We were able extend our opportunity to stay in Wrightsville Beach and Wilmington. We had finished touring the Battleship the North Carolina, downtown Wilmington, and visiting the beach and returned to our boat after checking out of our hotel believing that we would be leaving the following morning. We were disappointed to learn from the Bennett Brothers that we were going to be further delayed moving south. Much to our surprise the rudder parts did not show up. So, we took bad news and turned it into good news - we went back to Wrightsville Beach. This was a great place to spend my birthday. The hotel, The Blockade Runner- a Westin Hotel, gave us with a room on the top floor overlooking the ICW and anchorage. The hotel sits on an peninsula with the ocean on one side and the water way on the other side. It was beautiful watching the sun set over the water and the boats coming into anchor for the night (this is where we originally anchored when we came into Wrightsville -using our emergency tiller.) It was a treat to look out on the water without worrying about the boat, tide, current etc. Wiley wined, and dined his "old lady" and surprised me with lovely gifts for my birthday. All of the gifts came in small packages - there is little room on the boat for anything new. We were both able to go for runs on the beach in the morning - jumping over the southern moon jelly fish that were thrown onto the beach by the strong surf. We found another great Mexican restaurant - Tower Seven , near the beach and our hotel. It was here that we dined with the "surfer dudes and dudettes" who we watched hang ten. Upon returning to the boat we found out that it was still not ready. The boat was lifted into the slings while they worked on it and since we turned in our rental car we decided to stay on the boat. The boat was in the slings for 2 nights. We would climb the ladder to get into our home "in the air". The second night a storm rolled in while we were in the slings and the boat swayed from side to side. The guys at the marina said they did not want us to loose our "sea legs"! The Bennett Brothers did a fabulous job repairing and preparing the boat for our departure. They even provided us with "lessons" on how to navigate in strong currents, how to "stop" the boat, how to use ranges when navigating so that you stay in the channel, as well as how to plan for going through an area called the "rock pile" on the ICW. The boat was finally ready and dropped into the water - but we were unable to make the 10:00 bridge and the winds were strongly blowing from the north. So, we waited another day and realized that we had lost 10 days of traveling south while having the boat repaired - but during that time we received the gifts of time to tour, a wonderful birthday celebration, time to get to chat with fellow sailors at Bennett Brothers, and the gift of leaving on a day that was sunny and calm. We had a beautiful ride down the Cape Fear River to Southport, North Carolina. On this ride down the River we practiced stopping the boat and using range markers to stay in the channel. We are hoping to close down our web site "sailorsaground.com".