Busy day in Beaufort

Monday 6 Dec, Beaufort anchorage, cruising day 9: Visit CBP, shopping, lunch out with OCC port officer, run aground at anchor, run aground on way to fuel up, prepare for departure.

It was a busy day! We are meeting Dianna, the OCC Port officer for Beaufort (Ocean Cruising Club) at 10:30am. She has kindly offered to run us around for our chores today, for an hour or 2. But before we go there, let’s talk about last night.

I was up in the night for my usual, and noticed I’d left the instruments on. And I’m a bit shocked to see 2.4m displayed on the depth. It’s low tide and we are aground! I check the tidal data and this particular low is -0.25m below datum. Bugger. I’m not used to dealing with tides! The water is mirror calm and right now we are facing the same way as all the boats, nose to the current flow. But I need to wait up ready for the tidal current to swing 180 degrees. In any busy anchorage, everything is fine if all boats swing at the same time, due to wind or tide. If we are still aground then, the other boats will swing and we won’t. So I’ll need to be ready to fend off our neighbour. But after half an hour, and just before the tidal change, our depth is back to 2.5m and floating again. Though I still watch our swing just to make sure.

We love being at anchor, but we really don’t like crowded anchorages that are subject to tidal flow changes. The only collision we have ever had was in a busy anchorage, when another boat drifted onto us at 3am. But let’s not go there. No, wait, we should. I want to name and shame! We had quite a bit of damage, but this guy, Lee Weissman, an OCC member himself never sent us his insurance details and never offered to pay even 1 cent of the $4,000 bill and ended up claiming it was our fault for being anchored behind him! Aaaargh. Now look, my blood pressure is up! Back to today please.

First thing in the morning, the dinghy gets lowered, outboard is installed, then off we go at 10:15.
It’s a beautiful and warm day. Already 20degC and forecast for 23 later in the day. It’s so lovely to be warm again. The dinghy dock is but 75m away from Cloudy Bay so our first dinghy ride (not Oana’s favorite past time!) was short and painless, and most importantly dry! And Dianne is already waiting to greet us. She’s such a lovely lady, from Texas, with a very bubbly and energetic personality. Always eager to help OCC “cruisers” (as she calls us) as they pass through. Last week she had taken 2 yacht crews to her house and gave them all the big thanksgiving turkey dinner, with all the trimmings. That’s Dianne!

Our first stop is to see the CBP (Customs and Border Protection agency). Because our cruising permit ran out this June, we now have to check-in to every port we go to. Issuing a new cruising permit to a foreign boat is not allowed unless that boat leaves the USA waters for a minimum of 14 days. But, we are hoping the officer here will take pity on us, considering Covid travel restrictions, and issue us a new cruising permit. With a CP, we don’t have to physically visit CBP at each port, we only need to make a phone call. But sadly, although a very pleasant officer (many are not!) he told us the rules, which we already knew, and issued us with a CBP1300 form for our next leg which needs to be given to the next CBP officer at the destination port. A bit of a bummer.
But the cloud does have a minor silver lining. He tells us that if we have to pop into a place to shelter, and we only anchor but not dock (tie up), we don’t have to check in. So we will see how far we can stretch this rule without breaking it!

Next tasks are visiting the post office to get our Christmas cards sent. If you don’t receive yours, it means you have clearly not been good boys & girls this year! Then to food shopping. Dianna surprises us by taking us to a Lidl. This is a very popular supermarket chain in Europe and … wey-hey! It has mostly the same produce. European! Cheeses, hams, the full lot. Needless to say that our very short shopping list of few fresh produce ends up being $280 worth, including cheeses we have been drooling after ever since we arrived to the USA. Oh … and in North Carolina, the supermarkets are allowed to sell wines and beers. So we come away with quite a few more bottles, all at a reasonable price. We love Lidl!

A few other errands and lunch out at Five Guys (a burger venue) and we say our farewells to Dianna, tootle back to Cloudy Bay and unload all our booty!

While Oana battles with her usual perfect packing of the fridges (best to be out of the cabin for that!) I get the dinghy back up on the davits and prepare the boat to up-anchor and go to the fuel dock. But oh no … we are aground again! Damn! The boat seems to have swung itself into the shallows and not only is the keel in the ooz, but the rudder seems to be too. It takes quite a bit of gunning the motor and alternating the bow thruster to get the boat off the shelf and back into the deeper water. All with the usual audience of other boat crews! Not good for Hallberg Rassy reputation, I’m afraid.

Before we go aground again, we lift the anchor and set off to the fuel dock. I only put the depth instrument on because I don’t intend to leave the channel – so no depth issues to worry about, right? WRONG! We are directed to the T-head dock behind a massive 120ft sailing yacht that I know has a 13ft draft. So I think nothing of taking Cloudy Bay next to her, then to spin around and aim for the pontoon. Then what do we do? Yes, run aground again! When I power up the plotter, I see that I’ve managed to find the only shallow spot in the entire channel – and it is right in the middle of the channel too!

While I curse at myself like crazy, Oana is giggling to herself (she admitted later). 1 week in the water and already we have removed the antifoul off the tip of the keel and rudder. Next time I’m just not going to bother painting them! Well, at least not with ablating paint. Maybe tar? Or maybe I should just pre-paint them with mud 😊

After that, despite the cross wind and current flow, docking and fuel-up it straight forward. We take on 130 gallons (500Ltr) @ $3.61 a gallon. Pretty cheap, but still a $470 bill. Well, not bad really when you consider we last filled up 20 months ago and we have used quite a lot to heat the boat these last weeks.

When re-anchoring, I don’t mess about this time. I anchor right in the middle of the channel. Screw passing boats! We are not running aground again, and we will depart in the morning anyway.

Once anchored, I set up for the passage tomorrow. Initially it will be a downwind leg to Cape Fear, so I set the pole up already to swing out as we leave Beaufort. It takes me a while to remember all the markings I have previously made on the pole-lift, pole track halyard, and each of the 2 pole guy sets, port and starboard. I also remove our nice new genoa sheets and replace with the old ones. Why? Because when running for long periods with the pole, the sheet tends to chafe in the pole jaw, and I don’t want to be cutting chafed sections off the end of our new sheets. At least, not just yet.

Our evening is reasonably relaxed with the highlight being devouring a whole French baguette, liberally plastered with Irish butter and French cheese, and a hot wine in hand. Meanwhile, the cabin is filling with wonderful baking smells. Oana is baking a lemon cake ready for the passage. I just pray that she will have the appetite to eat on this leg, not like the last one.