North Carolina – Part 2

Oriental-We left Beaufort at 7am along with many other boats headed north. We had a little episode getting out of our slip, but were soon out in the channel and headed north. There was a line of boats which we followed out of Beaufort on the secondary canal. We were passed by many faster and larger boats as we were going 8-9 mph. The water in the river was a bit choppy but not bad.

Our marina was simple, but functional. As Tim said, a marina with character. We arrived on a Tuesday and most everything was closed because their weekends are Saturday-Monday. Hence Tuesday was their day of “rest”. We did find a small restaurant that was open, but we should have eaten on the boat if you get my drift.

Belhaven-Our journey from Oriental to Belhaven was ugly. We had 3-4 foot waves with waves crashing over our bow in the Neuse River and Pamlico Sound. We had salt all over our boat by the time we docked in Belhaven. Belhaven was a welcome sight to this weary traveler. This part of our journey was worse than the crossing in the Gulf. We stopped at the city dock and got a pump out then headed next door to the marina and docked for the night. The boat got a good washing that evening and then headed out for some local grub. Tim got the special that night–meatloaf–which was very good. ( Belhaven was a quaint little town with a very well run marina. I just forgot to get the camera out in my quest to finish a few boat projects, the hardware store was just a few hundred yards away 🙂 )

Alligator River Marina–fun fact: the river didn’t get its name because there are alligators in it, but rather because the river is shaped like an alligator. We journey today took us thru a long canal and not much open water for which I was thankful. The marina provided us a safe place to dock for the evening but not much else. It was next to a highway with a Shell gas station. I guess they had some food in the gas station, but it sure wasn’t a Buckees.

Elizabeth City–forecast for today: 2 ft waves with wind out of the south. So what that means is the wind would be at our back and we would be “surfing”. It’s not what we got. The wind was from the west (on our beam) and the waves were confused. And did I mentioned the “million” crab pots we had to dodge. It was worse than Clearwater. I still don’t understand why they are allowed to put them in the channels. Anyway, we made it to Elizabeth City and our timing was inpectible as the bridge was opening just as we arrived and the free dock available for us to dock for the night. I am very thankful for a good docking place right in front of Mid Atlantic Christian University. We even enjoyed a good meal in their cafeteria that night at a good price. We were going to stay 2 nights, but there wasn’t much to see after we toured the Museum of the Albemarle . So we decided to tackle the Dismal Swamp channel after one night stay.

Dismal Swamp Canal–We started our day at 6am to ensure that we arrived at the first lock at the scheduled opening of 8:30. The river to the lock had many tight turns and when you need to arrive at a certain time it caused a little tension. But we arrived at the lock with 15 minutes to spare. (FYI: there are only 4 openings a day at these locks). We were the only boat locking thru at this time so were able to converse with the lock master (24 years on this job). This lock moved our boat up 8 feet to match the level of the next section. We then proceeded into the Dismal Swamp ditch (canal) which is straight and narrow. Stay in the middle of the channel we were told and watch for logs or obstacles while under way. We arrived to the Visitor Center without mishap. The visitor center has a dock for boats coming thru the area which is also the rest stop along the highway that runs parallel to the canal. We toured the visitor center and walked the boardwalk in the swampy area to learn more about this area. Three boats joined us at the wall/dock later that day with 2 of them rafting up to each other as the wall couldn’t accommodate all 4 boats. We enjoyed “docktales” with the group that evening which is always interesting as we share our stories about the journeys we’ve been on. The next morning we left around 7:30am as a group to ensure that we arrived at the next scheduled opening of 11am. We were successful. FYI: We only had one big bump of something hitting our boat in this section (mm 19.9), but it didn’t cause any damage. The section between the locks was very long because our speed was about 5 mph–both for not waking the sides of the canal and because of the possible obstacles in our way. We finally crossed from North Carolina into Virginia. One more state into the books for us.