Blackbeard Sailing Club, (see map)
N 35 03.766 W 076 56.912

There's more than enough wind today. We are tied up on a T wall at the end of the docks, and the wind is blowing at 29 knots directly on our beam. We couldn't leave right now even if we wanted to. Of course, we're not ready to leave yet. We have yet to meet Les, our host.

The people here at the sailing club and other friends in North Carolina continue to be very helpful. We always wanted to take a side trip to Ocracoke and Manteo but various vague warnings about shoaling scared us away. We are really chicken when it comes to venturing places where we might find our way blocked by shallow water. In such cases, local knowledge is the only cure. In this case, we've heard from local people that yes we can go to Ocracoke and Manteo without depth problems.

We're looking forward to the side trip. We've done the ICW in North Carolina several times. Long stretches of it are featureless and boring. Ocracoke sounds anything but boring.

Yesterday, we assisted two very big yachts come in to their slips in heavy wind conditions. Even for experienced sailors, accomplishing that simple task is a real gut clincher. It is like landing an airplane in a forest. In these two cases, the dockings were successful with only minor mishaps, but disaster seemed only a hair's breadth away all the time.

Last November, I went to a lecture by Captain Jack Klang about docking techniques. I recommend it to everybody. There's a DVD that he sells. Captain Jack's docking techniques are excellent. Hardly anybody I've seen uses them. They would have worked very well in both cases I saw at Blackbeard.