November 4 Harbour Village Marina to Wrightsville Beach NC

What a quiet, toasty warm sleep on Persuasion last night. We plugged in on the dock and ran the little electric heater throughout the night. Felt good to wake up to warm floors and cabin. We were up at 06:00. Having finished yesterday’s blog, Mike started editing and uploading it. Jim brought Mike over a coffee and I headed for a shower.

After we all showered, we had coffee and tea on Persuasion and then were ready to shove off the dock at 08:45. This is a big marina.

We got underway and the temperatures this morning were much more pleasant. What we couldn’t believe was the length of some of the boardwalks from some of the houses out to their boats.

We motored along and had a 20 minute wait for the Figure 8 Island bridge. We saw some neat statues on a lawn across from where we were waiting for the bridge.

 

 

 
The bridge started to swing and we motored though.

We see the backs of some homes and buildings along the canal which would have ocean fronts.

 

 

 

And the size of some of these homes!

We are not so lucky when we get to the Wrightsville Beach Bridge. We had almost an hour wait. We were kept entertained by these pelicans.

 

 

 
And a dredger worked nearby as well.

We noticed this lone palm tree right out in the canal. Finally, the bridge lifted and we headed through.

 

 

 

Lots of boats and marinas on the other side.

We take a quick left and head out into the bay to anchor. We want to dinghy over to Wrightsville Beach on the ocean. Jim and Cheryl’s daughter, Alyssa and her family used to live in NC and they had been to the beach with them. So today was a short motoring day for us. After lunch, we lower our dinghies and head over to a dinghy dock and then walk across to the beach. It is beautiful, warm white sand.

And surprisingly not that cold. Apparently the water temperature was 75F last week but with the cold spell has gone down to 66F. We took so many photos.

People were out surfing and Mike and Jim went up on the pier and talked to a few locals out fishing.

These sand pipers were busy and neat to watch.

Beautiful pier and waves and this man was raking for sand fleas for baits.

We walked around the little town a bit and then went back to the beach and had a great supper at the Oceanic Restaurant and Pier We were back to the boat by 18:30 and it was already dusk with a great sunset.

Today we travelled 15.7nm.