Underway Jose

Tonight we "swing on the hook" (lay at anchor) outside Beaufort, NC (pronounced Bo-fort) after negotiating Adam's Creek. Communications amaze me as we are 1/4 mile from land and I sit at the navigation desk in contact with the world-with no visable means of support.
Last Sunday we slipped off the dock lines, motored out of Oriental harbor, and rolled out the genoa. "Whosh" we were off to New Bern NC to see the sights and visit a bit. The genoa was reefed down a bit and Godspeed shook out the wrinkles and jumped into a high lope and that was all the sail she needed. It was fun with a nice following sea and was fairly uneventful until we hit this narrow channel and decided to navigate it under sail. As we turned into the fist marker we also turned into the wind on a close reach (about 45 degrees into the wind with the sail pulled in tight to the boat) our leeway (side slippage) was too great to stay in the channel and sail at the same time, something to do with that shallow shoal a few feet downwind caused me to start Mr. Yanmar and burn a little deisel. We motored the last 45 minutes to the Trent river and sent Bruce (one of 3 anchors) to the bottom.
Interesting night! There was a 45' bridge(our mast is 54') about 200 yards behind us with 20 to 25 knots of wind on the bow. I slept (not a wink) in the cockpit stareing at the bridge all night and when my eyes closed I saw the mast drifting closer and closer to the bridge as the anchor dragged. Funny thing was, when I jumped up we had not moved an inch. This senario happened at least 1000 times that night until the wind stopped and Lorrie showed up and said "I'll take over the anchor watch now" That's my first mate!
The next morning we found ourselves trapped behind the now closed rotating railroad bridge. About 10 am "Candybar" a little working skiff, raised enough caine on the vhf to get it opened. We quickly pulled up Bruce and turned for the bridge just in time to see it closed again. The next 2 hours we took turns motoring in a lazy oval pattern raising some caine ourselves and got to play a game of bridge with the RR.
Helen met us at the docks and we had a great time. She took us on the town tour, did a little shopping and she dropped us off at the dock. From there we motored Godspeed to the Northwest Creek marina. We were treated to a slip, showered, and off to Helen's dinner party. After a tour of Zepher, Helen's Endeavour 40, Gil and Joanne from 3 doors down showed up and we had a fun evening. Before our trip back Helen gave us some much needed anchor chain, that Godspeed is swinging from as I write this, and some jerry jugs for extra fuel. If that wasn't enough, she drove to Oriental the next day bearing more gifts and best of all, cruising advice! What a
gal!
Dave Wright from St-Bart Yachts stopped by to wish us on our way and Lorrie conned him into a picture. Dave has been a great help and way above the call of duty- thanks Dave! Now we head south down the ditch, watch the depth sounder, and connect the dots!