October 26th Sunday... Washington, NC to Broad Creek, NC

We were ready to cast off before daylight, but waited for a few minutes to make sure that we could see the markers that we needed to follow for the first few miles. When I turned the key to start the engine it barely rolled over. I gave it a couple more tries before giving up. Our starting battery was in the boat when we bought it and we have no idea how long it had been there before that. We moved all the "stuff" off of our guest stateroom to get to the battery which I removed and replaced with a battery form our house bank. The whole process took about 10 minutes and then we were on our way.

We motored through the narrow channel for the first few miles and then hoisted our sails for another perfect beam reach out the Pamlico River. After the 30 mile run we rolled up the two head sails and started the motor to head into Goose Creek and the Canal that takes us about 10 miles to the Bay River and the Pamlico Sound. We tried to sail once in the sound but the water was flat.

We really didn't know where we were headed at this point. Oriental was the next town and we needed to stop there for a while to check on "Restless" and to purchase a battery. However, today was the first good travel day in about 3 days and everyone heading south would be stopping in Oriental. We opted to head into Broad Creek and anchor for the night and then stop in Oriental in the morning after the cruisers had pulled out.

At that point we made a U-turn to follow Perseverance 2. They called to see what we were up to and to assist if necessary. We explained that we had changed plans and were going to follow them to an anchorage.

Just as we signed off with Perseverance 2 and changed back to channel 16. We got a call from "Fine Lion" whom we had met last winter in the Bahamas. They live in Oriental and really wanted us to stop in for a visit. We promised that we would see them tomorrow.

Once anchored, I dropped the dinghy and invited the three other boats in the anchorage over for hot chocolate after dinner. They were all continuing on to Beaufort in the morning and we were heading into Oriental so we really didn't know when we'd catch up with them again.