July 11—Swansboro, NC to Wrightsville Beach, NC

Aqua water and dolphins swimming by the boat, a sure way to tell the Atlantic is close at hand.  Even Fritz wags his tail furiously and starts looking over the side when we call out, “Dolphin friends off the starboard.”  What a friendly dog.

Casper’s Marina was peaceful all night with just a few more showers rolling through without lightening involved.  Cool temperatures and overcast skies accompanied us when we turned southward in the morning.  All was quiet passing through the Camp LaJuene target practice area on the ICW, but we did see remnants of their handiwork.  

The second day of being back on the Intracoastal Waterway, ICW, brought more bridge troubles in the form of two and a half hours of waiting for openings.  Dennis runs our boat at about 6 knots, and if there is current with us that means we’ll do 7 knots, if against us 5 knots.  Then the wind is the other factor, sometimes helping by a knot or more.  At one time we were doing about 8 knots with both wind and current in our favor.  Just missing the first two bridges, we had already waited an hour, and still had two bridges to clear.  Our second to last bridge, Figure Eight Island Bridge was on the hour and half-hour, the last one, Wrightsville Beach, on the hour only.  Just missing the 2:00 opening, then waiting a half-hour we came through Figure Eight at 2:30, but needed to do 8 knots to get to Wrightsville 4 miles away at 3:00.  Maybe we could do it we thought.  Just after passing through Figure Eight though the current changed and we slowed to 6 knots.  Our hopes were dashed.  Although we were in sight of the bridge at 3:00, when we called the bridge operator to see how much she could delay, she politely replied, “Only 5 minutes, and you can’t make it by then.”  With no place to anchor, that’s when the holding pattern began, reversing, 360s, fighting current, avoiding vessels, docks and people in the water for another hour.  We were hoping a commercial or government vessel would call for an opening because they can go through any time, and we could slip through too, but there was none.  It just reinforces why we don’t spend time in casinos…blessed we are, but lucky, we’re definitely not.

Storms rolled through the Wrightsville Beach anchorage until about 10:00, this time accompanied with thunder boomers.  During a break we did manage to take Fritz to shore and get ice.  Even though we got wet a little the night before walking to Piggly Wiggly, we were glad we didn’t need to make the trip in Wrightsville Beach, which is first a mile dinghy ride then a mile walk, and with our luck, just not a trip we should make in a thunderstorm.