To cross the Albermarle Sound, it is quite important to pay attention to the weather. This body of water literally stretches hundreds of miles and is one of the longest estuaries in the state, leading, eventually, into a number of rivers, specifically the Roanoke and Chowan Rivers, both of which extend all the way into the state of Virginia. This gives the wind plenty of opportunity to create large waves and hazardous conditions. According to the weather forecasts we were seeing, the wind looked mild earlier in the morning and was expected to increase through the day. With this information, we decided to leave as early as possible. We were on our way by 6:30am and heading out to the open waters. We had to go out the channel which we entered and then turn north. As we approached the channel markers to make our turn the depth finder kept getting lower and lower. I was following our path that we brought in, but the tides were different now. I was trying to find deeper water, going from one side of the channel to the other, then we bottomed out. “Fu$k!”. We were now ‘run aground’ (once again) in the middle of the channel! Lauren and I looked at each other and I didn’t know what to say. I kept showing her we were in the middle of the ‘marked’ channel, but that didn’t really matter now. What mattered is what were we going to do? Call SeaTow? We had to get going soon, before this tropical storm gets here! I was pissed, but thought my best bet- aside from waiting for the tide to rise in a couple of hours, or calling SeaTow, was to try to get off of it myself. I kept throttling in reverse, trying to get off of the sandbar. That wasn’t working, so I tried forward. That didn’t really work either. At this point I told Lauren to go ahead and call SeaTow, but I kept trying. Soon I could sense we were inching around; not forward or backwards, but we were moving… I continued trying both forward and reverse and soon we were actually spinning in place. WTF!? I continued this and we were soon moving backwards- enough that I thought we were going to be free. At this point we had been stuck for about thirty minutes or so. I kept at it and eventually got us un-stuck enough that we were now floating free, but I was still behind the sandbar that we were just stuck on. Stop the SeaTow call! Fu$k it- I’m going ahead and full throttle on the other side of the channel where we were stuck. We held our breath and made our way past the low point, with the depth finder showing zero below us, and we made it past that point. We turned port out of the channel and saw the depths rise to a ‘comfortable’ six feet. We eventually passed Nags Head and Kitty Hawk on our way out. We turned northwest and were cruising around seven knots. The wind was minimal on our journey across the sound and we made it to Elizabeth City in about six hours. As we got close to the town, we fell in behind another boat that appeared to be heading in the same direction. I called them on the radio to let them know we were behind them and to inquire of their destination. They told me they were trying to get into the Dismal Swamp today. I’ll explain the ‘swamp’ later… We were going to be stopping at one of the free dock at Elizabeth City that we saw on the charts. As we got closer, we could see the free city docks were in poor repair. Our second option was a free bulkhead along side of a food distribution company- Jennette Brothers. This is also listed on our charts, but it is immediately after a draw bridge, so we couldn’t tell if there was room or not. I called the bridge tender and told him our intentions, because if we couldn’t dock there, we would have to come back through the bridge. The bridge tender told me there was room, and we waited with the other boat while the bridge lifted. As soon as we got through we could see a few other boats docked along the wall- two with Looper flags- with just enough room for us at the end, closest to the bridge. I told Lauren my plan to come in and dock on the port side, which would mean turning 180 degrees right in front of the bridge, with not too much room to spare. We executed the turn and got tied up without incident. The other boat that came through with us continued on. As we were finishing securing the boat, one of the other boats tied up along the wall pulled out and headed upriver with the one I was following. I wish I would have known he was leaving because I would have waited and taken that spot! Oh well. Soon, one of the other Looper boat captain came out and welcomed us, telling us he tried to call us to let us know there was room here for us. Apparently he was watching Nebo and saw us coming- he looked up our info on the Great Loop website and called Lauren’s phone, but she didn’t answer as we were coming up to the bridge and was occupied with our conversation of what/where/how. It is nice to know people are still looking out for each other! The dock was fine, easy access to grass, but we were actually locked in to the grounds. Since we were in a private trucking company and it was a Sunday, the gates were locked. We hung out on the boat for a while, then decided to take the dinghy over to the city docks where we could dock and walk around the town. We took Frank and explored the small city. There wasn’t anything open, and the town was small. The area we were in had a couple of restaurants (all closed) and a brewery (closed sun/mon) so we returned to the boat after about an hour and half. The weather was expected to deteriorate more and rain was coming, so we battened down the hatches and hung out. Tomorrow is expected to rain most of the day, so we knew we were staying here another night. At least we were secure and since we were close to the bridge we had a barrier from the wind too.
Day 2- It did rain most of the day. I checked in at the office and got a list of rules: no dogs was one of them. Oops! We stayed tucked inside dry, and I took Frank out for another walk after they closed the office at 5pm. We ordered some takeout from a local restaurant Hoppin’ Johnz and enjoyed some shrimp and grits. We made our plans for tomorrow’s journey through the Dismal Swamp. I checked with the other boats and they are planning doing the same…
Yikes!! What an adventure! Bet you never thought you’d be dealing with a world pandemic during your trip!