June 12-June 23, 2018
12 days. 100 days since start.
182 nautical miles. 1055 total since start.
Mile Hammock Bay to Beaufort, NC
37 nautical miles. 910 since start.
7 hours motoring
Recall from the previous post that Mile Hammock Bay is smack dab in the middle of Marine Corps base Camp Lejeune. We stopped here because it was a nice protected anchorage around our typical 35 nautical mile distance from the previous stop. We also stopped here because it allowed us an early morning start to go through the live-fire training section of the base that the ICW goes right through. We had read that the live-fire drills occurred later in the days and that the military did not allow passage of the few miles section during the drills. You just have to stop and anchor until they are done….and hope to not get bombed or something… At any rate we motored through the section without being stopped or bombed. We did however see lots of models of tanks, human targets, and bunkers with big holes and chunks out of them. Pretty wild!
Anchored 2 nights
After exiting the military zone we arrived to the beautiful town of Beaufort, NC. You may remember seeing the town Beaufort a few posts back in South Carolina. Interestingly, there are two awesome cities on the ICW spelled exactly the same but pronounced a little differently. We anchored in Taylor Creek just next to town. One cool thing about this anchorage is that it was also a favorite of the famous pirate Blackbeard. Anchoring Holiday in the same spot as his Queen Anne’s Revenge and imagining what it looked like 300 years ago was really neat. Another cool aspect of Taylor Creek is that it borders island preserves filled with wild horses. We watched the horses and foals just a few hundred yards away from Holiday grazing in the marshes each day. The town was really cool as well with a historic feel and lots of shops and restaurants. There was even a huge off shore fishing tournament going on in the area waters, and each evening we would watch as hundreds of giant sport fisher boats returned to dock for the night before leaving again the next morning.
Beaufort, NC to Oriental
21 nautical miles. 931 since start.
4 hours motoring
Leaving Beaufort, we were excited to enter the area of the Outer Banks and the large sounds and rivers of that area that would allow for sailing after so many legs of motoring. The first of which was the Neuse River. We arrived to Whittaker Pointe Marina in Oriental to prepare for some sailing voyages!
At dock 3 nights
We spent our time here doing laundry, filling the water and fuel tanks, restocking on groceries, prepping Holiday for some open water passages, and hanging out at the pool. We even had a visit from Lindy’s brother Matthew who was passing through on a road trip from Georgia back to DC.
Oriental to Ocracoke (Outer Banks)
40 nautical miles. 971 since start.
8.5 hours sailing (finally some sailing!!!)
We motored away from the marina leaving the ICW for a long side trip and into the Neuse River, raised the sails, and turned the engine off. After weeks and weeks of mostly motoring, it was awesome for Holiday to be pushed along as she is intended, by the wind. After sailing down the Neuse River, we entered the Pamlico Sound, the large body of water created by the coast of inland North Carolina to the west and the tiny strip of sand bars known as the Outer Banks stretching far out into the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Pamlico Sound is the second largest body of water on the east coast only smaller than the giant Chesapeake Bay. It can get rough out here, but we picked a perfect day and sailed for hours all the way out to Ocracoke on the Outer Banks. Only during the last couple of hours did the wind pipe up and bounce us around a little, but we made good time. The long entrance channel in was clearly marked, and we even shared it with a ferry that, despite what we had read in guide books, didn’t try to run us over.
Anchored 5 nights
Before the ICW trip started when people would ask me about it, I would always mention going to the Outer Banks as one of the things I really wanted to do. Neither of us had ever been, and honestly we didn’t even know anything about them. It just sounded like a cool place to go. Well, guess what, “a cool place to go” is the understatement of the century. Ocracoke, only accessible by boat, is just plane awesome. Silver Lake is a 360 degree protected anchorage surrounded by funky little island restaurants and shops. The island is full of history and historic buildings and a light house. This is yet another place that the pirate Blackbeard hung out and even where he was captured and killed. There are miles and miles of unspoiled beaches and even some wild horses. We rented bikes for our entire stay, and every day we would cruise around hanging out at the different beaches or water side hang outs. A truly excellent place to be. A couple of weather related things happened during our stay here too. The first is that we had our first few days of seriously oppressive summer heat and humidity. It had been hot for a while now, but for the first time this year it got pretty unbearable. We just seek somewhere with AC or water to swim in during the middle of the day. The nights are never bad though and with a breeze blowing through the open hatches Holiday is comfortable then. The second weather event was our first summer squall blowing through. One night we were awoken by Holiday bouncing all around, pounding rain, and howling wind. I went into the cockpit just to check how the anchor was holding and saw 50 mph on the wind indicator. Seriously strong gusts, but the anchor held just fine. Before long it was over, and we were back to sleep.
Ocracoke to Belhaven
45 nautical miles. 1016 since start.
8.5 hours sailing
For this leg of our side trip off the ICW, the wind would decide where to next. We could go north up Pamlico Sound along the Outer Banks on a 60 mile sail past Hatteras to the Roanoke area. Or, west on a slightly shorter passage back across Pamlico Sound and enter the Pamlico River (the next large River north of the Neuse). I had really wanted to do the long sail up to Roanoke, but the wind wasn’t right for it, and we left Ocracoke heading west. It was another perfect day on the Pamlico Sound, and we sailed all the way across before continuing our sail up the Pamlico River. At the Pungo River, we rejoined the ICW and sailed north to the Pungo Creek near the city of Belhaven.
At dock 1 night
We found a cheap marina (Pungo Creek Marina) for the night needing to do laundry and refill our water tanks. A long shower was also in order of course!
Belhaven to Catfish Point
39 nautical miles. 1055 since start.
9 hours mostly sailing
The big water areas of the region weren’t over yet as we left Pungo Creek, raised the sails, and sailed up the Pungo River. After motoring through the skinny but pretty Alligator River/Pungo River canal, we emerged into the next large body of water, the Alligator River. Although called a river, the Alligator is really huge and miles across. We raised the sails yet again and sailed about half way up to Catfish Point. The entrance to the anchorage was surreal as we were out in the wilderness and using our chart plotter to navigate through a bunch of shallow water and tree stumps to the protected area just off the river.
Anchored 1 night
Catfish Point was surrounded by preserves with no sign of humans or development in any direction for miles. After quite a few attempts we finally found an area with enough swing room to anchor and not get pushed into the shallows by the switching wind directions as squalls passed around us. In the end though we got settled and had another awesome evening in a place that can only be described as total seclusion surrounded by nature. We spent the evening watching beautiful storms roll by but luckily didn’t get too much rain or wind.
No Comments