Captain’s log 11-05-06

We left Belhaven on the way to Oriental, NC.  The main road to take is the ICW and motor for 8-10 hours.  Looking at the charts, Pamlico river connects to pamlico sound and that connects to the Neuse River which leads to Oriental NC.  So Instead of motoring the ICW, we took advantage of the Northern winds and sailed most of the way to Oriental via Pamlico sound.  We had quite a distance to cover because Pamlico sound has a long shoal which extends west to east.  We had to go east as far as necessary to get around the shoal.  The sound was well marked with buoys.  The day was sunny and a bit chilly.  Autopilot was sailing most of the way.  By the time rounded the far east marker and headed back west to Oriental the mood was great.  I made sandwiches while Crystal and Bella slept most of the day.  There was about an hour section where the rollers were big enough to make Crystal a bit disy.  But that went away pretty fast and as planned we were making our way towards Oriental just in time.  The sun was setting and the full moon was rising as we entered a tricky harbor.  Very narrow entrance with just enough water to make me warried.  But we didn't run aground.  The anchorage was FULL, so we gently anchored on the endge of the shallow water.  After we anchored, a sailboat was passing about 20 feet behind us.  I asked them what their depth sounder was reading and they answered 4 feet!.  So we were literaly on the edge.    The night was pretty rocky as the breakwater was still letting some of the outside swell come in.  In the morning we went around town looking for cellphone connection, WIFI and other supplies.  This town is not very accesible.  We'll meet Rick, another C&C owner form the online forum tonight, and we'll be on our way to Beaufort, NC in the morning.