October 31, 2007

When I checked the weather last night, I received a surprise. Even though Noel was expected to be way to the east when it gets this far north, the forecast for the Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds was for gale force winds on Thursday and Friday. Both of those sounds have a bad reputation for big, ugly waves when the wind picks up. There is no way we are going to put ourselves in that kind of situation on purpose. So we came up with a new plan. We decided to go down the Great Dismal Swamp Canal instead. That route takes you way inland and we would be in a narrow river with trees on both sides when the wind was blowing. This morning, just before pulling anchor to get under way, I called the Army Corps of Engineers canal information number to check on the status of the Great Dismal Swamp Canal. It's a good thing I did; the canal is closed due to low water caused by the draught. Back up and regroup - again. There are very few anchorages between here and the Albemarle Sound. And, there have been a bunch of boats heading that way that will need to hole up and wait for the winds to die down some before they cross the sounds. So, all things considered, it's time for shore leave in Portsmouth and Norfolk. We'll just sit here at our anchorage at Hospital Point until Noel passes and things settle down.

We launched the dinghy this morning and on the first warm, sunny, day we have seen in ages we walked around downtown Portsmouth, had lunch at a New York deli and bought Patti a pretty to commemorate our Gulf crossing (I've owed that to her since June!). This evening we dingied to Waterside in Norfolk and went to a food court to graze. This sure beats getting slam banged, knocked around and scared s-less trying to cross the sounds in gale force winds!