20+kts of wind blowing us further aground. We made it through without any problems but it was still a little white knuckled. 

   There are multiple dredges working along the ICW. Here we are passing a tug and barge towing the dredging pipes to another work area. 

   We arrived at Masonboro mid-afternoon and just about low tide. Our first attempt to get into the anchorage area ran us aground into a 3ft deep sandbar. We were able to back off, then go further down the ICW and come into the anchorage area from the other end successfully.

  There's always work to be done on a boat. As they say, cruising is performing boat maintenance in exotic places. We were sitting at anchor when we heard a thump and noted fresh water being drained into the bilge. As I suspected, the hot water hose going to the cockpit shower had come off the T junction. We had to unload the back room to get access to the hot water tank hoses. It's easiest for Sue to work back there in the cramped spaces. Sure enough, the hose was unconnected. It should have been a simple job to put it back on and tighten the clamp, but it turned out the reason it popped off was the clamp would not fit properly because the other clamps were in the way. I had to readjust the other two clamps, then I could push the 3rd clamp properly up tight against the T and properly secure it.  All fixed in a short time and we had running fresh water again. Now to restore all our provisions in the back room.

   It was a fairly mild night in the low 50s for our 4th night at anchor. Tomorrow we are off for Holden Beach and will pull into the town dock and plug in to electricity for the next couple nights.

   

   

6-10 Jan - Dowry Creek and Hobucken, NC

    It's been a bad 5-day stretch of weather so we have been holing up in marinas, both to have electrical power to run the heater and to avoid anchoring in high winds (and cold weather).

   We spent 2 days at Dowry Creek waiting for a front to blow through on the 6th. For several hours the winds came from the southeast where our dock slip was exposed to the building waves, but by mid-afternoon the wind had clocked to the south where we had protection. 

   Staying two days gave us two opportunities to check out the craft beers and appetizers at the new marina restaurant. This will be a routine stopping place in the future.

    On the 7th, the winds were down and the sun out and we were able to sail and motor sail across the Pamlico River for the short trip to Hobucken, where we will hole up for 3 more days as a particularly strong storm front blows through. 

   This is the Mayo Seafood docks in Hobucken. It is mainly a commercial shrimp boat facility but they let recreation boaters tie up on the end of the dock. Its a bit rough but they have power which means heat for us and the price is right - $15 per night - which is good since we will be here for 4 nights. 

   Its not really the Women's latrine anymore, they have bathrooms inside the ship's store but, it fits in with the local atmosphere. I guess at one time is was the working Lady's room. Funny there's no Men's room. Guess they had to go onboard the shrimp boats.

   The storm front came through on Tuesday afternoon and evening. Of course the strongest winds came at 9pm, always in the dark. 

  All afternoon we had 20kt winds pushing us against the dock pylons but, fortunately the waves were only about 1ft with the protection we had in the canal. 

   We were able to position are 10in fenders to keep us off the dock and they did there job.

   We were a bit worried as the wind was forecasted to go to 30-35kts with higher gusts and that would build the waves up even higher but, to our great relief, when the higher winds came they had clocked to the south, directly astern, and that kept the boat off from the dock. By 9pm the wind was steady at 30+kts with higher gusts into the 40s. We had one severe gust that I was able to record at 58.8kts. I was watching the multiple tornados on my phone radar picture and happy to see none coming near us. By 10pm the front was through and the wind had shifted to the SW pushing us well away from the dock and dying back down to the 20s. We had a Baileys on ice and celebrated our successful weathering the storm with no damages.

   Morning came with blue skies but still stiff winds from the west, again pushing us off the dock.

   We had doubled up our bow, stern and spring lines but didn't have any problems. Better safe than sorry. There sure was a lot of creaking and straining on those lines during the night.

   We were able to walk each day we were at Hobucken. Here is a shot from up on the bridge looking at the whole facility. That is us tied up way on the end of the dock. 

   The winds were still brisk from the west on the 10th, so it was not a good day to bash westerly up the Neuse River. We will be off tomorrow early to motor on down to Beaufort, NC. 

5 Jan - Alligator River Anchorage to Belhaven, NC

    Up and underway and into the Alligator-Pungo River canal on another crisp and sunny day.  It's only a 5hr trip to Belhaven so we didn't have to depart early. We spent that extra morning time in bed under the covers where it was nice and warm.

  It was 48 down below when we jumped into bed last night at 8pm with PJs on under 2 blankets and a comforter.  The bed quickly warms up and I was shedding PJs and 1 blanket during the night. But, with the inside temp at 39 in the morning, it was great to stay under the covers until time to depart at 9am.

   We do have a Honda generator that we can set up and it will run our electric blanket to heat the bed before we jump in but, it's a cold job getting the generator out and setup on the bow and not that bad biting the bullet for just a few minutes getting into the cold bed and warming it up with body heat. Not a problem for one night. Although Sue reminds me each time we do this, she doesn't know anyone else that would agree to this without complaining.

   This trip through the canal we saw 5 bald eagles. We normally see 1 or 2 but this was a new high. They always look majestic. 

   Also, this trip we saw a flock of 7 all-white snow geese for the first time. At first we thought they were swans but, as we got closer we could see they are not as big as swans and have a thicker and shorter neck. 

  With the sun out it warmed up quite toasty in the cockpit. The thermometer in the direct sunlight said 82degrees but I think it was closer to about 70 actually. By this time we had taken off 3 layers of clothes from our departure from the anchorage at 32 degrees. 

   Its a 5hr trip to Belhaven and Rivah spends most of the time laying in the sun. 

   Yes, it is a fact that ocean levels are rising around the planet and not some fake news from leftist environmentalists. Today the trees are dying from the rising salt water levels. In the future, we humans need to start getting more serious about what we are going to do about global warming. We have been warned but like typical humans we tend to just ignore inconvenient facts. 

   Soon we are approaching our next stop at Dowry Creek Marina. Easy entrance to our slip with no wind or current. We were soon tied up and plugged in with heat on.

   We are planning to stay here for 2 nights as the weather is going to be bad tomorrow. There restaurant is now open so we will have to check it out. Hopefully it's good as this is a nice place to stop along the ICW trek through North Carolina. 

4 Jan Coinjock to Alligator River Anchorage, NC

   We're off across the Albemarle Sound and conditions are ideal right now. We motored down the North River from Coinjock for 3hours with no wind. As we entered the open waters of the Albemarle, the wind is picking up from the northwest. Ideal for us as that wind is off the starboard quarter and the waves are still mild from the shore protection. We soon secured the engine and were sailing at a good clip across the Sound.

   It's only a couple hours across the Sound and that was a good thing as the wind and waves continued to build as we sailed across. You can't see large wave heights in photos but basically we went from 1-2ft to 3-4ft over the 2hr passage. By the time we arrived at the Alligator River entrance, the wind was up to 20-25kts, the waves over 4ft and we were surfing down waves at speeds over 8kt.  Given that the maximum hull speed of our boat is 7.2kts, this was impressive and some of the fastest sailing we've ever done. Good thing it was downwind and no bashing, only rocking.

   It was a bit tricky doing the S-curve entrance into the Alligator River without jibing the mainsail but, we made it. Inside the protection of the river shore we continued to sail at 7+kts with the waves back down to 1-2ft. 

   At that speed it was only 20mins to the Alligator River swing bridge. No problem with a timely opening there and we motor-sailed through with the main out and the motor running.  Then we secured the engine and sailed 3 hrs down to our anchorage at 7kts. Our best trip yet across the Albemarle.

   There are no convenient marinas between Coinjock and Belhaven so, this is the one night we have to anchor out. This is a photo of the shore from our anchorage. We are about 1000ft from shore; it is too shallow to get any closer but, this is close enough to get protection from the big waves being blown down the river from the NW winds. We are tucked up against the northern shoreline and you can see the waves are less than a foot. The wind is forecast to die down after dark and that's what it did.  Ready for a frigid night - will let you know how it turned out in the next blog.