1st full day on the ICW
24 April 2009 | Mile Hammock Bay, N.C. ICW
Jan
6:30 came early this morning, but we were ready to get things rolling! By 7am we were dropping our lines and backing out of T dock towards to the turning basin and on our way down the Cape Fear River, northwards... A lot more power boat traffic in N.Carolina but the ICW channels were usually wider. We went thru 5 bridges, 3 of which had to open for us. Our timing was perfect, as 2 of them only open on the hour! We motored for 10 1/2 hours and covered 65 statute miles! That's pretty good so we should be heading into Norfolk , VA by Tuesday the 29th, only 2 days behind "schedule". The water is a bit bluer and a tiny bit warmer (74 degrees) than in South Carolina, but the waterway was not as "twisty-turny" . A little bit more "mundane" but lots of different kinds and sizes of homes and docks with plenty of greenery and lots of hawk or osprey nests on the channel marker posts. There are a lot of beautiful parks and preserves along the way as well as fisherman drowning a lot of bait! We only passed 2 sailboats the whole day and they were traveling...south! However, listening to Chris Parker with the Atlantic/Caribbean weather more boats are beginning to make their trek northward from the Bahamas. All in all a very good day AND we actually made it further than planned and with very little negative current.