On April 30th, we departed Silver Lake on Ocracoke Island, North Carolina to round the last of the NC capes on our last passage of this winter cruise – an overnight sail around Cape Hatteras to the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay and on to Willoughby Bay in Norfolk – from where we departed on this cruise back on November 4, 2009. We had made a reservation for a slip at Willoughby Harbor Marina, where we have docked much in the past.

We departed Ocracoke at 8:30 am, just before high tide, with SW winds at 15 kts. Our exit out through Ocracoke Inlet was straightforward as we could follow our bread crumb trail on the chart plotter as well as simply following the same marks back out. Once outside the inlet we set a single reef in the main with the jib fully out on a starboard tack due E around Diamond Shoals. We gybed over to port tack inside Hatteras Light and could see the famous Cape Hatteras Lighthouse on shore in the distance, watching over the Graveyard of the Atlantic. The wind increased to SW 15-20, then SW 20-30 late in the day and we were going too fast to fish. Fortunately, the wind abated overnight for awhile, or we would have been arriving in Norfolk in the dark. We were thankful for the strong winds throughout the trip however as they pushed us along and allowed us to reach our destination earlier than expected (which is always a nice thing on lengthy passages that include an overnight).

Approaching Cape Henry just before dawn, the wind increased again back to 20-25 from the SW, giving us a close reach into the Bay and across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel's south tunnel. The closer we got to Norfolk, the wind decreased and we were able to finish our cruise crossing the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel under sail, arriving at Willoughby Harbor Marina at 7:30 am on May 1. John F. made radio contact with us in time to get a fix on our location and drove to a couple of spots along our route to take photographs! He then met us at the marina dock to help us tie up temporarily in his empty slip.

Whew! We made it back! This retirement stuff is hard work!!! We'll post a summary in a short while of a look back at this "first cruise" of ours to give you a snapshot of the best of what we learned and loved.  Thanks for caring!