It’s just over a week since we left Winnipeg, but it feels so much longer. The drive to North Carolina took us about 28 hours over three days, but it wasn’t the distance as much as the change in temperature and vegetation that made it feel like we’ve time traveled from winter to spring.

It occurred to me as I marvelled at green grass and spring flowers as we got closer to NC, that we’ve never driven south before. For some reason it feels different than taking a flight to the tropics.

Day time temperatures have been hovering around mid-teens, but going down close to zero some nights. It’s a darn good thing that our new boat is equipped with a small gas fireplace. It may not be such a big deal when we’re back in the Caribbean, but it’s certainly a big hit now! It makes the boat all cozy and warm.

We’re settling in to the our new boat quickly. It’s probably because it’s the younger and bigger sister of our boat back home, so it feels familiar. But I have to say I’m loving the extra space and all the \240conveniences that come with a bigger boat!

Stephen and I have been busy outfitting her. The boat had come with every piece of electronics you can think of - but other then that, essentially it was a bare boat. The previous owners lived only a few miles from here, so they didn’t use the boat as their home. As a result, we had to start over acquiring all the essentials – from pots and pans to sheets, pillows and towels…  all the things we need to live on board for the next three months. (So many trips to Walmart!!) A bit of a sad reminder of all the things we lost to Dorian, but as Stephen keeps reminding me - we’re moving on!

Speaking of moving on, we’re planning to move the boat from Oriental to New Bern this weekend, which is about 30 miles from here. Oriental is a lovely folksy little coastal town, but the marina is somewhat isolated, so we have to drive everywhere. In New Bern, we managed to find a slip in the historical downtown area of the city, with shops and restaurants all in walking distance to the marina.

Our current thinking is that we’ll spend most of the month of February getting the boat ready for cruising while in New Bern, and then start heading south to Florida the beginning of March.

Under cool and cloudy skies, Stephen is taking the boat from Oriental to New Bern this morning - approximately 30 NM inland.

It will take him about 5 hours probably mostly motoring. I’m driving the truck and it will take me about 45 minutes! Nobody has ever said that sailing was an efficient way to travel! 😆

It’s been a week since we arrived in New Bern Grand Marina. It’s considerably larger than Sea Harbour in Oriental - there are 100 boats on our dock alone. I believe it has over 350 slips in total.

The weather turned unseasonably warm during the week - mid-twenties - which meant we could enjoy going for walks and sitting outside in our cockpit for the first time since we got the boat. What a wonderful feeling!!!

Well that all changed in a hurry yesterday with a low pressure system moving through the coast bringing with it heavy rain and gale force winds. You sure find out in a hurry where the leeks are - \240both windows in the head leak like a sieve. Well at least it wasn’t the hatch over our heads in the v-birth!

In addition to the rain, there’s been tornado warnings for the area, along with high winds gusting to 55 Kts (100 km). The marina is located at the forks of the Trent and Nouse rivers and normally there’s about six feet of water under our keel. With the high winds the wind tide is pushing the water out of the river basin and we’re now at risk of hitting ground ... the water is down close to 6ft. so we have less than a foot under our keel! The winds had started subsiding by late this evening so thankfully we didn’t hit ground. Locals tell us that the winds were stronger than with Hurricane Dorian! 🤪

On the up side, we’re ahead of schedule with getting the boat ready to go South. We have decided to hold off on getting the floor boards and cushions redone until the end of the season. As a result, the only thing we’re waiting on is getting the dodger finished. The previous owners recently redone the canvas on both the bimini and dodger, but for some unfathomable reason did not put front and side panels on the dodger.

So we’re definitely waiting until the dodger is finished, and Stephen installs the new wind generator, but hopefully we’ll be on our way in a couple of weeks, instead of a month we originally thought.⛵️

We’re starting to feel like one of the locals. By locals, I mean fellow boaters who live full time on their vessels. There are more than 40 boats just on our dock used as permanent homes. Dave and Betty, the lovely couple to our starboard, have lived on their 47ft trawler since 1988. 😯 Lots of retirees to be sure, but there are families with children, young people, widows, couples.... and a fair number of middle aged men with dogs! 🐕

It’s certainly easy to understand why. New Bern is a delightful harbor town, and especially charming with it’s intact historic down town. A little trivia for Outlander fans - Tryon Palace located a block from the marina, was the official residence of the British governor William Tyron in 1700s who plays a prominent role in season 5 of Outlander!  But I digress…

 The weather has been hit and miss – one day it’s warm and sunny, the next day it could be cold, 💨 and raining.  The other day it went from +27C  in the afternoon, to below zero over night and snowing. True story – people stood in line at the local hardware store to buy sleds! Unfortunately there was only a sprinkling of snow the next morning not quite enough to go tobogganing! 😞

But despite the weather, we’re totally enjoying the town and living on the boat.

Stephen is continuing to putter on the boat – fixing leaky windows, installing blinds, bbq and our new stereo (the one that came with the boat died the first week) and he has finally mounted the wind generator just today! I’ve been keeping busy by volunteering at a local Catholic charity most afternoons, and enjoying going for walks on one of the many beautiful river paths. Feels a lot like Gimli!

We’ve also made some new friends - Laura and Randy from across the dock, originally from New Hampshire sold everything they owned and moved permanently on their 34 Catalina a year ago to be closer to their grandchildren. We have managed to share more than a few good meals and “one or two” fine bottles of wine 🍷! Oh did I mention that they used to be in the wine distribution business before retirement! 🤣

We’re still waiting for the dodger to be finished, and our new boat decals to arrive. We’ve also just discovered that we’re missing a cushion to extend the port settee to a double sleeping birth…. Which is critical if we’re to have guests on board! 😊

So although we’re anxious to hoist our sails and move on to warmer climes, we’re also quite content hanging around New Bern for a little while longer. As a result, it’s looking like we’ll not be moving on before the end of the month after all!

We did it! We accomplished the hardest part of our journey so far— we finally threw off our bow lines and sailed away from the dock. 🤪

Sad to say goodbye to beautiful New Bern—and to our new friends—but it was time to go.

Looking forward to exploring new places, seeing new faces and having new adventures.⛵️⛵️⛵️

We arrived in Harbor Village Marina yesterday afternoon in pouring rain after spending our first night at anchor. The Inter Coastal Waterway (ICW) is pretty shallow around here so Stephen found a bay that was deep enough for us to spend the night — but it just so happened to be by a military base. So if you enjoy the sound of shelling and helicopters 🚁 circling all night then this is the place for you! 😆

There was a gale wind warning for today so we were quite anxious to get off the water hunker down in a marina and wait it out.

The marina is in a middle of a suburban area surrounded by huge homes and a golf course but there’s nothing else nearby. The place is also completely deserted because it’s too cold for locals to go boating so we pretty much had the place to ourselves.

We’re hoping to move on tomorrow to Wilmington, which will bring us closer to the boarder of South Carolina.

A cold windy day on the water again but at least it wasn’t raining! Took us four hours to get to Wilmington. We chose to stay at a marina right on the ICW called Bridge Tender Marina. Not great facilities but the restaurant attached to it had great food.

It was a beautiful day!

Warm, sunny with very little wind.... it was a pleasure being on the water. A welcomed change from rest of the week. We left Carolina Beach before noon and arrived at our next port just under four hours.

🎼If I had I million dollars.... it wouldn’t be enough to buy any of the houses around here. It’s been over a week since we left New Bern and one thing is for certain, the homes along coast are getting bigger and more extravagant as we travel further south.

We stayed at St. James Marina just outside of Southport. Welcome to “Pleasentville”! A thin veneer of wealth and beauty all around us.

Stayed the night at Barefoot Marina, North Myrtle Beach—once again right on the ICW. The marina is part of a resort located right across the river from Barefoot Landing — a large shopping and entertainment complex.

We walked across the swing bridge in the morning to check it out, \240and more importantly to find some beer for Stephen. We didn’t find beer but bought some SC wine and had a nice walk on the grounds before we moved on.

Yesterday was the nicest day we had so far... it’s definitely warmer in South Carolina!

We spent most of the day on the Waccamaw River that meandered through forests and wildlife management areas—which was a nice change from constant mega mansions that line the Inter Coastal Waterway.

Stephen found a small creek off the main channel to anchor for the night and it was total bliss of tranquility!

As we settled in for the night we could hear birds and some freaking weird sounding frogs 🐸 , but other than that it was total silence.

It felt like we were on our summer cruise up north on Lake Winnipeg, except for one thing. We have never been \240up North so early in the year. We forget sometimes that just because the temperatures are in the mid-twenties, it’s still Spring. This morning having coffee in the cockpit I practically could see the buds opening on the trees!

Another day….  another anchorage. We reluctantly pulled anchor and left our secluded little spot in the creek and pressed forward on the ICW towards Georgetown, South Carolina.

We didn’t know what to expect as we slowly approached the town harbour. In the distance we could see bellows of smoke from a paper mill, along with old abandoned derelict boats on the shore…. we were a little weary of what we might find.  But as we approached the city public docks we were pleasantly surprised by great facilities and a lovely waterfront.

As we found out, Georgetown is the third oldest city in South Carolina, once rivalling Charleston as the state’s major port. During the boom years of indigo and rice, Georgetown developed into a town with beautiful colonial architecture, much of which still stands today.

We quickly decided that the town was worth checking out, and made plans to stay an extra of day — the fact that we could moor in the harbour for free made it even more appealing. 😄

The next day we explored the marine museum, took a tour of Kominsnky House one of oldest mansions in SC, and wondered around the town’s historic downtown window shopping at all the cute seaside shops.

Moved on from Georgetown today and even managed to sail part of the way mostly out of necessity because it was blowing so hard it was easier than motoring. 💨 💨 💨

We stopped at a small fishing village McClelanville for the night before we push through to Charleston tomorrow.

The harbour is a working harbour full with shrimping boats. We were told we could buy some fresh shrimp at the local market... \240 so as soon as we tied up we headed over and picked some up for dinner. Made shrimp scampi with spinach and cherry tomatoes in linguine. See picture below - Yummy!!!

Before dinner though we decided to go for a walk and explore the town. The place has a small town charm and laid-back vibe that makes you think of simpler times. Grand colonial homes that date back to 1700s with porches and rocking chairs and usually a swing on one of the \240gnarly tree branches. A place where you feel safe. Which is saying a lot these crazy times!!

The further South we go the more “live” oak trees we see. I’m totally in love with them!!! The trees are 200 - 300 years old with gnarly branches and large trunks. They are so beautiful!!! We heard that it’s illegal to cut down hese trees in the Carolinas.

The name live oak comes from the fact that evergreen oaks remain green and "live" throughout winter, when other oaks are dormant and leafless - who knew! \240🌳

As I write this tonight we have been in Charleston for a couple of days, and we have witnessed our world 🌎 completely change in a matter of those few days!

These are unprecedented times, and it’s hard not to sucomb to fear and anxiety based on what’s going on around us.... but we simply can’t allow us to do that.

Despite everything, we did manage to see a little bit of Charleston during the few walks and a bike ride we took.

Left Charleston this morning with water, fuel and our food fully re-provisioned heading towards Savanna. It should take us a couple of days.

Our anchorage for the night is in a wildlife reserve.

Woke up to the anchor chain rattling as it was being pulled up. Stephen was up bright and early getting us prepared to leave at sunrise—which we rarely do—but we had a long day ahead.

Our destination is Savanna but we’ll not make it there today, so we’re heading to Beaufort SC — about 35 Nm— where we can anchor, or tie up to a mooring ball in the town harbour.

Part of the urgency to leave early was due to extremely shallow waters in the channel in low tide so we had bug out during high tide (tide is about 6ft), and secondly, because of a swing bridge just before Beaufort. The bridge opens every hour on-the-hour, except between 3-6 when it closes for rush hour. So unless we got there before three we were going to have to wait around for three hours before we could go under the bridge.

Our ultimate destination is St. Mary’s — a small town on the border of Georgia and Florida to meet friends from Winnipeg (Brigitte and Bill) who are currently sailing in the Bahamas but are on their way back. They have found a marina to haul and store their boat during the off season, and we’re hoping to do the same. Unfortunately, we can’t get a hold of anyone to confirm availability. So in the meantime, we’re continuing to journey south and hope that they have room for us.

It’s a lovely warm and ☀️ day. It’s a shorts 🩳 day - only the second time since we have been on the boat! The water is glistening and dolphins 🐬 are keeping us company while we gently glide through the water. In moments like this it’s easy to forget that there’s a global pandemic going on and \240most of the world is lockdown. 😢

We got to the infamous bridge at two in the afternoon and tied up at the public docks shortly after. Once again we found a lovely waterfront with swings acting as park benches facing the water — which people were using to enjoy a beautiful afternoon and hopefully keeping their safe distance.

I had an opportunity to go for a quick walk and do a workout in the park before coming back to the boat and making dinner.

Pizza 🍕 night tonight!!!

After such a lovely day in Beaufort, unfortunately we did not have a great evening.

We left Beaufort after lunch and headed towards Savanna, but because we couldn’t get there in one day we decided to drop anchor about half way there.... \240in a busy river channel just off the ICW. We \240shouldn’t have been surprised by the crazy amount of boat traffic zooming all around us. What we were surprised by is the number of party boats — \240imagine a dozen or so young people drinking and listening to loud music 🎶 and partying all around us..... and every once in while jumping on their jetskiis to buzz the boat for our added enjoyment! 😂

No social distancing going on there!!! In fact, all along the way we saw people aggregating on beaches and boats as if it was just an ordinary Saturday.

By the time they have finally left it was pretty much dark and we were ready to settle in for the night, but we got accosted by something way more insidious than noisy teenagers - swarm of gnats, or no-see-ums. They are so small that they get through our screens, as a result, the cabin was infested with them. We had no bug spray on board so there’s nothing we could do but hide under our covers except it was a hot and muggy night so it wasn’t much of an option!!! \240We hardly slept at all! They are so small and yet they can be such a huge nuisance!! Nasty critters! \240🦟 We’re definitely picking up bug spray at the next opportunity!!!

Not sure what we expected when we anchored in a marsh. 🤪

This morning we woke up to cool and cloudy skies. We pulled anchor around 8 am at high tide and pushed forward to Savanna!

We arrived in Savanna on a cool and windy day, so we were thrilled to tie up the boat by about 4 in the afternoon— both of us looking forward to a hot shower — so I didn’t notice at first.

It wasn’t until we were on our way to check in at the office when I looked up and saw the name of the marina—Isle of Hope. I nearly teard up when I saw the word HOPE in large letters. I didn’t realize until I saw the word how much I yearned for reassurance that it’s going be all right—have some hope! ❤️

The next day we decided to take advantage of the courtesy car that’s available for transient guests to pick up a few provisions and see a little bit of Savanna — from the relative safety of a car.

After wiping the car down with baby wipes soaked in bleach (we haven’t been able to find any disinfectant wipes anywhere) we drove downtown to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist... which surprisingly was open.

The cathedral was so beautiful - and once again we had it all to ourselves! We stayed a while enjoying the sanctity of the place while saying a silent prayer for the world 🌎!

Pulled away from the dock around 8:30 in the morning under bright sunny skies! What a difference a day makes. ☀️

After 8 hours on the water we dropped anchor in a beautiful little bay in Blackbeard Creek for the night.

Our day started with a squall but it cleared up by around noon and then it got really really hot!!! By the time we got to Brunswick late afternoon it was 30 degrees. 🥵

We dropped anchor in the bay front of the town but we’re not getting off the boat. We’re moving on tomorrow to St. Mary’s—our final destination this season.

We have confirmation from the boat yard that they have room for us, but we still don’t have a date for taking the boat out.

Tomorrow, weather permitting we would like to leave the ICW and sail out in the ocean to St. Mary’s. We will see what the wind 💨 is going to do tomorrow. It typically never cooperates! 😂

We don’t usually experience these things on Lake Winnipeg..... 🤣

1. The US Coast Guard pulling up next us asking that we hurry up and get off the channel as soon as we can because a submarine is expected to ascend shortly!

2. Message to mariners from the Coast Guard on the VHF that a rocket 🚀 is being launched from Cape Canaveral... clear the security zone!

Rockets, submarines and fighter jets! 😯 Having been on the boat for three days without getting on land.... I can’t help thinking—did we miss something?! 😆

Yesterday we sailed ⛵️ all the way to Jacksonville, Florida.

For the first time since we purchased the boat in January, we finally had an opportunity to unfurl our sails and just sail!😍

We arrived in St. Mary’s, Georgia Thursday afternoon only to be told that we will have to wait until next week before our haul out date is confirmed. We’re hoping for next Wednesday - April Fools Day! 🤪

With nothing to do but wait we quickly tied up to the town docks - once again a beautiful little harbour and waterfront - and we contacted our friends Brigitte and Bill.

Brigitte and Bill arrived a day earlier from the Bahamas and had already hauled their boat out of the water were hard at work on disassembling it.... but \240agreed to came over for happy hour. It was hard not to hug them when we saw them, but keeping safe distance we spent a couple of lovely hours visiting and exchanging stories. It almost felt like life was normal again! 😞

Yesterday we had the bright idea to motor to Amelia Island just couple of hours away from St. Mary’s, but across state lines into Florida.

We didn’t know then how fortuitous that decision would be.

Our main reason for staying in a marina was to have power to run the air conditioning because the weather turned hot and sticky.... and we can’t leave our hatches open because the no-see-ems get through the screens and will literally eat us alive!Having the ability to take a shower and do some laundry didn’t hurt either! 🤪

An additional perk that marinas have down here in the South is a curtesy car. Ability to borrow a car at no charge for two hours to run around town to pick up provisions. It’s brilliant!!

So this morning after breakfast we drove to pick up some groceries - after carefully wiping the car down with our special invention of baby wipes soaked in bleach.

When we got back Stephen decided to change our car rental reservations to Tuesday in St. Mary’s — because we’re still hopeful that we can take the boat out of the water on Wednesday and start heading home the following day.

To our absolute horror we found out that all car rentals in Georgia and Florida have closed until further notice due to the Covid 19 virus 🦠!

With our friends Brigitte and Bill having left a couple of days ago — how were we going to get back to New Bern to pick up our truck?

After a couple of minutes of panic on my part — \240Stephen managed to find a car rental place that was still operational in Jacksonville airport. So we quickly booked a car, and requested to use the curtesy car once again to drive to pick it up. Because we were already in Florida it didn’t take more than an hour to drive there and back! 🚗 🚙 🚗

Sometimes 😇 guide our path! 🙏

We got back to the town of St. Mary’s yesterday afternoon. Stephen took the ⛵️ and I drove our rental 🚗 from Amelia Island. The journey took a couple of hours for Stephen, and 45 minutes for me.

We tied up to the public docks again overnight… right under the sign “6 hour docking only”! 🤪 Under normal circumstances it might be a problem, but these times can hardly be considered normal.

We’ve started to take the boat apart today, in anticipation of taking it out of the water tomorrow. Stephen took off the main sail, and I’ve started packing up most of the food we’re taking back home. But we had to stop due to a front going through bringing with it high winds and a tornado warning ⚠️ Seriously!!! What next? 😯 Locusts!!

Earlier today we drove to the boat yard to pick up some paperwork and to check the place out. I’ve come to the conclusion that boat yards are not my favourite places... they always look like junk yards, with straggly dogs wondering around... not to mention the salty sailors who live on their boats and look like they haven’t showered in a month! 😉

We’re back on the boat desperately trying to keep the boat from smashing against the dock... the wind is gusting to about 35 Kts and is pushing us on it! Stephen has the engine running in reverse trying to use our prop walk as a counter force to keep us off!

With mixed emotions — relief, apprehension, sadness, anxiety — we left the boat yard in St. Mary’s Georgia at 10:30 this morning. Our first destination is New Bern to retrieve our truck, and then we’ll hightail it back to Canada as fast as we can.

Despite the absurdity of the situation we have really enjoyed our time on the new boat. We’ve totally fallen ‘head-over-heels’ in love with our new vessel and feel sad and disappointed that we had to cut our time short with her.

And despite the extremely strange circumstances, we also enjoyed seeing — albeit in a limited way — the east coast of US. If it wasn’t for the fact that we purchased the boat in North Carolina, we probably would never have experienced this beautiful part of America.

On the other hand, we’ve been following the news closely, and by the time we were in around Charleston we become fairly convinced that the US was destined to become the next epicentre of Coronavirus.... so we needed to get home sooner than we planned.

By this time we have already abandoned our original plan to bring the boat all the way to central Florida, but where to leave the boat was the first big question!

At the end, we decided that our best bet was to take the boat to St. Mary’s Georgia — the same place where our friends Brigitte and Bill were leaving their boat. We knew that they would never leave their boat in an unsafe, substandard boat yard, so if it was good enough for them.... it would certainly be good enough for us! But would they have room for us? It was the second big question.

By the time we heard back from the boat yard we were already in Savanna— three days from St. Mary’s. Good news! They confirmed that yes, there was room for our boat, but with everything that’s going on, they couldn’t give us a date for the haul out. \240Rocky, the boat yard owner told us to call him back when we arrived in St. Mary’s.

So the third big question became — when could we haul the boat?

We arrived in St. Mary’s a week ago, only to be told that we have to wait until the following week (yesterday) to be “fitted in” for the haul out.

Disappointed, but having no other choice, \240we resigned ourselves to make the most of it... which normally wouldn’t be a hardship at all. We could finally go for a sail! Which we did, and it was truly awesome!

But, with each day the pandemic got worst. We watched in horror, \240like everyone else, the deaths piling up in Italy, Spain and New York, all the while kids still partying on Florida beaches. We saw firsthand the situation on the waterways in Georgia.

We watched in dismay the virus spread throughout the world like wildfire..... all the while the incompetent moron in charge of the US saying that the virus was nothing but a hoax made up by Democrats - nothing to get excited about! I feel so sorry for the poor people of US!!! ❤️

So as the situation grew worst, our anxiety grew as well. We were increasingly getting anxious to escape back home, but all we could do is wait and keep our distance from people - which is way easier on water than on land by the way!

The thought of leaving the safety of our boat and driving home filled us with apprehension. But we have decided to take every precaution we can — social distancing, washing our hands, and driving straight through—and get home to Canada 🇨🇦 as fast as we can!

Our final and last question — can we get home safely? 🙏🙏🙏