Last Blog on Our Winter Cruise

When we posted last it was on Phil's big 70 birthday. Our next significant stop was Georgetown, SC where we planned to stay overnight...and what a stop it turned out to be. Late Saturday afternoon we pulled into the town dock where a cruising friend had told us we could stay. About the time we finished securing the lines Capt Rod came riding up on his bike. He gave us some good advice: If we stayed there overnight we may have a visit from the local police department. Seems a lady councilmemeber who lives in the condos directly behind this dock has made it her mission to enforce the "no overnight docking". Taking his advice, we moved the boat and made a really good friend. We went to church with him the next morning and he took us alligator hunting that afternoon. He runs Lowcountry Plantation Tours and is a walking encyclopedia about the history of the area. The next morning we joined a group that he was taking out on his big boat.

Phil and Vi on the beach where Lafayette mistakenly landed on his first trip to America.

Georgetown Lighthouse - After Georgetown had surrendered, the British used the lighthouse for target practice. The townspeople made a handmade bomb and placed it in the area where the ship had to pass through when leaving. When it struck the bomb it exploded sinking the ship where it still lies today.

Capt Rod at the helm Reluctantly we left Georgetown heading north. Going against the current in a slow boat is not the best way to travel...at times we were just barely moving but we finally made it to Myrtle Beach about 4:00 Tuesday afternoon. Next morning we made a pleasant run up to Little River where we anchored. Tours boats, shrimp boats, pleasure boats, even a racing-style kayak all came by our anchorage.

This was one of the smaller tour boats out of Calabash.

Shrimp boat that apparently serves as something during hurricanes. Thursday afternoon we're finally back in Southport, NC and don't you know it was cold and windy just like when we passed through going south in November. The Provision Co. Restaurant offers free dockage IF you eat dinner with them. At least we didn't have to dress or make reservations, just step off the boat into the restaurant. We hooked up with a couople from Vermont who were also waiting out the weather so we had company for dinner. The second night we were there the tide came up os high that it flooded the restauratn floor. The locals just kept on eating like it was nothing unusual while all of us tourists just gawked.

Grace and Seahawk at the dock in Southport The Cape Fear River can strike fear in the heart of even experienced boaters. In fact Kevin and Debbie, the couple from Vermont that we met in Southport, have nicknamed it the Daisy Patch. He said there was no way he was going to take his boat on a river named Fear. They left directly ahead of us and it was fairly calm when we made the run up to Wrightsville Beach on Saturday. We stopped there to visit a friend that we'd made in Marathon and had planned to spend a couple of days with him. As it turned out, the Wrightsville Beach Yacht Club was the most expensive marina we stayed in the entire trip so we only stay one night. Terry and Kathy took us to an Easter service at the Port City Community Church. It has 10,000 members and an awesome light and sound system. The pastor was a 40 year old surfer dressed in jeans and a short sleeve shirt. Appearances can be deceiving, the young man preached the bible. The next couple of days were just travel and stop, nothing exciting. We stopped in Oriental to pick up supplies and stayed 2 days because of the weather. By Thursday the winds had calmed enough for us to cross the Neuse and Pamlico. We dropped anchor in Pungo Creek that night and made it to Alligator River Marina early Friday afternoon. Almost home right? WRONG! Our cruise club was meeting in Edenton for the week-end so we kept right on going past Columbia to join them. What a nice unplanned welcome home party!

We finally made it back to our homeport Sunday, April 15 after 5 months and 6 days on the water. What a wonderful leg on the incredible journey we know as life!!