December 7. Things went pretty good today, our repair really did well. The drive train had a lot less vibration that we used to have. The damper was probably in bad shape since we got the boat because vibrations we’ve always had are now gone, I just didn’t realize that they were out of the ordinary.

We were underway a little before 0700. It was a balmy 55 degrees and overcast. The forecast was for 10 to 15 knots of wind from the north, it turned out to be 5 knots from the southwest, dead on the nose. So it was a long slow motor all day. There are small inlets all along the ICW here, a lot off them are too shallow to be used but they let the ocean influence the ICW just the same.

As we were approaching an inlet as the tide was falling we were getting sucked along at close to 8 knots. Then as soon as you passed the inlet it started to work against you and we were slowed to only 4 and a half knots for a few miles until the next inlet started to suck you forward again. It was great, it sucked, it was great, it sucked. On the plus side though, we did see more dolphins.

The bridges today were kind of a chore. One of the bridges opened on the half hour and on the hour but the next bridge only opened on the hour. They were only 5 miles apart and when we missed the half hour opening of the first bridge it compounded our delay because now we had an hour to cover only those five miles when we were getting sucked along at better than 8 knots. So we ended up waiting for 15 minutes at the first bridge and then for 30 minutes at the second bridge. It’s really only a slight inconvenience but in the bigger scheme of things it did cost us an hour of travel time.

So now we ended up stopping a little short of our destination as it would have meant an after dark arrival. On the plus side though, the marina we stopped at does not appear in any of the guides as it is brand new. The floating docks are well protected and brand spankin new. The houses here in town are all pastel colors, kind of like a North Carolina Miami Beach. We’re off shortly to go on Bill-About (see the dictionary) and explore our new surroundings and find some place to eat as we’ve been isolated in Sneads Ferry just a little too long.

This is a photo of an absolutely ghastly metallic mermaid some guy had in his yard. The picture doesn’t do it justice; it looks as if it’s made of aluminum and probably 7 feet tall. Hideous, really.

We went to Old Salty’s for dinner tonight. It was kind of a dive bar that the harbor master recommended on the “boardwalk” here. Dinner was actually really good and afterward we walked home, eventually. Magellan, er, I mean Christy insisted that we could walk directly back to the boat rather than take circuitous route we had taken to get there. Incredibly we ended up on the wrong side of the lagoon that our marina is on. If I had my Jesus shoes we could have walked there but alas we had to retrace our steps and walk around the lagoon.

They are calling for record low temperatures tonight and ridiculous winds overnight. It is getting cold but we’re warm in the boat and the high winds have yet to show themselves. Tomorrow’s an 0730 start so it’s off to bed.