11/2/14
Southport NC
Posted by Bill

Yesterday the weather came in with a vengeance…hail, pouring rain, and wind all day. We didn’t let that get us down and we walked 2+ miles going to lunch in town, and also getting a document printed. By the time we made it back to the boat our pants and shoes were completely soaked. Not the better side of living on a boat.

Today, we had sunny skies but highs only in the low 50s and lots of wind. We walked to breakfast in town and then along the waterfront. We ran into this guy with a OSU hat on and struck up a conversation with him and his wife. They were from Dublin, Ohio and moved here 2 years ago. They told us about their cool subdivision and how much they loved living here. The subdivision was a little over a mile from our marina and the waterfront downtown, and it was composed of new build construction cottages, and we decided to go check it out. It turned out to be really nice…so nice we are going to stay an extra day here to do more due diligence.

The marina holds a session every day at 6PM that talks about the weather for the next 3-4 days, passage planning for ocean passages from the Cape Fear River, and also conditions in the ICW going south to Savannah GA. The ICW talk scared the crap out of us. There are many sections that are so shallow that they can only be attempted during high tide. That’s going to put a difficult spin on passage planning. One couple in the briefing said that they used the ICW in the spring and it was so badly shoaled in some areas, that they are going to do all ocean passages and never use the ICW again…wow!

After the briefing we walked to dinner and froze our asses off. The locals told us that this is as cold as it ever gets during the year and everyone is complaining that it has hit so soon. Good news is that it will be in the 70s again in a few days. Glad we have heat on the boat.

Some pictures of the waterfront in Southport:

And the marina:

Not quite sunset: