Our Great Loop Adventure

Due to rain and very gusty winds our travel plans for Easter Sunday altered. Gale force winds were predicted all day and just getting the boat off the dock would have been challenging. We stayed in Myrtle Beach another day. We spent a quiet afternoon on the boat and went to the Officers Club for Easter Dinner. They had ham, baked potato, green beans, carrots, and desert was a chocolate sundae. Dinner was delicious. Monday, April 21st, dawned with clearing skies, but still the wind was brisk. We got an early start passing thru several inlets where again tides, currents and winds affect your speed. At 8:38 we crossed the border into North Carolina. When we turned into the Cape Fear River, the ride became lumpy, but the currents were in our favor, so we were moving at over 10mph. We passed a large restricted area complete with a patrol boat. It turned out to be the U.S. Army Military Ocean Terminal which is the largest ammunitions port in the United States. We came to Wrightsville Beach, NC, where we spent a quiet night at Seapath Marina. On Tuesday we traveled from Wrightsville Beach to Swansboro. Near Swansboro is a military base called Camp Lejune. We felt their presence because there was lot of chatter on the VHF. They were performing military exercises on the beaches with water craft and we got a glimpse of a large ship out on the ocean. At Caspers Marina, Tony docked the boat like a champ in the high winds. Tom and Melesia Goodman are the harbor hosts in Swansboro. We traveled with them on the rivers and to the fall rendezvous. We called and Tom agreed to take us to lunch and grocery shopping on Wednesday. The next morning we walked into town. It is very small and the shops did not open until 10:00am. Even the coffee shop was closed, well that is not entirely true, the shop was open but there were no customers or staff. Talk about small town America. Tom picked us up at noon and we went to a Mexican restaurant for lunch. Then he took us to the Lowes and the grocery store. Fully stocked, we came back to the boat, where we thanked Tom for his time. Melesia was out of town, but it was great to catch up on all the news. At 4:30 new dock neighbors arrived. The Pinta came in. The Nina is still in Georgetown for maintenance work. This is the fifth time we have been at a marina with them.The crew knows us on a first name basis. Thursday, April 24th was a short journey to Beaufort, NC. We wanted to get there early so we could have the day to walk around and visit the historic sites and see downtown. We went to the Beaufort Historical Association and got a map to do our walking tour. We then found a coffee shop to have a beverage and plan our route. The coffee was just so so. Beaufort was originally settled by the Coree, a native american tribe. They were followed by the French Huguenots. It was eventually settled by the British. By the 18th Century Beaufort was a thriving community of fishermen, sailors, soldiers and pirates. Many of the historic homes were built by sea captains. They have two tiered porches, which were popular in the West Indies and the Bahamas. There are also Queen Anne Style cottages and Greek revival homes. Porches are the dominant style for all of them. There are also many picket fences because there due to an ordinance that said pigs must stay in the yards. Pigs found outside the yard could be slaughtered by the finder. One of the highlights of our walk was the Old Burying Ground. The cemetery was deeded to the town in 1731. The oldest part of the cemetery looks empty. An archaeologic survey in 1992 confirmed that there are many graves in the area. These are probably the graves of victims of the Indian wars because many of the skulls have evidence of tomahawk wounds. Most of the graves face east because they wanted to face the sun as they arose on "Judgement Morn." We traveled mainly on rivers on Friday, April 25 ending up 48 miles later at an anchorage in Campbell Creek. The winds were building and we had tornado warnings. High winds and rains were with us all night. I turned in early and missed the lightning show. Today, we are in Belhaven, NC, where we are cleaning the boat and washing.