Ducks all Lined Up

Adams Creek, North Carolina
34 55.98 N 076 38.85 W

Contemporaneous writing is amazing. Each of the past two blog posts were written at a point of emotional high and low. In both cases, conditions changed within an hour. If I had written either of those posts earlier or later, the content would have been different. As they are, they form an instantaneous snapshot into my thoughts at that moment. That's why in criminal law, contemporaneous witness statements weigh heavier than anything they might say later.

After getting beat up and pounded and discouraged yesterday on a seemingly unstoppable tack toward Iceland, conditions changed rapidly. The wind dropped in speed, it veered to NW and then W then NW again. The sea settled down to nearly flat. We were able to stop the engine and sail along just fine. For the next 20 hours, wind waxed and waned. We mostly sailed, but also used the motor from time to time.

The only distraction was a warship, that would only identify herself as Warship III. She appeared to be an aircraft carrier similar to the Iwo Jima that I saw on display last year in NYC. Warship III hailed us on the radio and asked us to stay 5 miles away from her. OK. I maintained course and speed which carried us away from her. However, throughout the night Warship III maneuvered here and there and crossed our path twice more. She kept asking us and other vessels to stay 5 miles away. At night, she was lit up like an airport with green lights marking the landing deck. Planes and copters practiced take offs and landings. I presume that in a war zone she does no show those lights at night.

We were sailing so good that we threatened to arrive in Beaufort before dawn. We didn't want to do that. Therefore we kept reducing sail area to slow down. I computed that the optimum arrival at the Beaufort channel would be 0600. Dawn was at 0618 and the tidal flood current would peak at 0630. We timed it pretty good, actually arriving at that point at 0610. That's extraordinarily precise for a sailboat. Anyhow, it all worked fine and by 1000 we were anchored here in Adams Creek ready to catch up on sleep and food for a day.

Tomorrow we'll go to Oriental. Saturday our daughter in law Cathy is coming for a visit. Early next week we'll head for New Bern for a few days. We are reminded that we don't want to go too far north too soon. Yesterday they had a foot of snow in Vermont. The weather is such that we could have stayed on the outside maybe all the way to New York. However, arrival in NYC by May 2 would be far too early. Even today it feels chilly here in NC.

By the way, I think we need to expand our sailing expertise to include heaving to as a remedy. We've never done that for more than a few minutes. However yesterday would have been the perfect case where it should apply. Nice sailing was interrupted by 13 hours of hell following passage of a front. Rather than battle the bad weather we could have heaved to, abandoned the watch and gone below to eat, sleep and relax until the weather passed. Yesterday however, we were near a shoal and a shipping lane. Both of those made heaving to inappropriate. We need to incorporate that into our bag of tricks.

Stats for this passage: 68 hours at sea, 5.6 knots average speed, 380 nautical miles traveled, 560 statue miles of ICW avoided, probably 11 days of ICW traveling avoided. The first 24 hours we went 180 miles, for an average speed of 7.5 knots -- WOW!