THE TRIP

We left Belhaven late afternoon on Monday. The winds were from the NNE about 10-15. We sailed on a reach down the Pungo River and were heading for Abel Bay as an anchorage for the night.

When we got close to Abel Bay, it didn't look so good. Mostly marsh grass with little or no protection. We turned and headed back up the Pungo to Wright Creek. This was a very shallow creek, but well marked. This is a shot at dawn the next morning, leaving the Creek.

The winds were predicted to be from the NE all day, then around to the E by afternoon. We needed to get going in order to take advantage of the wind direction. As you can see by the tracklog, we didn't make it all on one tack. The wind remained good at 15-20, however.

This guy kept following us along the way.

We tied up at the park service docks and met the only other couple there for the night. We made the mandatory Jolly Roger and Pelican Restauant trips and took a walk around the beach.

Another great sunset.

The next morning, the couple next to us was packing up and getting ready to shove off. They said that the next day's forecast (when we were both planning to return) was pretty yucky, 20-25 and thunderstorms. Since the winds were 15-20 from the SSW this morning, we decided to join them and head back after only 17 hours at Ocracoke.

We had a great ride back. We averaged 7.2 knots including motoring out from Silver Lake and saw 8.4 knots several times. Is that a rooster tail?

The wind shifted from SSW to S just in time for us to turn North into the Pungo river and had a great run all the way back. We only tacked off our rhumb line once in the 6 hour trip back and that was 2500yards from our home!