January 26, 2016
We had a smooth trip down the Potomac River, spending New Year’s Eve at anchor on the Potomac River. No partying for us and we were in bed early to get an early start in the new year. We continued on New Year’s Day to Deltaville for another night at anchor, then on to Portsmouth, just across the Elizabeth River from Norfolk.
New Year’s Day Sunrise on the Potomac
There we spent a couple weeks, using the time to catch up with good friends Gary, Cookie, and little Ruthie and new friends Larry and Susan. We visited the Virginia Beach Bridge Club a few times and played in their Sectional Tournament, where we accumulated some good Master Points. We also continued work on replacing a couple of our toilets. And we had a visit from good friends Ron and Wendy who may come with us for some cruising soon.
From there, it was time to head south to Morehead City, NC. Winter weather can be tricky and we wanted good weather to head around Cape Hatteras. It’s about a 30 hour trip and it looked like we had a good 36-hour weather window, so we set off on January 14th. The challenge was to get a weather window that lined up with the tides, but that was not to be. We elected to maximize the weather window and simply run at increased RPM to make up for the tides being against us on departing and arriving. We ran the whole trip at around 1200 RPM vs. our normal 1060, for an extra 2 gallons of fuel burned per hour. Once again, Captain Bradley got the weather right – we had a reasonably smooth trip all the way to Cape Lookout, where they were beginning to broadcast building seas and gale warnings. As we approached the Morehead City Yacht Basin, the rain came and the winds increased, but we were soon safely docked and the storm blew past, bringing a day of nice weather so that we could give the boat a good wash! We will be here for about a month, doing a bit more maintenance and visiting more good friends before departing for Charleston in February.
Sunrise near Cape Hatteras
Here are a couple videos of our recent passages and some more photos (click any photo to enlarge):
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- Last night of Hanukah
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- Bradley enjoys pancit and lumpia before departing from DC (thanks to my step-mother Virginia!)
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- New friends Larry and Susan
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- Accumulating some master points at bridge
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- View of Tidewater Yacht Marina in Portsmouth, VA
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- A little snow on the dock in Portsmouth
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- Passing a sub near Norfolk
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- Our new Iridium GO! satellite communicator/tracker
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- Sunrise near Cape Hatteras
Shear Madness 
#1 by anne herrera on July 12, 2016 - 7:30 am
Valuable blog post ! I am thankful for the analysis , Does someone know where my company might grab a template a form form to use ?
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#2 by edward stancil on January 27, 2016 - 8:47 pm
DEAR JUNIOR AMIGA & BRADLEY:
HAPPY NEW YEAR; THANKS FOR THE UPDATE. WE ARE PLEASED THAT YOU HAD A SAFE JOURNEY. WHEN YOU GET CLOSE TO CHARLOTTE AREA PLEASE LET US KNOW FOR WE HAVE SOME DEAR FRIENDS WE WOULD LIKE YOU TO MEET THAT HAVE A HOME IN CHARLOTTE. TAKEN CARE, WE MISS YOU AND LOVE YOU; LAS VEGAS AMIGA & EDWARD
_____
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