Saturday, October 31, 2009

Belhaven, North Carolina...


We've been enjoying ourselves in Belhaven, North Carolina. Belhaven is just off the ICW at mile marker 135. The town is behind a huge breakwater that is about to be re-built. The anchorage has room for hundreds of boats and we've seen as many as 20 anchored here over some nights. There are a couple of marinas and a new condo complex. It's a nice town with a lot to offer. We've been coming here since 2003 when we brought aCappella down the ICW for the first time. This is the first time we stayed here for multiple days though.

We've mainly been waiting for good offshore weather. Wind and wave predictions off the coast of North and South Carolina have been outside our "comfort zone." No big deal. We've gone grocery shopping, taken the dogs off the boat a couple of times, toured around the harbor on the dinghy and worked on ActiveCaptain.

The public access in Belhaven to walk to the stores is a little difficult. There are remnants of some type of marina falling into the water next to a boat ramp. We had to find creative ways to tie the dinghy because there's no standard way. Lucky for us, there's a piece of rebar sticking out of the concrete in a convenient tie-up location. I would have felt silly deploying the anchor onto the grass to keep the boat secure...

The front that brought all the bad weather is slowly passing by. We'll get to either Cape Lookout or the South River tomorrow. By Monday, we should be at Cape Lookout either way - a beautiful hook off the coast of Beaufort, NC. The calming trend looks like it'll continue and we'll be able to take off to Charleston on Tuesday. If the weather is very calm, we'll continue onto Brunswick, GA where we'll be sitting for a couple of months, ending this third phase of our cruise.


3 comments:

Carol 'n Wayne said...

Good luck on the weather window. We never could find a real good one, but managed to get outside one day from St Catherine's Sound to St Marys Entrance and Cumberland Island in the dark. At least we avoided the worst of the GA shallow spots.

Got to home dock in time for lunch today. Will keep up with your progress.

Anonymous said...

That was an all nighter. And you made it past Ft. Sumter without firing a shot or being shot at? Do you then go around to the Historic District? Lots to do in Charleston. Good time of year. Not too hot. Is it the insurance that keeps you there? I'm a novice ya know.
Bev

MV Red Head said...

Bev - no shots fired. It was all pretty friendly. Our insurance keeps us north of Morehead City until 11/1. This year we could have left earlier since there were no named storms on the horizon. Now that it's into November, we have no restrictions except for US and Bahamas. A single overnighter is safe for 2 people. Mpre than that pushes it unless the weather is very, very calm. We've done 2 double-overnighters previously. Given the discomfort of going on this one from Beaufort and the building bad weather for Tuesday night, we didn't think it was smart to keep going. I'm glad we're in Charleston too - it's our favorite city along the east coast for boaters.