St James Plantation Marina in Southport, NC - at a dock and we meet old friends for dinner

 

Not often you see swimmers in the waters of the ICW

We headed out at 7:15 am since we had 50 NM to travel but came to a sudden stop when we saw swimmers in the water! It seems there was some kind of swimming meet using the ICW. Each swimmer had a person in a kayak nearby to mark the swimmer. Some of the swimmers were out in the middle of the channel. We slowed to a crawl and they slowly went to one side of the channel as we passed by. I think I counted about 1/2 dozen in the water. 

Jim McKay is with Matt in the photo - Matt now has a Bob423 burgee for his future boat

After that excitement, things settled down for the rest of the trip. There were no surprises on the Bob423 track and we made good progress. We arrived at St James Marina at dead low tide and found a brief 4.6 ft spot at the entrance. We didn’t feel anything with our 4 ft 9 in keel and we made it in without incident. Since it was low tide, that makes the entrance 4.6 MLLW, but just a flicker - one quick reading. The rest of the way was 5 MLLW or better. 

I highly recommend the Provision Company 

We met the McKays for dinner. They brought along their grandson, Matt, to Fleetwing before dinner so he could see the boat. It turns out that he’s quite fascinated with boats and wants one when he grows up. That earned a Bob 423 burgee but he had to promise to take me for a ride when he gets his boat, he agreed. 

The dinner at the Provision Company was excellent as usual. They have a relatively limited menu and the best meals are the specials. Ann and I had the three homemade crab cakes with side dishes, really good. All that was topped off with brownies, ice cream, whipped cream, and chocolate syrup. We are full!

We will do some minor provisioning on Monday using the car generously loaded to us by the McKays. On Tuesday, we will head north again. Time to get home.