Trip Oriental to Ocracoke
Finally I have some time to write about this last trip. I launched at Oriental NC Thursday night. I spend the night at the public docks, and me and a Mac-26 departed early in the morning. Right off the bat the Mac-26 gunned his 140 horsepower engine and I was alone. I sailed all the way out the river tacking back and forth. I didn't wanted to motor too much because my gas was limited to 8 gallons. I had a nice sail most of the day, until 4pm and in the middle of the river the wind died down. I had to motor sail the last half of the trip. I made it to Ocracoke at 6:30pm. Docking was a mess, I'm not used to dock, I just anchor and I stay on the boat. This time everybody was on the dock, and I didn't had my dingy with me.
I spend the first night ok. Morning came early and I wanted to go sailing, but everybody wanted to stay on the island to shop and walk around. After lunch Billy, the guy in the Mac 26 accepted to go out the inlet sailing. It was a great trip, the boat sailed like a princess, really closed to the wind, it was great.
The leg back to Ocracoke, we ran aground in a marker. The shoal shifted, but I jumped out of the boat and we were on our way in 2 minutes.
The night at dock was ok, kinda boring, but I used the pool.
Sunday morning, everybody was up early getting ready to leave. The wind was on the nose from the west. The first leg of the trip I was with a Person 27 and a Catalina 30. I motored all the way out the channel, and I raised my sails to motorsail a little. Then the wind died to nothing. I motored for about 4 hours to the middle of the sound (mark anchor on the picture)
I took a long break there, waiting for the wind to turn around S-SE 10-15 knots. At 4pm that happened, so I was on my way again. I sailed and motor sailed some. In the NR-6 marker the wind piped up to 15-20 with gusts of 25, and I got cough with a lot of sail in a lot of wind. The boat rounded up really fast and really bad, and I scooped a lot of sea water inside the cockpit, good thing I had the boards up and the hatched battened down. After recovering from that I reefed the main, and I fire up the engine to max power, I wanted to get out of that quickly. I was the only boat smaller than a fishing troller in the river, and not a single sailboat on sight.
I made it back to Oriental at 7pm, dropped sails, got the boat in the trailer and I was on the road by 8.
Long long trip. I don't know if I'm doing something like that again.
Gus
I spend the first night ok. Morning came early and I wanted to go sailing, but everybody wanted to stay on the island to shop and walk around. After lunch Billy, the guy in the Mac 26 accepted to go out the inlet sailing. It was a great trip, the boat sailed like a princess, really closed to the wind, it was great.
The leg back to Ocracoke, we ran aground in a marker. The shoal shifted, but I jumped out of the boat and we were on our way in 2 minutes.
The night at dock was ok, kinda boring, but I used the pool.
Sunday morning, everybody was up early getting ready to leave. The wind was on the nose from the west. The first leg of the trip I was with a Person 27 and a Catalina 30. I motored all the way out the channel, and I raised my sails to motorsail a little. Then the wind died to nothing. I motored for about 4 hours to the middle of the sound (mark anchor on the picture)
I took a long break there, waiting for the wind to turn around S-SE 10-15 knots. At 4pm that happened, so I was on my way again. I sailed and motor sailed some. In the NR-6 marker the wind piped up to 15-20 with gusts of 25, and I got cough with a lot of sail in a lot of wind. The boat rounded up really fast and really bad, and I scooped a lot of sea water inside the cockpit, good thing I had the boards up and the hatched battened down. After recovering from that I reefed the main, and I fire up the engine to max power, I wanted to get out of that quickly. I was the only boat smaller than a fishing troller in the river, and not a single sailboat on sight.
I made it back to Oriental at 7pm, dropped sails, got the boat in the trailer and I was on the road by 8.
Long long trip. I don't know if I'm doing something like that again.
Gus
1976 Chrysler 22 Halve Maen - Sail # 595
I use my eTrex with the track on. When I get home I download the tracks to my computer using Mapsource. I have the ability to install charts in the GPS, but the codes to do that cost a pretty penny. I'm waiting on my Garmin GPS 172C to arrive so I can play with that one a little. I saw a unit in another boat and looks great!
1976 Chrysler 22 Halve Maen - Sail # 595