For most of the trip, we’ve been pretty good at cooking aboard most nights, reserving one or two nights for going out. But since we treated Charleston like a bit of a vacation, we ate out most of the time. There were so many other restaurants we wanted to try, and the longer we were […]
Sorry, New York, but I have to admit I have a hardcore crush on Charleston. I love the beautiful architecture that combines Caribbean, English, and African influences (and I’m completely in love with the porches!), and there’s so much rich history – not all positive, but all important to understand. Of course there’s also the […]
Offshore sailing makes me nervous. Unlike being on Long Island Sound, there’s not always a convenient, nearby spot to duck into. Once you’re out there, you’re out there. We always choose our weather windows carefully, but I have a healthy respect for the elements and never take the time offshore lightly. Our sail to Charleston […]
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 […]
With bad weather in the forecast, we made an early morning hop to a mooring in Carolina Beach. Waves had started rolling in, confirming our decision to move on, and getting the anchor up in the wind was a challenge. Other than a few shoaly spots, the ICW between Wrightsville Beach and Carolina Beach was […]
After dropping the hook in the middle of the night, we awoke after a good night’s sleep to find ourselves in a beautiful spot just off an island that’s part of a nature preserve. We started off by ourselves but as the day wore on, we got more and more neighbors until there were 8 […]
Alternately, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”. Now that our world revolves entirely around weather, we dedicate a lot of time to checking forecasts. We use Predict Wind, Sailflow, Windy and TZ iBoat, plus Weatherbug and Weather Underground to check local forecasts at our current location and our destination and conditions in between and […]
Beaufort is one of those places that I could absolutely see myself calling home. Much like Cape May, it’s reminiscent of Cape Cod in little subtle ways that are hard to describe. Some are obvious – the National Seashore, the commercial fishing, the tourism – and others are more of a feeling. I love the […]
One of the best things about this lifestyle is getting to meet so many other people with similar interests. Another member of the Catalina Owners Association reached out and offered to meet up and help us provision or get anything we needed. We were already well stocked, just having done a provisioning run in Belhaven, […]
This was exactly what I needed – an absolutely gorgeous, low-stress trip. We had early morning fog that had burned off by the time we got under way and before we passed Belhaven town, the clouds were burning off too. The wind was too light to sail, but it turned out to be the perfect, […]