Brown Eyed Girl: Oriental, Bellhaven, Columbia and Coinjock

Oriental, NC

River Dunes Marina

May 6, 2012

We left Morehead City docks after 4 nights on Sunday morning. We were heading to our next marina called River Dunes which is about 5 miles from Oriental, NC. To get to Oriental from Morehead City you need to travel on the Neuse River for a while. When you leave Adams Creek you can turn left on the Neuse to go to New Bern or turn right to go to Oriental. The reason I bring this up is that John and Mary on "Passport" had gone to New Bern two days before and they were also heading to Oriental so we hooked up again and went to River Dunes Marina together. The Neuse was rough and the marina is tucked into a creek so we were out of the weather. River Dunes is by far the nicest marina I have ever been in and the cost was only $1 per foot. River Dunes is a resort with cottages and a planned housing development.

The docks are immaculate, the pool is beautiful, the clubhouse is phenomenal and the staff is great. If you ever get a chance to visit this marina you should do it. We took the courtesy car and went to Oriental for a couple of hours. We ate lunch at a nice restaurant and walked around the town which is very small and not much going on except a nautical consignment store. The consignment store is basically all used marine stuff and more like a flea market. I was in Heaven but the ladies could not quite see the gold mine that I saw so I only bought one thing and we left. We had happy hour in the clubhouse, spent some time in the hot tub and then we ate dinner on the boat and headed to bed.

The clubhouse at River Dunes

The pool

A small chapel on the property

The nice docks

Another view of the pool and cabanas

Cute building in Oriental

The consignment shop

Racks and racks of stuff

Even old dingy's outside

Leaving River Dunes - No waves here

Bellhaven, NC

Dowry Creek Marina

May 7, 2012

Since we had rough weather on Sunday and had to travel on the Neuse River and cross the Pamlico River, we checked the weather and it was supposed to be 10-15 MPH winds with 1-3 foot waves. Once we left River Dunes and got on the Neuse River it was pure hell. The waves were at least 6 feet and the wind was horrible. We had not prepped the boat for rough seas and everything came crashing down in the boat. The boat was fine but every time we hit a large wave something else would crash and bang which was more upsetting than anything. Once we got off the Neuse we got some relief for a while because we were in a creek that was protected. After we left the creek we had to cross the Pamlico River and it was going to be rough so we pushed the throttles all the way and got up on plane and toughed it out until we got into calmer water. While we were running fast an alarm keep beeping every few minutes and I couldn't figure out what it was until I finally saw that it was the high water alarm. We slowed down and I went below to look in the bilge. It was not full of water but there was quite a bit so I got down there and made sure the bilge pump was running and most of the water was gone. I think what happened was that the drippless shaft seals were leaking at high speed but seemed fine a slow speed.
We finally got to our destination which was Dowry Creek Marina right off the Pumgo River. We were very glad to be in port but the boat was a mess inside and out and we were not very happy. We got to work and cleaned up the boat and I cleaned out the bilge of all of the water. We were told that there is a get together every night at 5:30 in the clubhouse so we rested the rest of the day and then took some beverages and snacks to the clubhouse. We met some very nice people and one of the couples is the owners of Active Captain who were traveling on their boat. We had a nice time and went back to the boat for dinner and some TV. Not many pictures as you might imagine we had other things on our minds.

The owners of Active Captain are the ones on the left

We asked John, the dock master what happened to this boat.
He said, "Irene wanted a sailboat."

Leaving Dowry Creek Marina

Columbia, NC

Little Alligator River Marina

May 8, 2012

The next morning we were up early because we wanted to get through the rest of the Pungo River before the wind picked up. The very nice people at the marina were up with us and helped us out of the slip and on our way. The wind had switched around from the North to the South so it was behind us all day which was much better but it was still windy. There is a 20 mile stretch of narrow water that connects the Pungo River to the Alligator River. Of course we met a tow on the way and we had to move pretty far over to let him through but we didn't touch bottom. Both boats had planned to stop at a marina on the Alligator River but John and Mary decided to continue to Elizabeth City so they could get all the way up the Alligator River while the weather was decent. Ginny and I decided to stop and take the chance that the next day would be OK.
The marina is right off the Alligator River and it is behind a Shell gas station. We were the only boat for a while, and only one of three boats that stayed the night. There was a restaurant in the gas station so we had lunch there. I had two coney dogs and french fries. Ginny had a cheeseburger and fried okra. My kind of place. We had happy hour with Ron and Marji, Gold Loopers on "Meander" which was the boat behind us. We swapped war stories for a while and then had spaghetti on the boat. The restaurant opens at 5:00 in the morning and I agreed to meet Ron for breakfast at 5:30 A.M.

The tow we had to pass in close quarters

The boat behind us passing the same tow

They claim good hamburgers and they were

Feeling kind of lonely in the marina

Not sure what this is for but it was a good picture

This is the sign on the door to the gas station and restaurant. Look closely near the middle and it says "REMOVE YOUR HOOD". I am not sure what that means but we locked the boat that night.

More company later that day

Coinjock, NC

Coinjock Marina

May 9, 2012

When Ron and I met for breakfast at 5:30, we decided to skip breakfast and head out because it was supposed to storm and we wanted to get to our next spot before the weather got bad. The wind was still out of the South so it was behind us again and the waves were not bad.
There are two different ways to get to Norfolk VA. One way is through the dismal swamp and the other is the Virginia Cut. The routes diverge in the Alligator river about 5 miles from the marina and they converge about 10 miles South of Norfolk. Ginny and I were going to do the Virginia Cut and "Meander" was going to do the Dismal Swamp, so we parted company in the Alligator River. The auto pilot had stopped working correctly a couple days (remember the rough water) ago so I wanted to re-calibrate it. The way to re-calibrate is to put the auto pilot in a setup mode and then make two large circles at less than 2 knots, each circle taking at least two minutes. I am sure it looked a little wierd and if you look at the track closely you will see where we did this. It worked and now the auto pilot is working again. We only had about 37 miles to travel so we were at the marina by 10:00 in the morning. Coinjock Marina is a long dock in a narrow section of the intra-coastal at mile 50 which means it is 50 miles South of Norfolk, VA. The dock was crowded with very large boats and a cruise ship. They are supposed to have a good restaurant - we will find out tonight. Tomorrow we are off for another short day because we need to wait for a closed bridge that will open on Friday so we can get to Norfolk.