A Test of Our Mettle

Ocracoke Island
N 35 06.928 W 079 59.168

Yesterday, Neptune decided to test our mettle as seamen. After a 10 hours sail from New Bern, across Pamlico sound in light winds, Libby and I were thoroughly relaxed. We loved watching the dolphins, and the sea birds diving for fish. We also enjoyed watching the big ferry boats going back and forth. The winds had been predicted to shift to the NW 15-20 in the afternoon, but we still had NE at 8-10. We had only one obstacle to go. We had to navigate in to the harbor via Big Foot Slough Channel.
We had been warned that this 4 mile long channel was tricky and confusing, and that parts were shoaled in so that grounding was a real possibility if one made the slightest error. No problem. We had a 2 page written instruction on navigating Big Foot Slough channel in Claiborne Young's Cruising Guide.

Off to the west, I could see a front approaching but it seemed to be moving slowly, so I stopped paying attention. Well, wouldn't you know it, but just 1/4 mile from the channel entrance, the winds shifted and freshened drastically. Luckily, we had taken the sails down minutes before. By the time we moved the remaining 1/4 mile to enter the entrance channel, the wind increased to 33 knots. It was a gale, and we had no gale warning from the weather bureau. I think a fast moving front overtook
the slow moving front just as it passed over us, thus sneaking up without warning.

Well you should have seen the sight of Libby and I trying to navigate that channel. Libby sat in the cockpit with me reading the written instructions from the cruising guide. She had to hold the book with both hands to keep it from blowing away and hold a cushion over it to keep it from getting soaked by the salt spray. Then she had to shout the instructions in my ear. The wind was so loud that I couldn't hear her otherwise. Mr Young's instructions I'm afraid were so wordy and verbose, that
she had to repeat each two or three times.

Then I spotted a ferry coming out. Uh Oh. I worried about going off the side of the channel trying to leave room for the ferry. I picked up the hand held radio and called the ferry captain. He was a real gentleman. The captain, said that he was stopping the ferry dead in the water long enough to let us pass without worry. Then he talked me in; advising me to move more left or more right to avoid the shoals. After we passed the ferry, the channel became wider and deeper and much easier to navigate.
Then the ferry Cedar Island, proceeded on its way with our profuse thanks.

On the way in, the wind was on our stern quarter, so we made 7 knots of speed. The final step in navigation was to make a 150 degree turn and traverse a short 1/2 mile channel to the harbor entrance. That leg put us directly in to the wind. When I turned up in to the wind, our speed dropped to 1.5 knots. Uh oh. I boosted the engine to full throttle. We still made only 1.7 knots. Then the wind increased again, and we were down to 1.3 knots and I began to lose steerage way. You see, a boat
has to move through the water to make the rudder effective. If you go too slow, the rudder won't work. If we completely lost steerage we would have been out of control and I would have been forced to anchor in the channel (which is normally a big no no). Luckily, the wind eased off a bit and we recovered speed and we were able to complete the remaining 100 yards to make the turn for the channel entrance. 60 seconds later we were within the confines of a marvelously sheltered harbor. Big sigh
of relief.

Wouldn't you know it, but 10 minutes after we set the anchor and turned off the engine, the gale winds died away and we had relative calm. The whole gale lasted for less than an hour. If we had known that in advance, we could have anchored out in the sound and waited for the gale to pass before entering the channel. That's when I knew that the Gods must be mischievous and that it had just been a test of our mettle.

This morning, we moved in to a slip at the Ocracoke Park Marina. We'll stay tied up here for 3 or more days because there is another gale forecast to come in tonight (Sunday) and continue until Tuesday night. We'll feel much freer to enjoy the island on foot if we're not worried about Tarwathie sitting at anchor in a gale. After securing the boat, we walked up to the village and I bought Libby a most delicious order of eggs benedict for her Mother's Day breakfast. Life is good.