We left Carolina Beach at first light on Tuesday morning to make it to Southport before work. We had heard Snow’s Cut was challenging with shoaling, so I downloaded the Bob423 track, integrated it with Aqua Maps, and we made it through with no problems. The current was with us through the cut, but it went against in the Cape Fear River, slowing us to under 4kts. The Cape Fear River is really pretty, and I wish we had time to explore it a bit. I enjoy making morning hops and wish we were able to do more of that.
Southport Marina is a nice facility, and they’ve rebuilt a lot after being completely devastated by Isais. They’re in a great spot – easy walk to town – and they have a nice waterfront park with a bunch of live oaks, which have become favorites of ours. I love the big, sprawling, gnarled branches. Our marina neighbors for the first night were both boats that were in Carolina Beach with us – Chanceaux and Radiance. Small world! I enjoyed meeting a lot of other boaters here and hearing about their experiences. Some people are first-timers like us and others have been doing this trip for years. And we ran into someone we know from City Island who happens to be doing a delivery on another boat.
As we always do, we took time to walk around and explore. There are tons of historic old homes, the streets are lined with live oak and palm trees, and we’ve been loving walking along the marsh and beach in the early morning light. Moore Street is lined with interesting little shops, and I found myself a warmer winter jacket (but still no hat or gloves). I also wandered through the Smithville Burying Ground founded in 1792, which predated the town.
We visited a few local restaurants – Fishy Fishy Cafe (the name made us laugh, and it turned out that their local shrimp pot – shrimp cooked in Old Bay with corn and potatoes – was really good), Moore Street Oyster Bar (bar food with pretty good beers), and Burney’s Bakery. Everything at the bakery looked delicious, but the guy behind the counter steered me to the glazed croissants and they were so good, we ended up getting a dozen – two each of plain, german chocolate, apple, blueberry, cherry, and cream cheese. The german chocolate was Chris’s favorite (my second favorite) and the cream cheese was my favorite, but they were all amazing. We also stopped into the local wine shop and bought a local red, and it wasn’t bad for an area not known for its wine. For tonight’s dinner, I stopped in at Potter’s Seafood and picked up fresh, local caught vermillion snapper.
They say sailing is boat work in exotic places, and it’s true. We usually do our boat work on the hard over the winter, and since we’re not hauling this year, we need to keep up with it as we go. I polished all the metal, which had started to get gross after some salty passages, and cleaned the Eisinglass in the dodger. I’d never done it before, but I think it’s going to become a weekly thing – it’s a quick project and it’s so much easier to see when everything’s clean! We had a diver come and clean the bottom and check the zincs, since last time we had that done was in Deltaville. We also rebedded the starboard chainplate for the upper shroud and the forward deck plate for the lower after work one night. We’ve done that enough now that it’s become a relatively quick task – both only took four hours. Our rig tension has been off, and we think that’s what caused the leaks, so this morning we straightened the mast and got it better tuned. I actually enjoy doing the boat work, and it makes me feel good to know we’re keeping up with Silent Sky’s maintenance.
Tonight we’ll make final preparations for tomorrow’s 120 mile offshore passage to Charleston. As usual when we’re headed outside, I’m equal parts excited and anxious about this next leg of the journey, but I can’t wait to spend some time in Charleston.
The winds and the Sea, Sing their Requiem, and Shall, forever more.
Inscription on the marble obelisk dedicated as a monument to river pilots who lost their lives at sea