On our way north, we skipped Beaufort, so we were excited to make it back here this trip.
Town Creek Marina is a great spot, just a short walk out of town. This was our second stay here, and they remembered us even with the new boat. The staff is friendly and helpful, we were able to get fuel in our slip, and they have a ship’s store on site with fishing gear, beer, snacks and some boat supplies. And we lucked into a great slip… the owner (all the slips are owned and rented out when the owner isn’t around) came down every day to check her crab pot and do some fishing, and we got to talking. She asked if we liked crab, and a couple days later, we had a huge bag of stone and blue crab claws and bellies.
One of the great things about cruising a second time around is that we already have friends out here. Our friends Paul and Lori on Island Dream, who we buddy boated with in The Bahamas, surprised us when they pulled into the marina earlier this week. We’ve been so excited to catch up with them, and they got here just in time to celebrate Chris’s birthday. We also got to catch up with another sailing friend who was passing through on a boat delivery run last week.
For a small town, Beaufort has some great restaurants. We couldn’t pass up the opportunity to celebrate our Hatteras rounding with a dinner at City Kitchen, which was every bit as good as we remembered. We celebrated Chris’s birthday with Paul and Lori dinner at Blue Moon, had lunch and went back with Paul and Lori for dinner at Beaufort Grocery, hit up an oyster roast at the Backstreet Pub and enjoyed breakfast from Marmalade. We were bummed to once again miss the chance to try the croissants at Les Ciseaux – we seem to arrive every year just as they’re closing for vacation. I’ve heard they’re supposed to be amazing, and I hope one of these times we’re able to find out.
We took Squall out to the Rachel Carson Reserve in hopes of seeing the wild horses. We walked the beach until we found the outer trail no longer usable unless we wanted to trudge through muddy marsh and then turned around to walk the inner trail. We saw lots of evidence of their presence, but no horses. We took the side trail to Bird Shoal, and just as I was about to turn back, two horses walked up over the dunes in the distance, followed by three more. They walked in our general direction before turning to walk off down the beach, and we felt lucky to be able to experience such an amazing encounter. The inner loop trail joins the outer loop on the return trip, and we found ourselves with muddy feet but a beautiful view of the marsh and the egrets and ibises feeding there.
We’ve taken advantage of the extra time in port to get more boat projects done. Windara got a good bath, we started waxing her (it’s been a good long time since she’s been waxed and is going to need a few passes before we get her back in good shape), and I spent a lot of time polishing all the stainless. We also had the service department here finish fixing the forward head. The hoses are old with lots of calcification and had developed a serious clog that rendered the head useless. Yup, it’s gross. Yup, it’s a fact of sailing life. Poor Chris had the pleasure of troubleshooting (because paying them $125/hour to do that wasn’t worth it), but we didn’t have time or materials to finish the project. Cruising a new-to-us boat has its challenges, but it’s also allowing us to really get to know her and make her ours.
