It was hot enough for a while today that I could have worn the tee shirt and nothing else. Well, maybe something else. Anyway, I kept my outer shirt on just to enjoy the novelty of being a bit too warm.
I left Carolina Beach as late as I could to let the flood current slow down in the Cape Fear River and ran down to Southport in almost flat calm. I slowed and looked into Southport remembering the fine meals I had there last year and thought about stopping. However, that would have made me too late to get out of NC and I already had the title for this post in mind. The art comes first. Y’all owe me a lunch, you hear?
I started bucking strong current just past Southport and decided I didn’t want to worry about finding fuel and ice later when there was a fuel dock right there alongside the waterway. I swung over out of the channel, stopped about a boat length from the dock, started rigging lines, and nearly was part of proving that it isn’t just power boaters.
A sailboat had been following me since Snow Cut. I’d just finished getting the lines rigged and gone back to the helm when it went by me about ten feet away. The dock attendant told me later that he had been watching helplessly as they followed me right in and nearly Tboned me. There was enough channel width outside the fuel dock area for about twenty boats to pass but they evidently had gotten so used to following me that they simply kept me in their sights and didn’t realize I had stopped. Another explanation is the full dodger problem. You can’t see anything inside those things except the GPS. Narrow escape.
I later saw the boat aground farther down the waterway. I thought of stopping and seeing if I could pull them off but it would have been risky with the strong current running and their demonstrated level of competence on the other end of the lines. When I got closer, I could see by their waterline that they were beyond anything my twenty horsepower could do. About an hour later, I saw TowboatUS headed up towards them.
I pulled into the Calabash River anchorage at 1600 and anchored near mutual friends of BobT’s and another boat that I have been playing tag with ever since the Deep Creek lock. The weather is almost an exact duplicate of the day I was here a year ago. I took a picture of the shore which is nearly a perfect match for my boat card except that the boat isn’t in the picture.
Pictures here of what is just ashore from last year for anyone who didn’t see them:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2032433070897.80811.1846284215&type=1&l=50cf8f54b0
It’s nice to back.
I left Carolina Beach as late as I could to let the flood current slow down in the Cape Fear River and ran down to Southport in almost flat calm. I slowed and looked into Southport remembering the fine meals I had there last year and thought about stopping. However, that would have made me too late to get out of NC and I already had the title for this post in mind. The art comes first. Y’all owe me a lunch, you hear?
I started bucking strong current just past Southport and decided I didn’t want to worry about finding fuel and ice later when there was a fuel dock right there alongside the waterway. I swung over out of the channel, stopped about a boat length from the dock, started rigging lines, and nearly was part of proving that it isn’t just power boaters.
A sailboat had been following me since Snow Cut. I’d just finished getting the lines rigged and gone back to the helm when it went by me about ten feet away. The dock attendant told me later that he had been watching helplessly as they followed me right in and nearly Tboned me. There was enough channel width outside the fuel dock area for about twenty boats to pass but they evidently had gotten so used to following me that they simply kept me in their sights and didn’t realize I had stopped. Another explanation is the full dodger problem. You can’t see anything inside those things except the GPS. Narrow escape.
I later saw the boat aground farther down the waterway. I thought of stopping and seeing if I could pull them off but it would have been risky with the strong current running and their demonstrated level of competence on the other end of the lines. When I got closer, I could see by their waterline that they were beyond anything my twenty horsepower could do. About an hour later, I saw TowboatUS headed up towards them.
I pulled into the Calabash River anchorage at 1600 and anchored near mutual friends of BobT’s and another boat that I have been playing tag with ever since the Deep Creek lock. The weather is almost an exact duplicate of the day I was here a year ago. I took a picture of the shore which is nearly a perfect match for my boat card except that the boat isn’t in the picture.
Pictures here of what is just ashore from last year for anyone who didn’t see them:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2032433070897.80811.1846284215&type=1&l=50cf8f54b0
It’s nice to back.
