'Ere break of day - Beaufort NC to Wrightsville Beach, NC

'Ere break of day - Beaufort NC to Wrightsville Beach, NC

Saturday 7th Nobember 2020

The end of my journey with Mike & Gloria is for me to fly home from Wilmington, NC which has an airport with decent connections to Providence. Careful readers of this blog from 2018 will remember that the three of us flew back to RI from Wilmington after returning to the US from the Bahamas.

That year, we sailed up the Cape Fear River and stayed in Wilmington.  This year, it's more practical for me to get to the airport from Wrightsville Beach.  Getting here from Beaufort requires a choice.  One can use the ICW, this stretch of which is shallow and difficult to traverse or go offshore, directly to Wrightsville Beach.  The offshore route is about 63 miles.

Looking at the weather forecast calling for NE winds 10-15 with gusts to 25, we decided that the offshore route would be doable, especially with an extra person on board.

The only issue was 63 miles at 5 knots is 12 hours.  Our choices:  Leave in the dark, or arrive in the dark.  We chose to leave in the dark at 5 AM hence the start of this post.

Awakening at 4:30 AM, we grabbed a cup of coffee, cleverly prepared the night before, piled on several layers of clothes and pulled up the anchor.  Motoring through the myriad of lighted buoys was made much easier as Mike took us through some of the outbound route yesterday.  This gave us a GPS track to follow in the dark.

Just before leaving the harbor, we hoisted the mainsail.  Once clear of the harbor, we unfurled the genoa and were able to make about 6.5 kts on a broad reach (that means the wind is almost, but not quite directly behind the boat).  The wind, as predicted, was out of the NE at about 12-14 knots. We shut down the engine.  The seas were a bit rolly, but tolerable.   A slight starboard turn ( that's a right hand turn for you non mariners) put this wind almost directly behind us so, with excellent work on the foredeck by Mike, we poled out the Genny and sailed wing on wing for the next 50 or so miles.

 Mike finally got to try his vane steering device again.  This is a device attached to the back of the boat that senses the wind direction and steers the boat automatically.  These devices can be a bit finicky, depending on the sea state and the wind direction, but today, it worked brilliantly.  We had it steer the boat for us for over 3 hours instead of using the autopilot, saving battery power.  The rest of the time we used the auto pilot or steered by hand.

Several times we gybed the main sail as our direct course was almost straight downwind and that was neither fast not comfortable.  We expected cloudy skies and maybe a shower, but what we got we're sunny skies and glorious sun.  Layer after layer of warm clothing came off until Mike and I were in tee shirts and shorts!

Because of decent cell phone reception, we were delighted to learn, around midday, of Joe Biden victory.  Cheers all around!

After sailing for 11 1/2 hours, we arrived off the breakwater at Wrightsville Beach at 4:30 pm.  Dowsing the sails, we anchored in the northern end of the harbor and, having made the Cotinga "trig", we enjoyed a well deserved sundown cocktail followed by a dinner of pulled pork tacos with ratatouille made the night before.  A hot shower completed the evening and my eyelids are barely staying up as I complete this post.

Tomorrow, we explore Wrightsville Beach.

Rod

34 12.383 N, 77 48.020 W

Sunrise off Beaufort

Downwind sailing Beaufort - Wrightsville Beach

Downwind sailing Beaufort - Wrightsville Beach - "Wing on Wing"