Now that we have caught up on our sleep a bit, we can tell you the story of our trip from Beaufort, out at sea. We were sailing along happily, in our own little boat world, when we heard what sounded like thunder rumbling in the distance. Strange, we thought….there were no clouds in the sky at all. Then we heard announcements on the radio that the Navy was conducting live firing exercises in the vicinity and all ships should maintain a safe distance. Then we spotted a large hulking shape on the horizon, and we realized our course was taking us straight in their direction! Cap’t K got on the radio:
Us: “Warship No. 21, this is sailing vessel Way Happy.”
Them: “Way Happy, this is Warship 21, lets switch to channel 72”
Us: “We are approaching your location, and we’d like to know your course so that we can maintain a safe distance.”
Them: “we are on a course heading of 045 degrees, and we would request you maintain a distance of at least 3 nautical miles.”
Us: “ok, we will change our course heading to 270″
Them: ” thank you and enjoy your day sailing. Please keep in radio contact”

Well alright then! We’ll continue to enjoy our nice day while you guys fire explosives all around us!

So we changed our course heading to due west instead of southwest, and proceeded along until we saw another large ship ahead. Our new course had put us directly in line with another warship! Only this one was Destroyer 77. (side note: we think the warships should have more creative and dignified names than boring numbers. Some of our name suggestions are Rambo, Grim Reaper, and Fabio.). More radio contact was made, and it was determined we should maintain our course heading.

Eventually we saw a third navy ship, and all in all it took us most of the day to get ourselves safely around them. It was quite a long detour for us, and it completely changed our plans for arriving in Georgetown before dark the next day. And, our changed course heading meant we had to do a very long downwind run to get back on our original course.

Going downwind is my least favorite point of sail. You would think it would be the easiest, but at least for this boat it is not. Out at sea, especially, there is a tendency for the waves and swell to rock the boat back and forth very uncomfortably. This is the condition we found ourselves in. Also, when going downwind you must factor in the speed you are going and subtract that from the wind speed to get the actual amount of wind you have to work with. So while we had enough wind to sail in any other direction, going downwind we effectively had less than 10 knots, which just isnt enough to sail comfortably. So we rocked. And we rolled. ALL NIGHT LONG!!!

It wasn’t as fun as that might sound. In fact, it was what I consider a form of torture. Kind of like getting on a really bad carnival ride and not being able to get off for 14 hours. Sitting or lying down (standing wasnt really an option) required the activation of all your muscles all the time to avoid being flung from your seat. And the poor cats! Usually when we go sailing they hunker down in the comfiest place they can find and sleep until its over. Mojo in particular wont be seen again until the boat comes to a complete halt. But several times Slomo got up to stretch his legs and get a bit of fresh air, only to find he couldnt even make it a few feet with out sliding and being tossed around! Once he did actually make it out to the cockpit and had the horrible idea of trying to take a stroll up on the deck, and we had to throw him back in the cabin quick before he was tossed overboard!

We tried everything we could to make it a more comfortable ride. We adjusted our course as much as we could without going in the wrong direction. We tried different sails and different sail combinations. Finally we found that sailing the mainsail alone provided the most stability, although it was still painfully rocky. Sleeping was not really a viable option. We both just wanted to hop on the next train home, except there was no train and this horribly rocking boat IS our home.

So when the dawn arrived and we approached the Cape Fear inlet, we made the call to duck in there instead of enduring another day of being rocked crazy. As soon as we changed our point of sail to a nice reach, it was wonderful again and we had a lovely sail up the Cape Fear inlet. (while we each took turns passing out in deep sleep) Our boat really loves going to windward, and as soon as we turned towards the wind instead of away from it, she perked right up and got way happier. As did we!

So one of the major lessons we learned on this leg of our soutward journey is that while 10-15 knot winds from the northeast sounds lovely in theory, beware of the swell from hell!!

– Capt’n K & Lala

Location:Hell

The run from Beaufort was light and dead behind us. It rolled the heck out of us and the light winds were not enough to power us very well, so after 24 hours we decided to duck in to Cape Fear rather than press on in the exasperating conditions.

So now we will run on the ICW for the rest of the day and get a nice anchorage tonight. More stories later of the destroyer and warships that we ran into along the way!

Good morning! It is a beautiful (but chilly) sunny morning and we are headed out the Beaufort inlet to sea. The weather seems to be in our favor to make it to South Carolina by tomorrow night. We are aiming for Georgetown or Charleston, depending on how fast the winds blow us, but Cape Fear is an option too.

Last night we enjoyed a special meal with some new friends we met in a bar in Beaufort, Pam and Tom, who are visiting the area to do some kayaking. They were staying in a timeshare condo nearby and invited us over for dinner. A real “house”! Good food and conversation! And I even got to take a steam bath!! It was lovely!

We are back in pelican territory and I have been enjoying watching how low they can fly over the water.

We will check in when we get back to land…wish us luck at sea!!

– Capt’n K & Lala

Location:Back to sea

We are in Beaufort, NC, not to be confused with Beaufort, SC. The North Carolina version is pronounced closer to the correct French pronunciation (Bo-fort), while as far as we understand the South Carolina one is pronounced “bew-fort”. Anyway, here we are in a very crowded anchorage where we got almost NO sleep last night because a very inconsiderate boat anchored RIGHT next to us, literally on top of our anchor, and during the night a storm passed through with high winds and boats were swinging all around, with this guy about 10 feet from us all night. This person did not even check his position all night, while we were up most of the night monitoring the situation the best we could. In the morning we were finally able to move to a different spot, and we do not have very good feelings for this guy right now if we were to meet him. I’m sure he didn’t have any malicious intent in anchoring so close, he was probably just trying to squeeze into a spot like everyone else was, but if you are going to anchor that close to someone in a storm at least be aware of what your boat is doing while it swings around!!!

One of the reasons we are making a stop in Beaufort was so that I could pick up some mail from my sister, who was awesome enough to mail me some new clothes so that I can make a stylish impression on the pelicans at sea. Thanks Sis!! They all fit perfect!
Here I am modeling one of my new outfits, while our messed up new camera takes it upon itself to add psychedelic effects.

I thought Beaufort would be a great place to pick up mail because I remember from being here last year that there is a post office right across the street from the dinghy dock. Super easy and accessible. Well as it turns out, the nearly bankrupt post office closed that branch, and now the only post office in Beaufort is over 2 miles away on a busy highway on the very outskirts of town in strip mall land. I didn’t mind the walk, as I wanted to get some exercise anyway, but it was a less than pleasant 4 mile round trip excursion on the side of the highway walking nearly in the trash filled ditch in order to not be so close to the speeding cars. (there was no sidewalk) Our current development model does not take pedestrians into account!! It is assumed that EVERYONE has a car and uses only it to go EVERYWHERE. It discourages people from walking. I resent this.

Maybe we should have brought our car. I thought that wasn’t possible, but this video proves otherwise. We could have just driven it onto the foredeck and we would have been all set!
Check it out. I almost peed my pants laughing. These Haitians sure are resourceful! Hopefully it will be a little comic relief for your day.

Since we have been in the North Carolina section of the ICW, we have been sailing much more than we expected.   Our goal on this journey south, and generally as sailors, has been to sail as much as possible, but we were somewhat resigned to the fact we would have to motor most of the time on the ICW section.  We chose the North Carolina section of the ICW in order to avoid going around Cape Hatteras, also known as the “graveyard of the Atlantic”.  This is a difficult area due to converging currents and weather patterns that play themselves out in sometimes dangerous and challenging ways right around Cape Hatteras, not to mention the fact that you have to go about 100 miles out into the ocean to get around the major shoals that form there.

Anyway, we have been pleasantly surprised to be finding some amazing sailing conditions in this section of the ICW.  And challenging ones as well!  We have sailed all the way down the Pasquatank River, across the entire Albemarle Sound, and up most of the Alligator River until it ended in a narrow canal.  We also sailed all the way down the Pungo and Neuse Rivers. And we weren’t just pokin’ along, either.  Much of the time we were doing over 6 knots, one day with a double reefed main! Our boat seemed to be “way happy” sailing instead of motoring!  She was literally dancing just this afternoon down the Neuse River in lovely, perfect even, 15 knot winds.  During this time we watched countless other sailboats go by with no sails up and motoring.  (Lala’s side rant:  Why?!  Why do these people who like to motor so much and are too lazy to sail even have sailboats?  And $100,000 sailboats at that?  Why not just get a comfy trawler and be done with it?)

Not only do we have a painfully small budget that we would rather spend on other things than a bunch of fuel, we just like sailing better.  I personally, have been known to become a psychotic bitch when the engine has been on too long.  So we try to eek out every mile we can under sail alone, and there is a price to be paid for that as well.  It’s a lot of work to sail!  Sure, sometimes you can get your sails all trimmed, put on the autopilot, and not have to lift a finger for 10 hours.  But the sailing we have been doing the last few days is not that kind of sailing.  It has been more like “high maintenance” sailing.  The kind of sailing that keeps you on your toes and leaves you exhausted at the end of the day.   That means a lot of sail changes, like, put the mainsail up, an hour later bring it down, an hour later put it up again. Change the headsail..oh now the wind is too strong for that one, change back to the other one.  Put a reef in the mainsail, take the reef out of the mainsail.  Lots of coiling and uncoiling, tightening and loosening of ropes. Tacking, jibing, keeping close-hauled to the wind, reaching, then running down wind.  And if you are inside the cabin, watch out for flying objects and be careful not to spill your coffee!

One of us has been on the wheel actively steering for 10 hours a day.  No autopilot here in the land of narrow channels and many shoals.

In the last few days we have had quite a workout doing all of this.  Simply motoring would have been a lot less effort.  We have been in a wide variety of sailing conditions, including some of the strongest winds we have ever sailed in.  We continue to be in “shakedown cruise” mode, meaning we are still getting to know our new boat and what she is good at, not good at, how to handle her.  We have learned that she is great at pointing towards the wind and we have been really impressed with her performance to windward. (which is great since the wind is almost always coming from the direction that we want to go!)  She is much slower going down wind, and I find that point of sail challenging anyway.  Although today we did a downwind run on the Neuse River and she sailed fantastically.

I both love and hate all the work it takes to sail.  There are moments, when the sails have been trimmed well, and the boat makes bouncy yet ever so graceful strides across the water, that everything in the entire world feels in a state of balance.  I am present with the here and now, and the here and now are wonderful.  And then there are moments, when the sails are flapping loudly, and the boat is rocking madly, and the wind is cold in my face, when I think “what the hell am I doing out here?  Who ever said this was a good idea?”

But isn’t this is just a reflection of life in general? It seems that no matter what we do and how much we may love it, there are both of these extremes in everything.

And I do believe that the work it takes to sail makes us all the more grateful for the miracle of the basic elements of the wind, and the water, combined with our intelligence to use them to make us go where we want. This is the beauty of sailing.

We made it from Elizabeth City to Oriental NC. So sorry that we are missing the snow in New England. It really hurts to not be in 10 inches of snow right now 😉

Just a quick post to let you all know we made it okay. We will post our story tomorrow.

– Capt’n K & Lala

Location:Oriental NC

From our log book:

9:00am. Lala goes to post office to pick up general delivery mail in Elizabeth City. I check the engine oil, pump out the bilge, make bread dough and do the dishes. Then I check the diesel tank level. It is maybe 2/3 full…so estimate 20 gallons left. Planning on motoring for the next few days, so we need fuel.

Left the slip at 10:40am expecting to motor all day, but there is lots of wind from the sw. Gusty. Deployed the genoa then passed the point. Deployed the main.

Too much canvas.

7.2+ knots. Furled up the genoa to just a hankerchief and eased the main. Now averaging 6.3 knots. Motor off.

11:30am put a reef in the main.

12:00 to 12:15 attempted to lower the genoa and put on a small working jib, but the halyard car on the furler is stuck again and wont come down.

12:45 shift change. K on duty now. Pull out a bit of jib. Winds lessen. 5k.

1:30pm we’ve made it to the Albemarle sound.

1:45pm deployed all of the genoa. We need to make it south, and we cant point high enough with just a little jib out. The shape sucks. Have to have the whole sail out to get to windward. Needed to point 25 degrees higher after passing the marker. Luffing the reefed main. Now maiking 180 degrees magnetic in sw winds at 5k. Sweet

3:15pm 2.5nm to Aligator river entrance marker #1. cant make it under sail. Straight into wind. Starting engine to assist. Roll up genoa.

4:20pm rounding marker g9 to port and heading east for south lake anchorage. Motor off, deploy genoa. Sailing at 6 knots.

5:30pm anchor down. Stopped. Sails stowed. Cold beer.

6:30 raised Lala up the mast to clear the genoa blockage. She wimpered like a little scared girl the whole way up, but it was her turn. Brought her back down and changed genoa to small working jib for tomorrow.

7:15pm put bread dough in oven. Roasting roots too. Mosquitoes here. Using screens on companionway hatch.

8:00 pm Delicious homemade bread!!

– Capt’n K & Lala

Location:Crossing the Albemarle Sound

We are en route from Elizabeth City NC to cross the Albemarle Sound and get into the Alligator river. We plan to anchor there tonight and continue on through the canal towards OrientalNC from there. We will probably not make it to Oriental until Friday.

Here we are in the famed Great Dismal Swamp. After going through Norfolk, the Dismal Swamp seems like a beautiful paradise. Norfolk is the dismal place…..all those ominous warships and monstrous tankers and dismal development along the water. The Great Dismal swamp seems delightful to us right now. And we believe it may be the first time our boat has been in fresh water! It is wild to be taking our blue water boat though the middle of a dense forest!

It is pretty shallow though! We ran aground almost as soon as we entered the swamp canal, and thanks to Capt K’s speedy action hauling out an anchor with the dinghy, we got off in a record 10 minutes and still managed to catch the lock opening a mile further down that we were racing to catch before we ran aground! Now, instead of having to watch wind and tides and currents, we have to pay close attention to the bridge and lock opening schedule and attempt to plan our travel accordingly.

Last night we tied the boat off to some trees in the swamp and spent the calmest night we have ever had on the boat. No one around but us and some owls hooting in the forest (and some super scary spiders).

Oh! And I almost forgot to mention the pizza! Pizza is something that Capt K. in particular CRAVES when we are out at sea or away from “civilization” for awhile. He starts to get obsessive about it. He’s been talking about it for days now. Well, yesterday, just after we passed through the lock in the Swamp, we saw a dock that you could tie up to with a pizza place just across the street! We stopped and tied up and half an hour later we were enjoying a hot pizza and a cold beer! Cap’t K sure was happy!

I know the whole pizza thing sounds trivial, but sometimes it is little things like this that can make your whole day!! And seriously, if any of you cruisers out there are ever going through the Great Dismal swamp, this is a GREAT spot to easily get some provisions. just tie up your boat at the free dock just past the bridge of the first lock and across the street is a big grocery store, pizza place, etc. Super easy and convenient!

That’s all for now…next stop Elizabeth City, NC. We are so happy to be in North Carolina, we love it here!

Capt’n K & Lala

Location:Great Dismal Swamp

A few days ago we managed to get a little video of our boat under sail, while we were trying out our spinnaker that we had never used before.  We rigged the spinnaker like a jib, and it worked great!!

Also, we just completed our second big ocean passage from Cape May to Norfolk, VA.  It was a rather slow sail as we had very light winds.  (either the winds are too damn strong or there is too little wind, what’s up with that?!)  But we did sail almost the whole way and are just getting more fuel now for the first time since we left Buzzards Bay!  Not bad gas mileage at all!

We had a smooth and uneventful time at sea, with the pleasure of watching two sunrises and one sunset!  When the weather is nice and calm, it sure is less stressful being out at sea than it is navigating busy channels and difficult anchorages!  We are getting better at doing overnight passages and being away from sight of land.

We are also really enjoying our new boat and finding it WAY more comfortable and easy to travel in than Wee Happy.  The more we get to know Way Happy, the better we like her!

Today we are heading into the Great Dismal Swamp on the Intracoastal waterway.  Hope its not too dismal!!

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