June 29, 2009: Swansboro, NC

As we left Southport this morning, we passed a huge red and black freighter pulling into port.
We cruised the North Carolina coast today enjoying the beauty of the water and natural landscape. We saw the UNC Wilmington vessel - how could summer school be better.



So what are the signs that we are really back in good ole North Carolina. Well, one of course, is the appearance of NC flags along the waterway.


We saw old docks damaged by earlier storms, new lumber going up for dock constructions. We saw long narrow docks with no railings and wide docks built for play. All of them good investments as avenues for people to get to the delight of the water.



We passed by the inside passage behind Carolina Beach and Topsail where the water wanders through acres of marsh grass and tiny cottages can be seen on the beach in the distance. We stopped at lunch time in Wrightsville Beach, tied up at the Dockside Restaurant pier and climbed the steps to their glassed in and air conditioned porch. Yea for hushpuppies and cole slaw.


There were amazing open waterways like Alligator Bay where there were riverlets crisscrossing through the waving green marsh grass and glistening pools of water.

We pulled up behind an US Army Corp of Engineers vessel at the Little River Marina. It was a two story boxy ship used to do dredging and pile repair in the ICW. We were both there to buy diesel fuel. This spot fills the tanks of many fishing boats and is widely known as the cheapest place to get fuel on the East Coast. We were glad to be able to get 300 gallons at this price.

We passed by the US Marine target grounds near there where you can see old rusty vehicles parked randomly on the beach for shooting practice. Fortunately, there were no activities today, because that closes the ICW through here.

We saw the last ferry coming back from Hammocks Island State Park in the late afternoon sun. Tonight we are anchored by the Highway 24 bridge near Swansboro, NC.

June 28, 2009: Southport, NC

The Southport Baptist Church is next to Franklin Square and a grove of old oak trees. We attended the 11:00 service and there was a wonderful solo with the message of the cross of Christ being our “statue of liberty”. This church is in search of a pastor and a layman made announcements about participation to build a Habitat for Humanity house with other churches in the community. There was a guest speaker whose sermon was on the relationship of a church to its minister. We will pray for this church in finding a God filled person to nurture them.

Southport is the host to the official NC Fourth of July Festival and the small happy town was full of American Flags and red, white and blue banners draped on porch railings everywhere. We are just here a week too early. We walked by a couple of art galleries, but they were closed on Sunday. Returning to the boat, we had a fun cooking lesson which resulted in shrimp panned in butter, cheese grits and tomato mozzarella salad for lunch.




Our afternoon was spent making our first trip to Bald Head Island. Bald Head Island is the point on the map of NC just below Wilmington. The mouth of the Cape Fear River was not too rough and we made it across in about 30 minutes into the sheltered harbor at Bald Head Island Marina. The first thing we saw was Eb & Flo's Steam Bar, the local restaurant.

The island is mostly populated with private homes, well kept large beach cottages. We took our bikes on the road around the island on a roadway that was two paved lanes with an open grassy median. Most residents use golf carts for transportation so that was most of the traffic we saw. We stopped for a while to bob in the ocean waves and enjoyed stretching out on the soft sand there. There were long concrete jetties extending into the surf to protect the sand. Amber topped sea oats were as bountiful as a farmer’s field of spring wheat.


As we circled inland back towards the boat you could see large houses tucked away in the wooded secluded neighborhoods off the main drive. We stopped just for a moment at the old Baldy Lighthouse. Constructed of brick encased with cement, it was built in 1817 and although it is the oldest lighthouse still standing in NC, but it is no longer in service. We couldn’t stay too long because we needed to get back to Southport Marina to send Julie Anna on her way back to Raleigh.

The sun was beautiful as it dropped behind the neighborhood of boats in the still marina.

June 26, Southport, NC

This morning we had a great time riding around Saint James. They had a sidewalk/bike trail that led from the marina around the community of nice homes and manicured lawns. The trail led across a wooden boardwalk over a marsh grass inlet and by the Founders Club. We realized that we had been here before to a wedding of a friend we knew through Key Club.



After lunch, we took the boat out into the Cape Fear River and around the eastern end of Oak Island.
There stands Fort Caswell, built as a fort in 1826 and named after Richard Caswell, the first Governor of NC. It is also home to the NC Baptist Assembly, Camp Caswell, and a place were we have many happy memories of time spent in fun and spiritual growth with friends over the past 45 years. Not being sure of the channel there, we anchored out by the pier and took the dinghy into the little marina. It took two trips to deliver all three bikes. We had a fun time riding around the paved trails through the assembly grounds. There are a couple of famous old oak tree with limbs near the ground still holding their ground near the grey painted dining hall. We rode by the old fort batteries, past the barracks where kids stay for summer camp and down to the gate. It was a beautiful afternoon and it was good to get the exercise in a special place.


Since it was raining when we left for dinner, it was great to have Julie Anna’s car. The evening ended at the Fishy Fishy Café in Southport watching the sun set over the marina.

June 26, 2009: Saint James, NC

The tide was coming in as we moved back into the Little River and continued north this morning. You could see rapids flowing out of the marsh grass fields as the ocean currents worked their way across into the river. It reminded me of mountain streams. We passed a deserted island where three small wild goats were sunning on the sandy shore.

The low pontoon bridge over the ICW leading to Sunset Beach only opens on the hour. Unfortunately, we arrived at about 10:15 am, so we dropped anchor and watched as the one lane bridge alternated the constant motor traffic to and from the mainland. They are in the process of building a new high bridge across the water at this same spot.

Ocean Isle is another Venice. There were fingers of water cut in a pattern of blocks in the barrier island with happy beach cottages standing in lines. They all had piers and boats available to enjoy playing in the water. And the mainland side of the ICW is also filled with beautiful homes and docks. When we reached the top end of Ocean Isle, there is a cut into the ocean before you come to Holden beach. Here the color changed from the dark river tea to the atlantic emerald green. The sandy white beaches curved around the end of the islands and the ocean surf patterned the shore line. We anchored for lunch and took a quick swim in the hot sunshine.

Tonight we are at St James Plantation Marina listening to the rain and rolling thunder. We are looking forward to having Julie Anna and a new camera join us tonight.

June 25, 2009, Calabash, NC

We are finally on our home stretch and returned today to the waters of North Carolina. We have long loved the seafood available at the many down-home water front restaurants in the tiny village of Calabash. We entered Calabash Creek and dropped anchor between two sailboats barely out of the channel in 5 feet of water at low tide. Taking the dinghy down the creek, we saw the long familiar high dock lined with fishing vessels along the leftmost bank and sliding between two larger boats tied up perpendicular to the dock in order to find space.

We put our name on the list at the Dockside restaurant and then watched a little boy playing in the large old twisted live oak at the edge of the porch. The Dockside Restaurant old fishing boat logo was deeply carved in the gable end of the roof overlooking the hungry crowd. It was interesting to hear the conversations around us as various people got news on their cell phones and PDAs about Michael Jackson's death. Obviously, we are a connected people. Our wait was about an hour for a table for two after several parties of 22 were seated. We were served a basket of hot hushpuppies while we waited for our plates of small hot fried shrimp, the definition of Calabash shrimp. Our walk back down the dock to the boat wound through a crowd of people watching the chartered fishing boat unload their catch. There was a line of fishermen waiting on a couple of hardworking guys cleaning fish on a counter on the dock. There was a sizeable catch including some very large groupers, maybe 3 feet long.

Returning to the boat, I made a very sad mistake. I had been taking pictures of the huge red sun setting over the water, watching the clouds as they turned silvery pink. Then as I scrambled out of the dinghy onto the swim platform, my camera slipped out of my pocket into a watery grave. I am suffering great remorse for the loss of both the camera and the irreplaceable pictures from the last two days of our trip. Oh well, we’ll all have to use our imaginations.

The good news is that Julie Anna is meeting us in Southport for the weekend.

June 24, 2009: Myrtle Beach, SC

Cruising in the ICW north of Georgetown, there was a dramatic change in the terrain. The salt grass marshes had disappeared and the shores were densely wooded down to the water’s edge. This was the land of the Swamp Fox and the water covered the ground running inland so that only someone very familiar with the landscape would know where the dry land was. There was an occasional dock on the water's edge with a pier running out of sight into the forest.

Our course north today brought us to the Barefoot Resort Yacht Club in the heart of north Myrtle Beach. We docked here for the night and had the chance to use their beautiful pool.

We took the dinghy across the way to Barefoot Landing dock and did a little shopping finding new bathing suits on sale. The pool in the shopping area flowed down a water fall and there were tall oriental grasses growing at the edge. I even saw a dragon fly with its bi-plane iridescent wings floating gracefully on a frond and got a great picture of him. After a delicious dinner of pork ribs and Shrimp Creole at the House of Blues we headed home for the night.

June 23, 2009: Charleston to Georgetown, SC

We passed again through the Charleston Harbor and enjoyed seeing the battery, forts, and magnificent bridge everything one more time. Moving along the waterway we were delighted to see the cycle of life progressing as baby ospreys perched with their Mom on the side of their nest on the channel marker. The babies were almost as big as their mother, so they have grown rapidly and will soon fly away. (That happens in the best of families.)

We turned up Jeremy Creek just to see the water front at McClellanville. It was lined with shrimp boats and old houses and we reminisced of coming here once before traveling from NC in our ski boat. Boats were rafted double on the old piers at the marina so we were glad they were busy. We anchored near there in the rapid current flowing through the inlet to the ocean while we had lunch and then moved on to Georgetown.

Georgetown is SC’s third oldest city and was settled by colonists moving north. It was a busy industrial port founded in 1732. It was a center for indigo production, a treasured clothing due exported to England and Europe. The sizable profits from this industry established one of the earliest public free schools in the state (1755).

Cruising the waterfront, we passed the Shrimp Dock Independent Seafood where shrimp boats could unload and sell their fresh catch directly into the market. There were “Do not feed the alligators” signs on the city dock where we went to shore in our dinghy. The old City Hall and Clock tower were in the center of this small town. The tower was built in 1845 and was where the town was surrendered to Union forces in 1865.


It was fun to ride along the streets of this old southern community with many homes dating back into the first half of the 18^th century (1750). These were large two story homes with long porches. We also saw the William Morgan Mansion where he lived as mayor of the town in the late 1800’s. He was credited with bring electricity to the city and also deepening the harbor for industry.

We saw another SC Champion tree whose age was confirmed at over 500 years in 1940. With a girth of 23 feet, it had branches 50 feet off the ground that were each the size of large oak trees. I so enjoy seeing these majestic works of God’s art.


We found a little park next the wonderful boardwalk pier that ran along the water front. There was a stone monument there to Francis Marion the Swamp Fox commemorating his leadership during the Revolutionary War.


There was also an ice cream shop handy, so we ate waffle cones full of cappuccino ice cream as we watched the sky reflect the sunset through fishing boat spring lines.