Saturday, June 19, 2021

day fifteen - Cape Lookout Bight


The phone alarm wakes me at 5:10, I want to make sure I can leave with the last of the ebb tide.  Sleeping gear and boom tent stowed, cast off 5:50, all sails up at 6:00.


Approaching the inlet at 6:15, the water would be calm if not for all the offshore fishing boats heading out for the day.  


Through the inlet and on to Onslow Bay at 6:30, making 2.8 off Shackleton Banks with wind on the port beam.  Easy sailing as the low overcast slides away.


Making 3.8 at 7:35 a half mile off the beach, shrimp boats dragging their nets offshore.


Entrance to the bight in sight at 7:50, 4.0.  In the inlet at 8:30 past the red marker channel that is right up next to the beach.


I follow the shoreline south past a big navy-grey power boat and then two cruising sailboats.


Anchor down just north of the shallows at Wreck Point at 9:00


It is a spectacular morning with a comfortable north wind.  There is always a tropical feel about the water and white sandy beaches.


I relax and read, catch up on some email and the log.  Early afternoon it gets hot so I set up the boom teen with the fore and aft corners folded back, it gives me plenty of shade but lets the breeze through.


Late afternoon the wind builds and it gets rough with the chop rolling down the length of the bight from Barden Inlet.  I bring down the boom tent, raise anchor and motor a mile to the east to calmer water just below the lighthouse.  Sweet potato rice and chicken for dinner.

11.79 NM for the day

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