Beginning the next leg


Willmington, North Carolina

As I may have mentioned, the new boat is named AGREATDAY.  She is a 57-foot Carver, purchased at Hilton Head, North Carolina.  The boat has been docked at the City Marina in Wilmington, NC, for some months now.  We have finally managed to make time to move on up the East Coast for a couple of weeks. The crew for this leg of the trip will be Chris my Son-in-law, his son Grayson, Mitchell my grandson and myself.  We also have Daisy, the Australian Shepard, helping us out. I should mention that I'm the only one on the boat that can converse with Daisy so her thoughts maybe included from time to time. But I have to warn you right up front.  She tends to be a little sarcastic in her observations of people.

Our Vessel

The trusty Daisy

Leaving Wilmington

       


                              We started out from Wilmington late in the day, but like thesaying goes: "Ninety percent of doing anything is starting". The first day went well after we cleared the decks for action, we made it to Wrightsville Beach and docked at the Port City Marina.  It was Friday night and we enjoyed a parade of boaters going and coming from the various restaurants and bars scattered up and down the waterway which is always a pleasant way to spend an evening. In the morning, we untied and headed for Swansboro. The day's travel took us through the U.S. Marine base, Camp Lejeune, where we were held up for about two hours by Marine boats with machine guns mounted on them and manned by four to six Marines. They blocked us because they were doing a live fire exercise. We heard a few explosions but that was about it.

Mitchell and Gray swab

Floating Refreshment

                           

The bad news is while sitting and waiting we must have backed over a crab pot and got the line tied up in one of our props.  It  made a terrible sound when we would put the boat in reverse.  We limped on in to Swansborough where we docked at the lovely City Marina, Church Street Dock. Called Tow Boat US, a must have for traveling boaters, to find a diver to get off whatever it was hung up on our boat.  Tow Boat US advised that that kind of emergency is covered by our policy with them.  Good news but when the diver went under the boat, we found that what ever had been hooked under there was now gone, but not before tearing up one of our props

Tow Boat U.S. 

Diver readying

                           



Monday 14 August 2017
We left Swansboro at 0730 this morning in a heavy mist, headed north.  Still having trouble with the reverse on one of our engines.  We didn't care for the service or lack of concern at the Dudley Boat Yard.  So we decided to head north and look for some service in the town of Oriental, further north. By the way, ladies and gentlemen, this advice came from New York John, yesterday's Uber driver.  You know those Uber drivers are just a wealth of knowledge. I remember when I started boating, just a few years ago, we had to depend on a marina having a loaner car, or the good graces of someone that lived in the marina where we were stopped.  Now days you can just call up your local Uber driver.  The times they are a changin'.