Virginia Beach

We're off the dock at 0730 and I'm there to see it. Graeme still greets me, with 'Good afternoon'. I mean... what's a bloke to do? I AM retired, after all!

As soon as we exit the Belhaven channel, we're back on the ICW. We motor up the Pungo River and enter a long, straight cut of 21.2 miles (well, with one slight bend in the middle) that conveys us to the Alligator River thence Albemarle Sound and the North River. Our destination today is Coinjock, NC, where we have a dinner reservation at a famous prime rib restaurant.

Leaving the long cut, we motor out into the Alligator River and cruise for 20 miles along this broad, 3-4-mile wide stretch of water. A couple of other motor vessels close up on us as we approach the 3-mile long Alligator River Swing Bridge, so that we and a sailboat can all move through on the one swing. We continue up the Alligator until it opens onto the Albemarle Sound. This entails a 14-mile voyage across what looks like the Pacific Ocean, such is its vastness. Accomplishing that, with a gentle south-westerly breeze and the gentlest of swells, we then run up the North River for another 13 miles, then along a cut for 2.5 miles to reach Coinjock Marina for the evening.

Crossing Albemarle Sound we open the engines up for a scheduled 15-minute 'burst' at revolutions 2,400. As usual, this nets us another 2-3 mph at 4 x the rate of fuel consumption. But they say to do it after so many hours of cruising at 14-1500 rpm, so we do.

We dock around 4.45pm and top up our fuel tanks. Preston’s sister and husband arrive from Norfolk and after drinks we repair to Coinjock’s Sandbar—literally 40m from our mooring—for the finest prime rib I can remember, with jus and the most pungent horseradish sauce. Lorraine has softshell crab deep fried in a superb, tasty coating, reminiscent of the KFC “11 secret herbs and spices”, only better!

And so ends Day 17… one month to the day since we all departed from Downunder. Apart from a thunderous downpour while we were in an Uber in Myrtle Beach and another 30-min one here at Coinjock, our weather has been glorious.Read more