Monday, October 12, 2020

Homer Smith - Provisioning, laundry, and boat wash

 

Foggy day in Beaufort, NC

The rains stopped so it was time to get Fleetwing ready for the rest of the trip south. We were going to do laundry in the free washer and dryer but the washer was out of commission due to a bad pump that was on order so we had to go to plan B. After calling several laundromats, we none that would come to the boat, pick up the laundry and deliver it back - like our experience in Key West. However, they would wash and fold the laundry if we dropped it off - which we did. Our intent was to stay out of crowds as much as possible so that strategy was fine with us. 

The excellent marine museum is open for business

Next on the agenda was provisioning. We have used Instacart in the past so we returned to their service with Publix. It costs $10/month and you suffer from a markup above the store prices but then you avoid exposure to crowds and you don't need a car to get groceries, it's a trade-off we're willing to make. Lastly was washing the boat to rid the deck of fuzzy bills from Alligator River Marina. They look just like mosquitoes but they don't bite. If you anchor in an area where they are swarming, they can land on your deck in the thousands!  Each one that dies leaves a green stain that is very difficult to remove. I didn't have so many green stains this time but the cleaning still took about three hours in the hot sun. There is still a big list of boat projects to do but that's for another day.

We are headed for Swansboro on Tuesday so it will be a short day but we'll see our first shallow water along the way, ought to be interesting. 

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