Tuesday 10/24/2017 - Beaufort to Morehead City

The forecast for last night was for stormy weather and the forecast was accurate. An expected south wind preceded the front that made it rough even at Beaufort Docks.  The rain went from nothing to a downpour in less than 5 seconds but fortunately, both Phil and I were prepared so we didn't get much water in the boat.  It rained off and on most of the evening and night.  The worst of the storm came through between 2 and 4am with a good amount of lighting and wind.  By about 8am the rain had stopped and by 9, the sun was starting to come through the clouds.

During the day, I did boat work and Phil walked around town.  This was his first trip to Beaufort.  At about 3pm, we walked to the Cape Lookout National Parks Information Center.  We checked out the boat tours.  They have several tours to the nearby islands where you can see wild horses and lots of sand dunes.  We decided on a boat only tour that went about 2 miles up the channel in front of the Beaufort Docks.  I was slightly embarrassed riding in a boat with a huge "Water Bug" name on the side but I got over it quickly once aboard. It's capacity was 16 but we had just Phil and me and two other elderly ladies from New Bern.  The boat was skippered by Captain Peggy who did a nice job of telling us about the islands, some history of the area, etc.

Our plan was to leave Beaufort at around 5pm, leave the Beaufort Inlet and sail all night to the Masonboro Inlet 65 miles to the south.  The wind was around 15 knots from the SW most of the day (and SW would be our heading).  That didn't sound good.  But the wind was forecast to drop in strength during the day and then shift to the West then NW overnight.  I figured we could beat into the wind until midnight and then be on a reach until morning.  The wind dropped in the afternoon so we set off at 5pm (with a breeze that had picked back up at around 4:30pm).  When we got out to near the exit of the inlet and could see waves breaking near the entrance we decided to join two other large sailboats that were anchored on the south side of the channel on the south side of Radio Island.  Soon after we anchored, one of the boats left to head out.  We waited 1 to 2 hours and decided to wait until the wind (then SW about 15) dropped off more.

So, our new plan was to motor into Morehead City and see if the wind dropped and shifted to the W/NW during the night. We set our alarm for 3am.  For some unknown reason, our anchorage just SE of the Sanitary Restaurant was somewhat rough so we didn't get a lot of sleep.  But, during the night, the wind did drop and shift to the West.