Passage - Berkley Marina Ocracoke - Manteo Waterfront Marina
67 Miles

Long day. But, generally easy. 48 miles without a course change. Set the autopilot and take a nap. Well, not really. There are always crab pots and other boats. But it’s pretty easy.

We did have storm clouds forming over the western side of the Pamlico Sound. The wind picked up. We got a bit of rain and I thought I heard thunder. Down the antennas came. I hate being a lightning rod out in the middle of nowhere. Liquid Therapy has a few breaks in her bonding wires I need to take care of. Those wires steer lightning safely to the water protecting everything and everyone. NOPE, not always. I’ve had friends that had TWO boats hit by lightning requiring a rewire and replacement of anything remotely electrical or electronic. They were not aboard either boat when they were hit, but witnessed one strike as they were walking toward their boat. Anyhow, lightning does strange things and I don’t want to be aboard Liquid Therapy if that ever happens.

We were on our final leg traveling along the Roanoke Sound Channel towards Manteo when a sport fishing boat about 60’ long going between 25 and 30 knots overtook us. He did not have AIS, so I wasn’t sure who I should call for a slow pass. I pulled as close to the side of the channel as I could without running aground, to give him plenty of room on our port side. He did not slow down, passing within feet of us and throwing about a 4-5’ wake into the side of Liquid Therapy. I could not get the boat turned 120º to port to meet his oncoming wake and we were lifted and thrown on our side. I thought we might even capsize. The refrigerator tore out of the cabinet and just about anything that could slide and turn over did. It was violent. By the time I got myself together, the sports fisher boat was too far ahead to read its name. I did broadcast over ch 16 that we had been violently rocked so that the Coast Guard would know.

We docked at Manteo Waterfront Marina ‘bow in,’ first, as I couldn’t maneuver Liquid Therapy’s stern into the 14’ wide slip fast enough before the wind blew the bow away. I tried twice in the very tight turning space and had just had enough boating for today and ended up going bow in. We don’t like going ‘bow in’ as the bow is much higher than the stern and it makes getting off and on the boat tough.

We had another dinner at Avenue Grill on the Manteo Waterfront. Nice restaurant! The owner said he was understaffed and it would be 45 minutes for a table. We were offered a seat at the bar where we received service almost instantly. Great pizza with house made sausage and a Shala Shala salad!

You may not believe this, but we have had no network tv in almost a month! Here, in Manteo, we are able to stream Netflix! I wanted to share the name of the wonderful documentary we watched last night: My Octopus Teacher, received Oscar award for Best Documentary, 2020.

Today’s picture is the sun trying to set, but a tree is trying to holding it up a few more minutes.