We spent two nights in the River Dunes Marina and Resort. The extra day was spent - as usual, on boat projects - 1st, finding/fixing a leak in my fresh water system that was spraying water over my silverware, and then cleaning the boat cabin top-to-bottom. While River Dunes is a resort, with a pool, hot-tubs (that weren't turned on), restaurant (did eat dinner there with the group our second night) - none of us took advantage of the resort facilities. This is typical of our marina stays - the weather just doesn't make you want to lounge by the pool.

Two days ago, we headed to Beaufort. The route went across the Neuse River, down Adams Creek - very pretty with dense pine trees and little sand beaches along the way (very tempting to drop anchor and go for a swim!), then through a canal to the Newport River and Beaufort. I arrived around 3:00.

Beaufort is a very pretty little town near the coast and Outer Banks. The marina is right in town - it's called simply Town Docks, as the docks line Spruce Creek on one side, and the main street with stores and restaurants on the other. Across Spruce Creek is a string of islands that are part of a Rachel Carson refuge. This is much nicer that some of the other marinas we've stayed at - a destination in itself.

After I arrived there, and did the necessary hook-up tasks, I rowed the dinghy across Spruce Creek to the first island, landing on a sandy beach. There was a man and woman there, with the man - very tanned, swarthy and black beard, fishing for shrimp using a throw-net. Turns out they are living on a small, old sailboat moored in Spruce Creek, and they fish for their meals.

As I mentioned, these islands are a wildlife refuge, and their featured residents are a herd of feral horses. I walked into the island to see if I could find any - did see a LOT of horse poop and for a while that's all I thought I'd see. But as I finished the trail loop and came back to the beach - far off I saw two grazing in the salt marsh. I was able to row relatively close to them and you can see the pictures in the gallery. The water is relatively warm by my standards (my guess 70o), and quite clear (4+ feet visibility), I went for a swim, and then rowed back.

Later that evening my brother-in-law Peter Volin and his wife Faye came by for a visit. We sat in the cabin, caught up, and looked at the charts for the Bahamas. Our plan was to spend yesterday (Saturday) together - although they had to change plans and so we could only visit in the morning. After they left, I joined the group for a visit to the North Carolina Maritime Museum, and climbed to the Widows Walk at the top of the building - great view as you can see in the Gallery pictures. Later, I took my next door neighbor David Pelkey and his dog Sparky to the island so that Sparky could jump into the water and swim.

The group agenda was to spend two nights here, and then go 25 miles down the ICW to Swansboro. But the weather, in the form of Tropical Storm Phillipe, combined with a front from Canada, are changing those plans. So we are staying here a 3rd night (at $70 marina fee per night...) and are not positive that we'll leave tomorrow. We'll see. But at least there is the town at my doorstep.

On the Grace front - I made a great discovery! The boat has a refrigerator that runs off of the batteries. I hadn't been using it because of the drain on the batteries. But I discovered that once the refrigerator is chilled down, it uses much less battery. What does this mean? Well, for the first three weeks of my journey, I mostly lived on canned and dried foods like rice and pasta. But now I run the refrigerator, which at present contains one ribeye steak, 4 chicken thighs, a package of North Carolina ham, a package of lettuce, 1/2 of a tomato, 1/2 of a green pepper, salad dressing, onion, a six-pack of Ballast Point Sculpin Ale, a quart of milk, cheese - the list goes on. And I can make ice cubes! This, in my opinion, is the height of luxury.