Air temp 74, water temp 73, winds N @ 20-30
Did not move the boat today
We had the air-conditioning on all night because it was warm and humid when we went to bed. It is always warmer in the boat when we run the engine for several hours because it heats up the whole engine room. And, we closed all our windows before going to bed so we wouldn't have to get up again when it started raining.
Turns out the forecasters were a little off and Tropical Storm Andrew came a little closer to shore than they predicted. I'm so glad we were tied to a dock in a protected area.
I think it started raining around 3am and continued through the night. Here was the weather RADAR just after 6am when it was really pouring and I got up to see if everything was OK. We are at the blue dot. The storm was just churning almost right over us. It really wasn't that bad on the boat because the winds were from the north - the direction our boat is pointing while at the dock. If winds had been from the east or west we would have been getting rocked pretty good.
It rained hard into late morning when it finally let up into spits and spurts. We found several more leaks to fix on the boat which is typical when we get a deluge like this with high winds. The rain finds it way into everything including all the towels we had left in the cockpit. It looks like laundry-day now with them all drying on the rails.
It was a fairly quiet day on Second Wind. Around 10am I walked to the office and paid for 2 nights - last night and tonight - $34 total. Geez. (For comparison, we paid $142 for 2 nights in Swansboro.) That also included power and WiFi. The reason it so inexpensive is this place is in the middle of nowhere and it's really a commercial fishing dock. They are not trying to make a profit from cruisers. They do sell lots of fresh frozen seafood and I browsed after paying for our dockage. Laura and I will go back later for seafood shopping. They vacuum seal and freeze all their fish, shrimp, lobster and scallops which keeps them tasting great. Last fall when we stopped here we spent over $100 on just seafood for our freezer.
As usual, I spent part of my morning checking weather forecasts and seeing when it would be good to move on. Hmmm. Doesn't look like decent cruising weather for a while. Check out this 10-day forecast for Belhaven, NC which is only about 10 miles from here. Rain and thunderstorms right through to Sunday - that's 6 days from now!
This is an inexpensive and calm place to be - especially with the COVID-19 isolation going on. We are fully stocked with fuel, water and groceries plus we caught up on laundry with Tim and Karen. So, we are good for probably 2 - 3 weeks if necessary. Great Bridge would be our next grocery / laundry stop which is only 3 days from here when we finally get moving. No worries Mon....
I practiced the flute for a while later this morning. I'm hoping to get good enough to record a video of me playing just so I have a recording of it. I really like the 8notes.com website. It's great practicing with background music.
After lunch, Laura and I went for a walk through the neighborhood. That's really a joke. In our 3 mile walk I think we saw one house once we left here. I was able to walk up on a highrise bridge just down the waterway and take this nice panorama of the area including the docks and boat. Check it out. Sorry about all the wind noise. Guess I need a better microphone for my iPhone.
Here is a picture of the boat and docks from the top of the bridge.
We'll work on the boat a bit (I already fixed Laura's automatic stove lighter this morning) and try to walk every day for exercise. That's really the nicest part about being here instead of at anchor. We can get off the boat easily! Probably another 2-3 days here if the forecast looks better. Or, maybe we'll be here until next Sunday. Come visit!
Perfect stop with fresh seafood. Good find. I remember sailing by a few times.
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