Beaufort (Bow-fert in North Carolina) is usually just a small seaside town with plenty of boats; both working fishing vessels and pleasure craft of various kinds. Nearby Morehead City has a fair sized port, so there is also commercial traffic coming and going through the inlet. Beaufort is not overly touristy to my mind. Nevertheless, a handful of times a year in the area, and one week especially, major fishing tournaments bring many many people and boats to town. My buddy, Victor, kind of set me up. As we were planning the jump offshore from Wrightsville Beach to Beaufort, he never mentioned that we were arriving during the Big Rock Fishing Tournament Week. Victor actually works out of town every other week as an engineer, so it might not have occurred to him. And yet, there I was in another touristy town, even if it was only overwhelmingly touristy for that week.
As Mollynogger lolled in the anchorage off of Front Street downtown, the Beaufort Docks were teeming with fancy boats. I cannot imagine how many dollars worth of gleaming, high dollar fishing boats lined the docks. And boats were in Atlantic Beach and Morehead City too as all the marinas swelled beyond capacity.
As I mentioned, Vic and I had done a reunion cruise of sorts but on the previous trip his mom, Cheryl, had been with us as well. I had promised to take her out sailing once Mollynogger and I were in town. If I recall, there was some weather coming in a few days. We were going to go out on Sunday before the weather, and planned to slip out after the fishing fleet left and return before they all came roaring back for the weigh-in deadline.
After welcoming her aboard and prepping Molly, I started the engine and went forward to raise the anchor. Almost right away I had noticed an odd ticking noise in the engine’s idle. I was hoping it would go away once the engine was warm. We started moving out of the cramped anchorage and motored past Front Street. I grew more and more uncomfortable with the ticking sound. Once we were clear of the anchorage, I asked Cheryl to steer while I checked the engine.
I scrambled down the companionway and unbolted the stairs to lift them out of the way. I grabbed a flashlight and opened the engine hatch just enough to see inside. Right there in front of me a little spurt of exhaust was escaping around one of the injectors. That was not good at all. I won’t cast any aspersions, but there I was trying to take another member of the same family out sailing and was foiled yet again by the engine.
We turned around and I re-anchored in almost the same spot by Front Street. Cheryl and I had a nice chat, a snack and sampled some bourbon. It was a very pleasant afternoon, but not exactly what I had planned. Victor and a friend cruised out in his skiff a little later to collect Cheryl. He was nice enough to take some of my trash as well.
In the previous post, I described how my brain froze the last time Molly’s engine wouldn’t start. I had been away from boats for two years and my tenuous confidence as a diesel mechanic was at its nadir. I slept on my injector problem while my brain chased several scenarios. In the morning, I set about to pull the injector; the basic first step. Two nuts hold a collar which holds the injector down on top of the engine’s head. As soon as I had the first nut about halfway off, I knew the problem. The collar was cracked in half. With a broken collar, there was no pressure holding the injector in place. I posted a couple pictures to the Perkins 4.108 groups on Facebook asking for advice and finished my coffee.
I remembered that Gaylen, the previous owner, had left me a spare set of injectors. I knew right where they were under the V berth and went to grab them. Another issue I had discovered unbolting the injector collar was that one of the nuts was so rusted to the stud that the stud unscrewed from the head with the nut. Installing the new injector, that stud seemed to bottom out before the nut was tight. The torque on those nuts must have been uneven and that uneven pressure would have definitely caused the break. I put new studs on my mental list and put a couple stainless steel washers between the collar and the nut. Without a torque wrench, I snugged the nuts by feel and reassembled the fuel rail. After bleeding the fuel system, I turned the key and the engine came to life again. No tick! It was such a feeling of accomplishment to prove to myself yet again that I was reasonably self sufficient. I’ve never felt I was any good under the hood of a car, but I’m getting more and more confident over an old diesel engine.
That afternoon, I walked up to the Piggly Wiggly to get some provisions. On the way back, I stopped at Barbour Supply to get some kind of caulk for Molly’s portlights. After talking to the counter man, I broke one of my cardinal rules. I don’t like using silicone on my boats, but it was basically my only option within walking distance. And supposedly the State of North Carolina buys it by the case for the windows on their ferries.
Between Barbour Supply and the dock, I made a short detour and walked over past the Hammock House built around 1700 and thought to be one of the oldest houses in North Carolina. My main reason for going was that there is also a tradition that the pirate, Blackbeard, stayed in the house in the eighteenth century while it was serving as an inn. It is now a private home without regular tours as far as I can tell. I took a quick selfie from the street and walked on to the dock.
The next day, I got up early, made breakfast, and prepared for leaving town. The engine came to life again and began a comfortable purr, so I went forward to raise the anchor. Taylor Creek is a quite pleasant, if slightly crowded, anchorage. The current is not bad and the wind is constrained from several directions. Molly and I made our way past the Beaufort Docks just as Cheryl and I had done two days before. This time, however, I turned to starboard and went the back way behind Radio Island and into Town Creek. I was anchored there with Ruth Ann a couple times and it was fun to pass through some familiar waters.
I was headed north without a firm destination, but I was looking for a lonely spot of water to decompress. Town Creek spills into Gallants Channel which took us out toward Core Creek; a part of the Intra Coastal Waterway (ICW). Core Creek was connected to Adams Creek up north when the ICW was cut through. That passage runs up to the Neuse River and I thought I might head over to a spot I had heard was nice and quiet.
I rolled out the genoa as I got into Core Creek and started motorsailing. With an eye on the wind and on Molly’s speed over the ground, I eventually decided to kill the engine. There it was again. Nothing but that quiet gurgling of the water running past the hull. I had a catamaran ahead of me who seemed surprisingly slow under sail. Of course, when I caught them to pass, it was in a narrow section of the creek right before the bridge where NC101 crosses to connect Havelock and Beaufort. Molly coasted by them without causing too much heartache. They might have been chagrined but they waved.
As the ICW enters the waters of Adams Creek on the north end of the passage, the way opens up with much wider water. I was still sailing and having fun even as I watched some ominous clouds off to the west. Off to my starboard was a wide but shallow anchorage where the Jonaquin and Cedar Creeks come together and wash into Adams Creek. I had previously anchored there aboard Ruth Ann, but Mollynogger’s keel is a foot deeper than hers was. Curiously, I started to remember the Coast Guard broadcasts from the week before. I think the floating log hazard was right here in Cedar Creek.
A powerboat that had been traveling along with the catamaran and I, turned into the anchorage. It seemed pretty early to me even with the clouds looming. However, just as I had passed the anchorage the radio crackled with a Coast Guard weather warning. I looked again and could see how fast the clouds were rolling across the sky, so I turned Molly around and headed back toward Cedar Creek. As we backtracked to the south, I furled the jib and secured the sheets.
Ahead of the anchorage, I was scanning on my chartplotter. The whole area was flecked with red marks to show that the depths were below my danger setting. Molly draws four and half feet of water and I use six feet as my depth limit. Normally, that makes piloting quite easy. I just stay out of the red flecked space on the chart. However, when I needed to duck into some skinny water to prepare for a squall it was not so helpful. There was a lumpy organic shape of safe water just beyond a channel marker but I wanted to cut the corner as the clouds and wind loomed closer. A line to the southeast appeared to have deep enough water despite the red flecks on the chart. If I cut toward the marker, and stayed along that thin line, we’d probably make it. When I’m either dragging the keel on the bottom or the sand is being stirred up into a thick cloud, the depth gauge displays three dashes rather than a number. I saw dashes more than once on my way into Cedar Creek.
I was releasing the safety strap on the anchor and pushing it off the bowsprit when the first downdrafts of the squall hit us. I took a measure of comfort when I felt the anchor grab and the chain snugged up. The sixty five pound Rocna is a trusty beast when it’s down and set. Quick math in my head ciphered that ninety feet of chain would be a little more than ten to one scope, well able to hold against whatever was about to hit us. I set the snubber and returned aft. After securing some loose items like the cockpit cushions, I headed down below to ride it out.
The squall was intense but brief; nowhere near as bad as some that I’ve been in. I just haven’t yet been through much aboard Mollynogger. You might remember that twice I went down to Carolina Beach from Wrightsville to ride out a storm on a mooring. Riding out a squall with Molly at anchor was still fairly new to me, but we did fine. She is more than twice the weight of Ruth Ann and feels very safe when the excrement hits the oscillating air circulator.
The air is always still right after a squall, so I climbed back into the cockpit. After a couple long breaths of that fresh air, I began to realize that I still had plenty of daylight left. After checking the chart and the time the sun would set, I knew that I could get to the South River as I had planned just before dark. All I had to do was make ready.
I started the engine again, raised the anchor, and warily traced that line back out into the channel and deeper water. Once back in Adams Creek, the channel leaned to the west before entering the wider waters of the Neuse River. Width is one thing, but depth is quite another. The South River lies on the other side of the Garbacon Shoal, an expanse of shallow water along the southern shore of the Neuse. We were on a schedule now so I motored along without bothering to set a sail. The river was still riled up from the passing of the squall, so we bounced along and the mast waggled from side to side. The channel light marking the edge of the shoal was about three miles ahead on a track just east of north.
After clawing our way to the light, I steered Molly to the southeast to motor about four miles down to the somewhat tricky entrance of the South River. We had tracked the hard chine of a triangular course up to the light and back down. At the river entrance, the chart was clear but the way was tight. A small shoal crept into the southside of the channel and right after the first turn to starboard, a buoy danced in the waves to mark a wreck on the bottom of the narrow channel. Molly charged along as I steered her clear of the obstacles and we made it into the smaller river in no time. After our double turn to starboard had taken us behind a point of land and into the smaller river, the waters ahead were much calmer.
With four or five anchorages marked along the next couple miles, we had some choices. The first was too close to the main river in a wide open space. I steered Molly toward the second possibility but it was a small spot near a creek with several houses nearby, so we kept going. I was aiming at two spots close together down the way. Big Creek drains into the South River. These were not overly creative names but I could see more trees than houses, so things were looking up.
As we approached Big Creek, I could see some construction and dredging was going on. The anchorage up the creek would be protected from the wind but there were several houses within sight. I didn’t want to wrestle my way past a couple barges just to get closer to civilization. I opted for the other spot almost a mile from the houses. That was just what I had been craving.
The sun was just touching the tops of the trees to the west of Molly as I slowed her to a crawl and watched our depth. When we were in about ten feet of water, I put the engine in neutral and walked forward to drop the anchor. It was just getting dusky when I backed down on the anchor to set it firmly and marked the spot on my anchor alarm. I could just make out a small beach along the nearby shore. I hit the solenoid switch to kill the engine and my world was silent again. The trees along the shore had melted from various shades of dark green into a single fuzzy topped, dark shape on the horizon. The river was about a half mile wide and I could not see any evidence of human occupation on the other shore. That was just what I had been craving.
I made a light supper and enjoyed some of the bourbon that Cheryl had left us. Molly soon rocked me into a stupor and I slept like a man who had finally made it home. In the morning, I slept in and then made a large leisurely breakfast. Afterward, I made some effort to scrub the decks and tidy up the boat. I sat in the sun and read. And later took a bucket shower in the cockpit. The houses were far enough away that I knew they could just see the sliver of Molly’s hull against the lush green forest, but I also knew they would only be able to see me if they got out some binoculars. I didn’t have to worry too much about clothes or modesty. That was just what I had been craving.
After five glorious days swinging on anchor in the wilds of the South River, I was running low on provisions. I needed to stop in at Oriental, NC anyway. I always keep a stock of dried mushrooms in my pantry and they were nearly gone. I had read about a store in Oriental that would accept UPS packages for cruisers. Before leaving Beaufort, I had confirmed that they still offered that service and ordered some mushrooms from Minnesota. An email had come a couple days before that the package had been delivered, so I got myself and Molly organized to move again.
Sadly, the wind was on our nose as we backtracked to the west and crossed the Neuse River to get to Oriental. When I was there with Ruth Ann a few years ago, we could sneak under the bridge into Greens Creek and got tucked away in a very protected little anchorage. Unfortunately, Mollynogger’s mast is eight or nine feet taller than Ruth Ann’s keeping me from getting to that quiet spot. There is also a couple free docks in the town harbor there but I had seen how crowded it can get on the inside. I was not going to attempt to get into the harbor yet. Molly is a much bigger boat than my previous one and I had only been sailing her a little more than a month.
After reaching the Smith Creek Channel Light and turning in toward Oriental, I began my analysis. There is an anchorage right in the entrance of the harbor, but I knew from experience it is usually crowded. Luckily, there is also an anchorage just outside the jetty. After confirming that many boats were already in the closer anchorage, I steered us off the channel and anchored in eight feet of water on the outside. I would need to watch the weather as we were only sheltered from the wind in a small arc to the northwest. Any wind out of a broad range from southwest to northeast would hit us uninhibited.
In the morning, I rowed to the town dinghy dock and set to wandering. I needed to check in at the Inland Waterway Provision Company for some boat parts but I can no longer recall which or for what. After hiking up to the tiny but well stocked Piggly Wiggly, on the way back I stopped in at the Nautical Wheelers store for my package. Nautical Wheelers is one of those amazing places typical of small, remote towns. They carry an amazing array of things; mostly leaning toward the well-to-do of both residents and travelers. They have Carolina souvenirs, cigars, wine, and local gourmet items. They carry clothing from souvenir t shirts and trucker caps to fancy blouses and lounge wear, and even some expensive footwear. Out on the lawn is a huge selection of different styles and colors of Adirondack chairs and other patio accessories in polywood. They even list a “polywood specialist” on the staff page of their website.
The store is in a big old southern house on Bridge Street with a big ol’ Southern porch on three sides. I set my bags down near the door and stepped inside. A chime echoed through the store and a nice lady asked if she could help me before I could even see her. I explained that I was there to pick up a package.
“It shouldn’t be heavy,” I said as she beckoned me to follow her down a hallway. It was a box of dried mushrooms after all. Two pounds of dried mushrooms that would last me several weeks of cooking, but two pounds, even in a large box, that wouldn’t slow down the nice lady helping me. I reached to carry the box anyway and we headed back toward the counter.
I had expected to pay some nominal fee for the privilege of having them collect my package. She had followed me toward the front room and I turned to ask how much I owed her. She was very confused and cocked her head. I could almost here “bless your heart” drifting as a whisper among the hats and shirts and oval “ONC” stickers.
“I don’t think there is any charge,” she finally managed to say.
“Well, thank you. That’s great.” I said. “But I will also take some of this,” as I placed a two pound bag of Carolina Gold Brown Rice on the counter before her.
“Wonderful,” she exclaimed returning to some comfort zone of retail exchange.
I thanked her again and exited the house to collect my other bags on the porch.
It was a short walk back over to the town dinghy dock adjacent to the Oriental Harbor Village Marina. Balter, the dinghy, waited patiently for me and tugged against the painter and the cable locking the oars into the dinghy, and the dinghy to the dock. I unlocked and stowed the cable, loaded up, and shoved off to row back out to Mollynogger.
I don’t recall if I’ve mentioned the dinghy name yet. It is not all that important but I’m compelled to enter it into the record. “Mollynogger” is an old sailor word for someone who frequents the company of loose or immoral women. To “Balter” is to dance or tread clumsily. I can only imagine that a mollynogger, sober or especially not, would most often be baltering along in his pursuits. Hence, I have named the dinghy Balter to be the tender to Mollynogger.
Oriental is not that far from Beaufort over land and Victor was going to come up for lunch. We had also discussed him taking Mollynogger’s spinnaker pole. I have discovered that the pole laying along Molly’s side deck which seemed huge is actually regulation size for her. However, at sixteen feet long and four inches in diameter at the center, I was never going to deploy the pole. I don’t have a spinnaker and won’t likely ever have one. Further, I would never be reaching with a spinnaker and would never need the pole to be able to clear the forestay. The most I would use a pole for would be to hold the genoa out to the side going downwind. This would only require what is called a whisker pole. Such a pole is usually adjustable for different lengths and is much smaller. It was going to be interesting trying to row to shore with that giant spinnaker pole, but Victor and I had a plan. He had a wooden boom on his boat that needed to be replaced and the giant spinnaker pole was almost just the right size.
Well, you know what they say about “best laid plans” and all. The morning of the day Victor was going to head my way, there was a change in the forecast including a small craft advisory for the waters around me. Being anchored outside the jetty, and basically out in the main river, I was going to be exposed to the brunt of that weather. Moreover, the winds were forecast out of the southwest where I had no protection. Any strong wind would have six miles of open water to build up the waves before they got to me. I had to bail and called Victor to cancel our plans.
I had hauled the anchor by midmorning and we headed down the Neuse to the Bay River. The Bay comes down from beyond Bayboro and is a much smaller river. The ICW actually turns up that river briefly and then cuts across the peninsula and behind Goose Creek Island to get to the Pamlico River. Molly and I followed that route and anchored in the somewhat appropriately named Gale Creek, just past the Bay River. We were in a little wide spot in the creek where it was quiet. There were three or four houses; a couple of them quite nice for such a remote spot. As the sun went down, we had run far enough out of the Neuse River that the storm never reached us. That was fine with me.
In the morning, I was on the move again as I had space on a dock waiting for me in a couple days. Our family is flung all around the country and into Europe. After we lost Dad in October last year, we had coordinated everyone’s calendar to be able to meet up and have a weekend of family fellowship. Mom and Dad are together in the cemetery in Cadillac, Michigan next to Dad’s parents. I had needed to find a secure place to leave Mollynogger while I traveled. As luck would have it my friends, Gaylen and Allison, who I had purchased the boat from, had a friend who was the dockmaster of a small marina in Washington, North Carolina. Washington is one of my favorite spots as I had been there with Ruth Ann for a three weeks or so a few years back. But I had a day to kill before my scheduled arrival and I was really close to a spot with some personal history.
I continued on Gale Creek past the RE Mayo Docks, a place that has always intrigued me but I’ve never had time to stop. Through the peninsula and into the Pamilco River, Washington lay to the northwest but I steered Molly the other way. We were back in waters with some room, so I rolled out the genoa again and we motorsailed down the Pamlico River and turned up into the Pungo River. The second big creek off to starboard, just past Sandy Point, was Slade Creek. Back in 2015, I was crewing for Alex Dorsey aboard his Eleanor, a Westsail 42, when we were flanked by an unexpectedly strong squall and had to run for cover off the Pungo. We had found some refuge in Slade Creek. I still don’t know how we made it there in one piece. The boat was healed over significantly under bare poles (no sails were up for you landlubbers). A baby water spout nearly raked the bow as we scurried toward the creek. Most of the way we had very little visibility in the horizontal rain. Alex was staring at the chartplotter and I was trying to watch ahead. I had feared seeing the trees loom out of the rain just as we crunched onto the beach, but Alex got us into the creek “flying on instruments.” Once we had entered, there were enough trees around that it was like someone had switched off the storm. The wind was gone. The rain fell down rather than across. And there was a spectacular sunset through the trees as if Mother Nature was begging our forgiveness. We spent the night there on our way to Charleston and I was going to go back there now just to say that I done so. Alex is back in Panama and I sent him a photo on Whatsapp.
There were a couple houses near the mouth of Slade Creek, but we continued on a bit deeper and around a bend. I dropped the anchor in a spot that felt familiar but after so long I really don’t know where Eleanor had stopped that previous day. I relished that I was in another lonely spot with no other humans nearby. I actually spent two nights there and only saw a fisherman go by once. It was wonderful. That was just what I had been craving.
On Thursday, June 25, I got up early and had the engine on and the anchor up by 7:00 o’clock. Molly and I had a date in Washington. Of course, the wind was on our nose, so we motored up the Pamilco, past Bath which was one of Blackbeard’s hideaways, and on into Washington. There’s a railroad swing bridge on the south side of what I call the lagoon. The locals don’t know what I’m talking about but there is a wide, shallow spot across the river from downtown Washington where I had anchored Ruth Ann. I call it a lagoon. This day we motored on past the historic city and looked for the marina at Havens Wharf. I had called Keith, the dockmaster, when I was a couple hours away. I checked in with him again as Molly got near. The marina is all the way at the other end of the downtown waterfront. Keith and his wife Marianne were waiting to catch our lines as I ghosted up toward the dock between a house boat and a fishing trawler. Thankfully, Keith had made it plenty easy on me. We were up against a long face dock on the side of the marina.
I spent the Fourth of July with a bunch of new friends. There was another couple at the dock who were also friends of Molly’s previous owners. Steve and Lisa on Liberty are literally right across the dock from me. Everyone was welcoming and friendly including and especially Spencer and his wife Dina who have lent me an AC unit. It was 101 degrees on the Fourth which would have been brutal without their generous help.
A few days later, I flew back to Michigan from Greenville, the closest commercial airport and the next town over. It was a special weekend with most of the family. We stayed in an AirBNB in Ludington which has plenty of family history as well and a beach on Lake Michigan. On Saturday afternoon, several of us made the trip over to Cadillac and spent some time at the cemetery followed by a tour around the town where Dad had grown up and he and Mom had later built a house to retire in. Sunday was a beach day and hanging out with the clan.
After a week in Michigan, I returned to Mollynogger. I was only going to spend one month in Washington but ended up signing up for a couple more. I’ve been working on some boat projects while I have shorepower and enjoying the people and the town of Washington. There’s been Trivia Night every Thursday at the Two Rivers Alehouse, the Beaufort County Traditional Music Association Saturday jam, an open mic I won’t tell you about, and lots of time with good people. But soon I’ll be leaving again to restart the wandering that I’ve been meaning to do. I’ll have another post about my time here, but the timing of these posts is auspicious. I’ve been distracted by all kinds of activity here in Washington and by my boat projects, but I’m finally catching up the blog just before I’m to start traveling again and have more stories to tell. Please follow along. I’m writing for myself as a kind of therapy but I really enjoy people following along and I welcome your comments and questions.
Enjoy your day. Be happy and make some other people happy too.