We spent four days in Beaufort waiting for good weather to continue up the coast. While there we visited the very nice Maritime Museum and the fascinating old cemetery. For the cemetery there was a thorough printed "walking tour" guide that told the stories of many of the “residents”. Included were many Revolutionary and Civil War era soldiers, a British soldier buried standing up so he could salute the King, and a young girl who died on the Atlantic crossing from England, her body preserved on board ship in a cask of rum which was later buried in the cemetery.

Across the narrow Taylor Creek from Beaufort are barrier islands protected as an estuary preserve and inhabited by wild horses . We hiked one of the islands watching our steps as we meandered through the ample evidence of the horses. We saw quite a few from a distance. We remained anchored through the passing of another cold front calling for strong 30+ kt winds. Where we were anchored in Taylor Creek proved to be quite the “hurricane hole” as we were barely impacted by the strong winds. A local neighbor had offered us a tie-up at the dock in front of his home, as his own boat was currently at a marina in Ocracoke. His children stopped by the evening we arrived in their runabout and extended us this kind offer in the most polite manner—we were charmed! We had a strong hook, however, so we declined their nice offer.

On April 27 we planned to depart Beaufort for our second cape assault to Ocracoke, NC, on the North Carolina Outer Banks, a town which is accessible only by boat or ferry. From Beaufort, our course would first take us east, well offshore around the Cape Lookout shoals, then turn NE to Ocracoke Inlet . Dave has visited Ocracoke numerous times in the past via ferry and looked forward to introducing Donna to the marvelous beach there. We were well aware that navigating Ocracoke Inlet was advisable only in good weather and with local knowledge. The navigation marks entering the inlet are not charted due to the constantly shifting sand bars which result in frequent resetting of the marks by the Coast Guard.

In advance, Dave phoned an Ocracoke marina and obtained the latitude/longitude of the first mark into the inlet as well as a description of the inlet route and received advice that we should have no problems, owing mostly to our shallow draft. “Just be sure to follow the marks.”  The forecast called for W winds at 15-20 kts, which was from a good direction to prevent high breaking offshore seas at the inlet. The islands north and south of the inlet are oriented SW to NE, so W winds would be offshore, albeit a bit stronger than ideal. We set the main with a double reef and departed Beaufort at 6:00 am, planning to arrive at Ocracoke Inlet late in the afternoon on a rising tide .

Our trip out around Cape Lookout Shoals was uneventful, but we could see towering breakers over the shoals. After rounding the Cape, the wind direction became more SW and increased to an un-forecasted 20-30 kts. We could only hope the wind direction at the inlet was more W as predicted. The SW winds were parallel to the beach and we had very large following seas. On the double reef main alone we were making 10-13 kts boat speed over ground. As we got closer to the inlet we knew the wind was remaining SW and very strong – and we became quite concerned about attempting the inlet. Donna radioed the Ocracoke marina and again received advice that the inlet was passable in the current conditions, the respondent remarking “…although I don't think anyone has come through it today.”  We decided to approach the inlet for a closer look with the ability to change our decision before committing ourselves to it.

We located the outermost permanent “sea buoy” and from there scanned the wind-churned water carefully to spot the next several temporary markers leading in . We dropped the mainsail near the outer buoy and proceeded in to what soon became a very meandering course through the shoals. But as described to us earlier, the inlet was very well marked. From the sea buoy, the next permanent mark inside the bank side was number 27 – meaning numbers 1 through 26 were temporary and indicated an approximate number of turns in the “channel”.

The first marks from the sea buoy took us directly towards the shore NE of the inlet, then back SW paralleling the beach into the wind and inside the first set of breakers from the sea. The wind was still blowing 20-30, and we had trouble motoring faster than about 4 kts. But being inside the first set of breakers resulted in calmer seas and we felt confident we could manage this. Soon we were able to turn west into the inlet itself and out of the wind where things got much better. We could see many marks to follow in front of us and actually had a chance to catch our breaths and enjoy the stark beauty of the shoreline . This was worth the worry after all. It took us an hour and a half to wind our way into the Ocracoke harbor, Silver Lake, Blackbeard’s Lair, and we anchored at 6:00 pm. The shallowest depth we saw was approximately 5 feet thanks to good timing on the rising tide. We rewarded ourselves with homemade pizza for dinner!

The next day we had a nice walk around town in the cool weather. Neither of us could pick up a cell phone signal on AT&T or Sprint; however, we later managed to pick up a wifi signal and soon learned that our friend David H. was in town for the annual Ocracoke Island Surf Fishing Tournament. Sure enough, not long after receiving that news by email, we heard David yelling at us from shore (since he couldn’t reach us by cell phone) and we brought him aboard for some more ruminiscing – using his rum supply we were transporting back from his visit to us in Grand Bahama. David wins the prize for visiting us in two locations on this cruise!

David treated us the next day, April 29th to a beach tour in his beach van to see the fishing tournament and get in some high quality beach combing. What a treat that was! We would not have been able to see as much without him. We treated David to lunch afterwards and capped off a fun time ashore with an ice cream cone. Thanks, David!