Posted on June 15, 2017
We move north rapidly and return to the Bay
The route from Oriental to Herring Bay and Herrington Harbour in Maryland is well traveled by Sophia. This will be her third trip through the Pungo Canal, Alligator River, and the Chesapeake and Albemarle Canal. And, of course, the Chesapeake Bay is our home waters.
We left Oriental at 8:30am on June 6th, sailing out in Pamlico Sound before cutting through the Hobruken Canal, to the Pamlico River, anchoring in the Pungo River, near the Pungo Canal entrance for an early morning transit through the 20 mile canal. We were concerned because the weather forecast called for 30+ knot winds out of the north on June 8th and we had to find a place to hide before that weather hit. The Alligator River, the next stretch of water after the Pungo Canal is aligned north-south with no protection and the Albemarle Sound, to the north of the Alligator, is notorious for rough, choppy seas in a wind. There is only one marina for 100 miles and we had to make that by the evening of the 7th. Elena called as soon as we pulled up anchor to verify our reservation at the Alligator River Marina, 50 statute miles away.
The transit through the Pungo Canal was uneventful, but as soon as we entered the Alligator River, the winds picked up. The weather we had been watching had arrived early. Before long we were in 20+ knot head winds with 5 foot waves crashing over the bow. What was just as bad was the wind and waves slowed our progress to a crawl, cutting out speed in half from 6 mph to 3 (we use statue miles when in the ICW instead of nautical miles or, for speed, knots).
After bounding through the head seas for five hours, pushing the engine more than we would normally like to do, we finally made it to the Alligator River Marina and tied up to wait out the weather for the next 36 hours. As we were just settling in, another sailboat was coming in, corkscrewing like mad in the cross seas, rolling to port and starboard 30 degrees. When I made a comment to a fellow next to me, he said that we had come in exactly the same way. I guess I was concentrating so much, I did not notice. And Elena said it hadn’t been too bad.
The Alligator River Marina is an interesting little place. It is nothing more than a Shell gasoline station with a small convenience store that serves hot food. There is nothing for 10 miles in each direction down US64 Highway. To the east is Manteo, NC and Nags Head, which I suppose brings in a far amount of highway traffic. The marina only serves transients traveling up and down the ICW. Surprisingly, they have a very nice gift store.
On the 9th, we crossed the Albemarle Sound, motorsailing on fair wind and made our way to Coinjock, NC, the traditional stop before going through the bridges and locks near Norfolk. The entire dock was filled, even though this is the beginning of the slow season for the Coinjock marinas. We filled the diesel tank (30 gallons since Southport, NC, some 230 nautical miles behind us or 7.6 nautical miles per gallon) and had a pleasant dinner at the marina restaurant.
We were underway at 8am on June 10th, had an uneventful trip through the North Landing River and through the Chesapeake and Albemarle Canal, stopping at Great Bridge. We stayed at the Atlantic Yacht Basin instead of the Great Bridge city (and free) docks, so we could use air conditioning. It is getting to get hot and we are not climatized to it yet.
While we were walking the docks, someone yelled “Hey Sophia!”. It was Earl and his wife, from “Wanderer”. Earl had the dock next to mine at Herrington Harbour and watched me labor away on Sophia for years. “Wanderer” sailed away in 2015 for a two year cruise to Europe and the Mediterranean. We got a snippet of their adventures in the few hours we had talking with them and hope to cross paths again at Herrington Harbour later in the summer.
The next day took us through Norfolk harbor and it just so happened it was the weekend of Harborfest. As we transited through the harbor and down the Elizabeth River, there were dozens of boats around us and a fleet of tall ships docked at the downtown Norfolk Marina. We continued on into the bay, hoisted sails, and sailed on to Cape Charles, one of our favorite stops and Elena’s favorite breakfast stop, the Cape Charles Coffee House.
On June 13th, we sailed into Fishing Bay near Deltaville to link up with Jamie (daughter #1) in Richmond, getting our truck and our four months’ worth of mail from her. In addition, we will have the diesel generator looked at again (leaking exhaust) and perhaps some routine maintenance on the engine. We have put our awnings to try to shade the boat some, but the heat is getting unbearable and we are hiding in the cabin a lot.