Our mooring at Carolina Beach was paid for two days so we could spend a day around town and work on a few boat projects. The morning was nice so we decided to put the second coat on our cockpit combing which we were refinishing.
On our way back from South America 12 years ago, we stopped in the Abacos, Bahamas for a couple weeks. There was a very nice stretch of weather coming so we decided to strip and refinish (varnish) our cockpit combing. We stripped, sanded, primed and applied 5 coats of varnish over 4 days at anchor. Over the years, we have sanded and applied new coats of varnish to keep it looking decent but now the varnish was de-laminating and needed full replacement.
This time, instead of varnish, we were going to use Awlgrip Awlwood. We had used this to coat our new bow pulpit 2 years ago and had enough left to refinish the combing (we hoped). The Awlwood is a much harder and weather resistant finish which is supposed to last 10 years without any touch-up. After 2 years on the bow pulpit, it still looks like new. The only downside is the cost and amount of work to apply. To coat our 2' X 4' bow pulpit, the primer, clear coat and cleaner was $600. Yikes! Plus, it dries so hard we have to use a power sander between coats to even out the surface.
Since this was only the second coat of the clear finish, we only lightly sanded with 220 grit then I painted on the clear finish while Laura followed with a tip-brush. It only took us about 15 minutes to finish this coat and it looked pretty good. Now that we have two coats on the teak and have built up the surface a bit, I will probably power-sand with 180-300 grit before the next coat. I'll post some updated pictures when it looks a little better.
We saw that clouds coming in so packed our wet-gear and took the dinghy into town. Looking for a place to eat lunch, we decided to try Pop's Diner. I thought the "Diner" would mean I could get a nice salad but as the waitress told me, "We don't serve healthy food here..." Instead I ordered their special - Filet Mignon Tacos. We also shared their lobster bisque which was awesome.
It was raining when we left the diner so, instead of taking a walk to settle the lunch, we headed straight for the Celtic Creamery for ice cream. They make their own ice cream and, when we were here in April, I had the best ice cream cone I ever had. It was rich chocolate with brownies, hard chocolate bits and a few other things. I was really looking forward to having it again! But, it was not to be. Since they make their own ice cream, the Creamery changes flavors to suit the calendar. This time they had flavors based on Halloween and Thanksgiving. There was a chocolate ice cream with other stuff but it wasn't as good as my April cone. Bummer.
But, it wasn't a complete loss. What we had was very good. When talking to the gent serving the ice cream, I noticed they had "hot donuts". I asked to see what they looked like and he said they were made to order. There was a mechanized deep-fryer on the counter which he turned on and hit the handle twice for two donuts. We watched as the donuts slowly cooked then flipped over before dropping into a bowl with cinnamon-sugar. Ok. Last time here I had the best ice cream I ever had. This time I had the best donuts I every had. They were warm, sweet and melted in your mouth.
I forgot to take a picture of making the donuts or what they looked like after they were made. My excuse was being mesmerized by the whole process. Here is a picture of the donut machine.
The Creamery also sold lots of what I would call "travel nick-nacks". My favorite was a towel that said, "A wife was sitting with her husband drinking wine. She said, 'I love you'. The husband asked, 'Is that you talking or the wine'. The wife answered, 'That's me talking to the wine...'
It was still raining when we left the creamery so we walked back to the dinghy for a wet ride back to the boat. On the way, we spotted this pontoon boat that I thought would have been a great business to run. It was a "Pedal Pub" where you sat at a bar (drinking?) and pedaling. The pedals are connected to a paddle-steamer type drum on the stern which moves the boat. You get a little exercise and scenery while having an evening cocktail. Nice idea? I also noticed there was a small outboard partially hidden on the stern so you were sure to get back to the dock even if people stopped pedaling.
The rain stopped shortly after we got back to the boat and took off our wet clothes. We spent a quiet evening watching the British Baking Show which I had downloaded to my iPad the last time we had wi-fi.
Wednesday, November 6th (Day 41)
Another travel day on Second Wind but we only had about 50 miles to the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club where we had reservations for 3 nights. From Carolina Beach we motored through Snow's Cut to the Cape Fear River. The river currents can be 2-3 knots so we always time our trip to the current running in our direction. Today it would be on the ebb (toward the ocean) for the whole morning so I wasn't in a big hurry.
We slipped the mooring lines just after 8am and motored toward the Cape Fear River. Winds were a little calmer than predicted but I figured it was just because there were houses and big resorts around us. As we motored onto the main river channel, the winds picked up from behind us and we were able to roll out our sails and shut down the engine for a quiet ride.
Now we had a choice of taking the ICW from Southport to Myrtle Beach or going out onto the ocean for a 25-mile run which would by-pass Shallotte and Lockwoods Folly inlets which are usually problem areas on the ICW. I checked several weather sites on my phone and they all said the ocean would be a bit rough (3-4 foot, short period seas). But, the winds would be from the shore which should mean the waves would be a lot less if we stayed close to land (1-2 miles). Also, the tides were in our favor and would push us out the Cape Fear River then change and pull us in Little River inlet. We decided to go for it and rigged the boat for some off-shore sailing.
The sail out of the Cape Fear River was quite nice. We had to sail about 3 miles off-shore before we could turn toward the coast because of shallow waters. It was a little rough there but I gradually worked the boat back to 1 mile from shore where we had a great ride for a few hours.
Here is your sailing lesson for today -
Our course was almost due west and the NE winds meant we were on a broad-reach (winds coming from our starboard-stern). Gradually, the winds clocked from NE to E which meant we had to turn the boat toward shore to keep the sails working. If we turned the boat directly down-wind, the mainsail would block the jib and the boat would slow down quite a bit. The boat was running around 7 knots with the wind at less then 130 degrees from our bow and both sails working hard.
15 miles into our off-shore sail, the winds clocked far enough east that we would run into shore if we kept going on the broad-reach. I decided to jibe the boat (turn the stern through the wind) which would put our course away from shore but also slightly away from our destination. After 30-45 minutes, we could jibe back to the starboard tack and sail to Little River Inlet.
Take a look at the picture from our chart-plotter below. Cape Fear River is on the right while the Little River Inlet is middle-left. The yellow track was from sailing here last Spring. The purple track was today. Notice the purple track comes down the Cape Fear River then into the ocean. We turn toward shore to cut down on the waves generated by the wind coming from shore then gradually get closer and closer to shore as we try to keep sailing. You can see we jibe to turn south (toward the bottom of the picture) then jibe again to the west when we are just passed the yellow line. Now we can make Little River under sail.
One problem was when we jibed to go farther off-shore, we found the 3-4 foot, short seas that were predicted for this area. The ride became rougher but still wasn't too bad. These seas stayed with for the next hour until we entered Little River Inlet. All in all we sailed almost 30 miles and averaged 7 knots while the rest of the boats heading south motored down the ICW doing the dance with every faster powerboat passing all the sailboats.
Here is a picture I took of our sail. I also posted a nice YouTube video that I took with our GoPro while off-shore. You can check it out HERE
After coming in Little River, it was a fairly quick ride to the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club. We tied up at 4:30pm and our friend Sandy came to pick us up at 5pm. She took us to West Marine (I had a short list that was over $180) then a nice spaghetti dinner at her house. We also brought our laundry which Laura took care of during the evening.
Back to the boat around 10:30pm and we hit the sack right away. Another great day on Second Wind!
Tomorrow, Laura and Sandy are going to have a "Ladies Day Out" and I have several boat projects to work including changing the engine oil / filter and the oil in our new generator. Lee and Linda on Slow Cruisin' will also be here tomorrow afternoon so we are looking forward to a nice reunion with them. Last we saw them was 5 weeks ago in Haverstraw Cove north of New York City.
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