Wind Tides??…we can’t leave the marina…

Wind tides (Seiche – pronounced “saysh”) were new to me but today we had a lesson in them. We woke up this morning and readied the boat to go. Pendragon, our neighboring boat was doing the same. Both Mr. B and the captain of Pendragon (a hired captain not familiar with the channel here) decided to take a run up to the office to talk to Tom, the marina/boatyard manager of Wayfarers.

Mr B was going up to say goodbye and thank Tom for the great service that we received. The hired captain for Pendragon came in late last night and was quite surprised to see the way out of this marina and wanted to know anything special that he needed to know to get his boat out of the channel and into the river. Anyhow, they both ended up in the office at the same time where Tom explained that because of the wind tides,  the channel was a good two feet low with shoaling and he recommended that neither of us leave until either the wind changed or after the contractor that he hired had come in and dug the channel out. The contractor was due in at about two this afternoon so Mr B & I decided that we would wait until tomorrow. The Pendragon crew was hoping to perhaps get a few hours in before dark but by the time the contractor was done, it was too late for them to leave.

So what are these wind tides you are wondering.  The easiest description that I could find that made sense to me was on the Ohio.gov site where it talks about the seiche on Lake Erie.  It says  “A seiche is a phenomenon whereby winds on the lake cause the water level to rise at one end and drop at the other. This rise in water level is sometimes called a wind tide, wind set-up, or storm surge.

When storm winds subside, water levels try to return to equilibrium, leading to the most interesting aspect of a seiche—the “sloshing” effect as the surge at one end of the lake rolls to the other end. Soon, the end that previously had the highest water now has the lowest and vice versa. It typically takes from 6 to 12 hours for the wave to travel from one end of the lake to the other, and the back-and-forth rolling usually continues for more than a day. Each time the wave rolls across the lake, it becomes attenuated; so assuming the wind doesn’t pick up strength again, the effect is never as intense at the initial wind set-up. Eventually, to the eye, the wave is indistinguishable from the many small waves that stir the lake surface.”

So there was my lesson for the day. Captain Pete that will be taking Pendragon and its owner to the Hudson river said that in his forty years of moving boats, this was the first time that he couldn’t get OUT of a marina. Mr B and I were lucky because we still have a vehicle here so we took a drive to Morehead City and had a shrimp sandwich at El’s and then to Walmart for a few supplies that we wanted.El's Drive In

I leave you with a few photo’s of the excavator digging out the channel that will take us out to the river in the morning…at least that is the plan – BUT – anyone that travels by boat knows that you need to be flexible. We will see what tomorrow brings.;-)Excavator Removing the sand so boats can get throughStretch that arm out!

Cicadas are coming – “They’re Back” …

Cicadas – what the heck is a cicada, you are wondering! Well, a cicada (genus Magicicada) is a bug. Yes, there are always bugs around so what is the big deal? These Brood II cicadas only emerge from the ground every seventeen years. Not everyone will be able to see this emergence. Seems like they will be most prevalent in portions of eastern North America including Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Virginia. What makes this really amazing is that they are supposed to emerge by the millions and some folks are saying maybe even billions.

cicadas

Photo Credit: Jason Sturner 72

These bugs are about one and one half inches long. They emerge once soil temperatures at about 8″ deep warms to about 63°F. They don’t bite and they don’t sting but they do sing and since they fly around, they are annoying. Adult male cicadas sing loud chirping songs to attract female cicadas. Their mating song is one of the loudest of any insect. You can track their emergence or report any that you may find at Radiolab. The good news (at least for those of us that really don’t care for flying bugs) is that once they emerge, they have a life span of only a couple of weeks. Have you seen any of these in your area? So far, I have not and I really won’t be too disappointed if I miss the emergence. ;-)

Boat cleaning – yuk!

Boat cleaning has been utmost on our mind. We have chosen to keep the boat right at the yard where we had it bottom painted. It just seemed to make more sense than trying to get it back to where we normally keep it and then turn back around and head right back up to continue our loop. That decision has caused us to have quite a bit of travel time to get to the boat and back home which ultimately takes away from some of the cleaning time. We spent the last week cleaning and scrubbing and we finally are just about done. We come home exhausted each afternoon and realize that we just aren’t as young as we used to be. Tomorrow should do it and then we have to put our “stuff” onboard. Whew!!

misty moose at the dock

Doesn’t she look pretty?

I recently read something that said to think of your boat as a suitcase, not a home. That means don’t take everything including the kitchen sink with you. We are about to see how we do with that! ;-) We should be able to leave by Sunday or Monday. Stay tuned – I will have MUCH more time to blog once we are underway.

image

Wordless Wednesday – Shrimp boats at sunset…

This photo of shrimp boats at sunset was taken in Swansboro last week. Amazing how far the sun is over compared to during the winter. I love the sky in this photo.Shrimp boats
1/320 sec at f 9, iso 100
22 mm (18-300 mm f3.5-56)

The boat – she’s floating again…

The boat has been on the hard at Wayfarers Marina in Minnesott Beach for about the last six weeks while getting her ready for our trip. She has nice new zinc’s and bottom paint. We also had an auto-pilot added and a new 12″ Garmin chartplotter.  WAY more easy for our eyes to focus on. ;-) We also had some other minor “stuff” done and as of last week, she is in the water again. Now comes the hard part – CLEANING!!

Boat in  Wayfarer's Marina.

Boat is tucked away in this marina near the arrow.

Do you have any idea how dirty a boat can get while on the hard?? Besides all the dirt floating around over the boatyard, there have been workers aboard with dirty feet and to be honest – we really haven’t done a really good cleaning job since we left Wilmington for Camp Lejeune, which is her permanent home now that we are living in NC! We should have  the majority of the cleaning done by this weekend and then we will start taking all of our things aboard and load her up with groceries.

Won’t be long now until we head out to continue our Great Loop journey. If you have followed this blog, you will know that we bought the boat on the west coast of Florida and traveled across the Okeechobee, and then spending a fair amount of time at Indiantown to get some needed repairs. After leaving Indiantown, we made our way to Fort Pierce where we spent a couple of months. Although we had traveled a fair amount already, we choose to consider Fort Pierce as our official starting point. We are about to start off again. How far will we go this time? Time will tell. Follow along with us as we travel.

I’ve added a few photo’s below as we were coming out of the marina the other day for the sea trail. As you can see, this is an interesting place to get in and out of.

Looking behind as we leave

Leaving the marina

Head towards the tree's

We have to fit through there?

Port side of boat

Pretty close on the port side.

Port side

The starboard side is even closer

Almost to the river

Check out the shoaling on both sides of the opening