Century Club: Tom Dean

Began our trip south from Lankford Bay Marina to warmer areas.  Not sure our final destination area - could be the keys, could be the Bahamas... but we tossed off the dock lines and headed off.  First stop Herring Bay - but wind changed direction and it was much stronger than forecast (NWS didn't get it right... again), so we picked up the anchor at midnight on Sunday and headed down to Mill Creek in Solomons. 

Monday, we headed south and anchored in Dividing Creek, where we stayed an extra day because of bad weather.

Wednesday we left Dividing Creek and sailed down to Chisman Creek off the York river.  Nice little anchorage - much bigger than it seemed on the charts - but a long way in and a longer way out.  At least wasn't going in the wrong direction!

Thursday we left Chisman Creek and headed for our first marina of the trip - Tidewater Yacht Marina at Mile 0 in Portsmouth.

Friday we took off down the ICW.  Didn't pull out until 8pm because we knew we had to wait for the first bridge opening at 8:30 - which was held up a while because of Amtrak (the RR bridge is right on the other side of the Gilmerton Bridge and the Gilmerton bridge won't open until the RR bridge opens. Continued heading down, got to the Great Bridge Lock just as it was opening for traffic - so we went right in. Looked at a few possible anchorages for the evening - but all looked sketchy - so we tied up at Coinjack Marina.

Left Coinjock at 8am on Saturday morning headed down the ICW and into the Alligator river where we anchored right before the Alligator/Pongo river canal. Lovely anchorage, lovely sunset, no alligators!

Pulled anchor on Sunday at 7am to head down the canal into the Pongo river - short day as we stayed in the basin outside of Belhaven.

Left Belhaven early Monday morning, headed down the Pongo, crossed the Pamlico and into the Neuse river - which on Monday was calm.  Got the sail up a bit which was nice both on the Pongo and Neuse as well as some stretches along the Albemarle Sound and Pongo rivers.  Was planning to go into Oriental, but the wind was going to start coming out of the NE and rather strongly and Oriental looked a bit exposed, so opted for the South River.

Tuesday morning, October 8, we left the South River.... had a bit of a rough go of it coming out of the south river and around the rather large slough. The NWS called it a "moderate chop" with winds 10-15.  Actually, winds were 15-20 with gusts over 25, seas 2 foot +.  In the Chesapeake - this would have at least been a SCA if not a bit more, but here - only "moderate chop" - interesting. Finally turned going downwind got some sail up and headed for the canal down to Beaufort/Morehead City, where we got a slip at Beaufort Docks (very affordable!!)

Now, waiting for Milton to pass as we plan to go out and around down to Wrightsville Beach - a 12 hour passage outside.

Figured the first mate needed to know how to both raise and lower the main - just in case - so we took off out of the slip and headed into Langford creek to practice. With the boat on autopilot (and trying to avoid some of the crabbers) I demonstrated both the raise and lower the main - with proper flaking.... and then gave her a chance. She got it up pretty quickly and did well to avoid the lazy jacks, but coming down was an issue, so we turned around and I demonstrated again - with the boat on autopilot. She did fine the second time - flaking it pretty well!. It was a short outing, there was no wind to speak of, but a necessary one...just in case I am ever knocked off the boat and she has to rescue me!

Had spent the past few days working on making sunscreens for the cockpit and changing over the batteries from lead acid to lifepo4 batteries - and I needed to get out and sail.  Wind was out of the E-NE at 10 knots with sunny skies.  When we pulled out of the slip at 2:45 it was 82 degrees and the barometer was at 30.22.  Got the sails up after entering Langford Creek and sailed all the way down the Chester towards Eastern Neck Island.  Saw lots of other sailboats coming our way - some were staying at our home marina - Lankford Bay marina. Turned around about 3:45 and headed back on a beam reach (as we had sailed down) and we were back in the slip by 4:45.  Then I popped over to help a friend who was installing  new stantions on his Hunter Legend 40.5!

Headed out at 10 am under mostly sunny skies, winds 5 - 10 knots out of the NE. Temperature at departure was 68, but it got a bit warmer. Barometer was at 30.38 and steady. Sailed around the top part of the Chester river basin for a while and then headed down the Chester River to the green buoy outside of Eastern Neck Island/Queenstown on a broad reach. We turned and then started beating into the wind for the return journey. Wind started to shift a bit more to the east, so we were able to fly the sails all the way up the Chester and Langford Creek before it died out and we had to turn on the engine just outside the marina. A lovely sail!