A Multi-event Day ............... and Night Before!

This daily blog starts with the night before. One of the large tug and barge setups with lots of dredging equipment came by Coinjock as we were getting ready for bed. It is quite a sight to see these large vessels pass by on a narrow channel in pitch black dark. They were going slow, but had lots of lights on and a spotlight that continuously panned from side to side. I got a couple pictures after it had gone by, but I missed getting any pictures of the other one that went by around 2am. Both of them went through Great Bridge Lock on Friday after we did. They move slowly, so it took them many hours to catch up with us. We got up at 6am and had breakfast, before I added some gear oil to the pods and prepared for getting underway. The Seakeeper, a gyroscopic stabilizer (very expensive option) was showing a fault code and would not start up. We were hoping to have it if the Albemarle Sound was choppy during the crossing. Fortunately, the Sound was perfectly flat and the Seakeeper was unneeded. Unfortunately, after talking on the phone to the Seakeeper dealer in Annapolis, the problem requires the services of a technician and may need a replacement part. Right now I'm thinking it's going to be expensive, but we will wait until we get to Jacksonville to deal with it. The boat will run fine without it. We left Coinjock around 8:00am. Things were fine at the marina, but a little ways down the waterway we entered thick fog. Our least favorite thing. ​

The fog burned off after a while and after winding through the North River we entered the Albemarle Sound. We passed an unidentifiable paddle wheeler while crossing the Sound and then came across the remains of a sunken boat right before entering the Alligator River and going through the Alligator River Swing Bridge.

We arrived at the Dowry Creek Marina in Belhaven, NC around 4:00pm. The wind was kicking up a little bit, but we got tied up safely. This is a friendly family-run marina. They work very hard to satisfy their customers and go the extra mile. Martha likes that they put towels in the bathrooms for the boaters. We haven't seen that before. When we were here in the Fall of 2020, they were in the process of building a restaurant. It is completed now and was pretty busy. One of the slipholders here is the featured music in the restaurant, so we decided to eat there rather than on the boat as we usually do. He did a nice job singing as well as playing piano and trumpet. ​

Tomorrow we will head to Washington, NC to catch up with a friend from college. We will be off the ICW for the night, but we thought that it was worth it since we were in the neighborhood. Weather is supposed to get a little rough this week. We'll see what develops.