Sunny, 55 degrees Winds 5-10mph
11/17/2008, From Deatons, Oriental – Whittaker Creek, N.C. to Adams Creek Anchorage

Man it was cold last night. It went down to 34 so needless to say we went to bed in sweatshirts, jeans, and socks and had 3 coverings over us. The weather man is predicting a low tonight of 28... I can't believe that we stayed in Oriental 11 days - wow... After we got up and had our morning coffee, we topped up the water, got a pump out, said a sad (on my part) farewell to Linda and Cat's Cradle and took off for Adams Creek. It was tight getting out because Sail Craft had boats double rafted into the creek so we couldn't turn the boat around. One of the guys at the boatyard backed it out and then into the lift area (where we got a pump out). Today was a short hop day - perfect day to cross the Neuse River and get our feet wet again (so to speak)? We went a total of 6-7 miles because with our later start figured we couldn't do a 50-mile day so tomorrow will be around 44 miles depending on if we can stop somewhere else or not. Wayne wants to put in at Spooner Creek but the entrance has been shoaling so we may not be able to. So we're planning on going further to Swansboro in case we cant get into Spooners. It looks like anchorages are not so abundant anymore (unless you have shallow draft boats) until we get to S. Carolina so we'll probably be doing short, long, short, long days (alternating).

I can't believe it's a month and a half to Christmas. We're going to have to start making some serious time to make the gam in Florida at the beginning of December. Something tells me we may not be making this one either depending on the weather, etc... It may not have been meant to be this year. This is a small anchorage right off the ICW path with a few homes scattered around the little inlet and shrimp boats. I saw a water snake when we came in, but couldn't get a picture of it. By the time we got anchored it was nowhere to be seen, but I kept looking for it! It's the first time I saw one in the water - very cool.

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11/16/2008

Okay - this is what Gary looks like and for those interested - I've added new pictures to the website - Trying a new format - let me know what you think...

Yuk - what a rainy day. Everything's wet and soggy. I must have emptied 5 buckets of water near the mast last night. It's been a quiet day around the service yard. Worked on odds & ends on the boat, plotted routes for the next 6 days and went through the Cruiser's network trying to mark down all the trouble spots along the way in North Carolina. I stopped before reaching South Carolina figuring a week was all I could handle right now. This is one of those times I wish we'd have brought a printer so I could print them out! I'm wondering what they charge to haul out the boat and store it for hurricane season here - I'd like to come back!

Pete showed up with the antenna/GPS unit around 5pm and once we plugged it in, it worked like a charm... Thanks Pete - you're a lifesaver!

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11/12/2008, Deatons Boat Yard, Oriental NC

Gary finished up installing the battery charger & regulator between Tow Boat US rescues (did I mention that he's the one that ungrounded us in Broad Creek then again between Whittaker Creek & Whittaker Point Marinas?). While you can't tell what he looks like, that's him in the picture tucked into our engine compartment, he's very conscientious and thorough and we've decided that he's our favorite (dare I say best too) boat mechanic on the Eastern Seaboard. While he was tucked into our engine we heard a "hello Kolibrie" from up top. Ben and Kristin from Windborne stopped by to say hi and brought over their extra washers from their manual bilge pump. They're from the west coast, and like us, found their boat out here - also a Bayfield 36 - located across the way in the Sailcraft Boat yard. They're getting her ready to take south sometime next week. It was nice to meet them & we hope to run into them along the way - we like their taste in boats LOL.

We ran through all the diagnostics 3-4 times for the chart plotter and after finding a blown fuse and replacing it (those came in today), and a loose wire and rewiring, rerunning the diagnostics one more time we decided that the gps antenna probably was the culprit and took Pete up on his offer to purchase one and try it out - if it works, we buy it from him, if not we pay him for his time and he keeps it for future work. We're having it sent out next day so it should be here some time tomorrow. Funny but I find while I'm in a hurry to head south to warmer weather, I'm not so much in a hurry to leave here. It looks like some weather is supposed to head in tonight and tomorrow too so who knows.

By the time we got everything reorganized and stopped working on the chart plotter, it was pretty much dark so I put together a chicken and rice bake for dinner - it wasn't bad but I probably wouldn't go out of my way for it again - I like Patti's better (the one with the cranberry and Catalina dressing) and think next time I'll use that one (yum).

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