25 October 2010 | Elizabeth City and Beyond
Mike
October 20th, 2010...Deep Creek, Va to Elizabeth City, NC
We left the Dock at Deep Creek around 9:40 and headed into the Dismal Swamp. It was cloudy and cool but as the morning progressed there the sun popped out occasionally to give us a little heat. Sapphire ran at about 4 knots, which would put us at the South Mills lock for the 1:30 opening. The trip was uneventful. There was a reported shoal at a feeder ditch but we slowed and never touched. A dredge was on site so they may have already fixed the problem, however there was a half knot of current in the canal and water was rushing out of the feeder ditch which drains a lake in the swamp. I assume the shoaling will continue until they get the water level in that lake down to the point where is supposed to be at this time of year.
We pulled out of the exit lock at about 2 p.m., which was early by about 30 minutes, and headed through the Turner Cut to attempt to make the bridge in Elizabeth City before it closed at 4:30. I powered up and Sapphire was running at about 7 knots when the bilge pump came on and didn't go off.....a bad sign.
I jumped down to the engine room and found water pouring out of the connection where the exhaust water enters the system at the exhaust elbow...(where the hot water from the heat exchanger meets the engine exhaust) Kathy shut down the engine and I turned off the thru hull fitting which sends water to the engine. Then it was her job to keep us in the middle of the 100 foot wide channel while I sorted out the problem.
We ended up anchoring in the middle of the road (so to speak) and in about 30 minutes we had things patched together for the run into Elizabeth City.... now aiming for the 5:30 bridge opening.
I spoke with the boat we'd been following all day to find that there was still some wall space to tie up and just before dark we were safely moored for the night. "Spinwalker" and "Motu" (new friends from Deep Creek and Deltaville respectively) stopped by for a glass of wine and chatted for a while before we buttoned up for the evening.
October 21th...Elizabeth City, NC to the bottom of the Alligator River.
In the morning I removed the hose that was leaking yesterday to find that it was almost completely clogged at the exhaust elbow end .... which easily may have been the cause of all or our recent circulatory problems.
Kathy looked up the nearest auto parts places and I took off to find a replacement. After 4 shops and a 5 mile walk, I was back and had the new hose in place. At about 10:30 we cast off and headed out the Pasquotank River toward the Albemarle Sound. It was a late start, but with luck we could make the trip before dark.
The wind built all day and it was gusting to 30 in the sound. Sapphire took a few waves over the top but it was a pleasant sunny day and without engine problems.... we had a fine day, arriving in time to have some left-over chili for dinner as the moon rose in the east.
October 22nd...Alligator River to Oriental, NC
We were up early waiting for the sun to get high enough to see the marks leading into the Alligator-Pungo but the moon setting in our eyes was a problem so we waited until about 6:45 to weigh anchor. After a long day of driving (72 nautical miles), we arrived at the dock in Oriental just before 5 p.m. in time for a party at Steve and Kim's at 5:30.
Present were "Fine Lion", "Veranda", "Savage Son" .... we'd seen all these folks in the last month but it's always fun to get together. Everyone is looking for a weather window to scoot over to the Atlantic (about a half a day from here) and head south. Unfortunately, it looks like there are south winds in the offing for the next few days, which will hold us up...
There is a long list of boat jobs so a delay is fine with us.
October 23rd...Oriental, NC
After coffee I washed a couple of layers of salt off "Sapphire" and then removed the first reefing line on our main. We've decided that if we're thinking about reefing, a double reef will usually be best. Then I worked on the roller furling system ,which hasn't been working well since our mast was hauled. Finally, I tried to stop some leaks around the mast that also were caused the mast work.
By then Kathy had our laundry together and we walked over to the condo to deliver things to Steve and Kim that we picked up for them in Annapolis...and to sneak in a load of laundry. We hung out there waiting for Steve's quiche to cool and by then it was almost time for the MSU-NW game, so I ran back and collected the remainder of our laundry and watched the game as Kathy washed a few loads.
In the evening we walked over to the Tiki Bar for a charity Bar B Q dinner.... had a good time listening to a local band and then returned to "Savage Son" where I changed the strings on my guitar and played a little before calling it a night.