Day 17: December 2, 2008

Port: Oriental (35.02N 76.66W)

Weather: The weather today was overcast with plenty of rain, turning to partly sunny in the evening. Winds were 5-10 with gusts up to 20 mph out of the West. There is 75% humidity. The temperatures have been in the 30’s all day.

As you can gather from previous posts, we spent a bit of time in Belhaven. We had planned to stick in Belhaven until the weather turned better, ie no more rain, lesser winds, warmer temps. Well, they kept telling us that Tuesday would be beautiful. I am growing less and less fond of weathermen. They are always wrong. Needless to say, we left Belhaven today, with 2 other boaters early this morning. We were headed through the Pamlico River (sorry I said Sound yesterday) and knew that if it was windy, it and the Neuse River would be awful. We took turns all day steering, attempting to stay very warm below. At one point, I rigged my umbrella to my back, so it sort of resembled those umbrella hats. Haha, it didn’t last very long, before the wind almost blew me away like Mary Poppins. I had to ditch the umbrella and just get wet. Of course, we had on foulies, so wet was more like just our gear. The kerosene heater could not keep the cabin warm today and the inverter couldn’t handle the electric one. Dad decided he had had enough. Instead of anchoring, we pulled into Oriental to a Whittaker Creek Yacht Harbor and have ordered a new heater. Email for details, as Dad will have to fill in those. It will be here tomorrow, where we will rig it up and be headed out again the next day, hopefully a lot warmer. What is it with this weather! Once again, wherever the Hilschers go, there is unusual weather. Kind of like going to the Grand Canyon = desert and having it flood!! Yea that’s us. Or BVI and there is no wind, yea that was us again. We hope it will get warm and sunny soon. At this marina, there are bikes you can ride into town (only about 1 mile). Dad and I (as there were only 2) went in for some parts to get the heater setup. We are now attempting to stay warm and have some dinner. Tomorrow the heater goes in and we are off again, like a bunch of sea turtles.

We wish Sune a very happy special wonderful birthday!

We also wish Lorraine a wonderful time in Ft. Lauderdale for her birthday!

Good weather and happy sailing!