Author's note: It takes a little imagination to keep the time line in this story streight. It was written in spurts while the events were taking place. Hang in there. It is worth the confusion.
Hurricane Fran is coming ashore near Wilmington North Carolina. Our 36-foot Gulfstar sloop Misty is tied up at Deaton Yacht Service in Oriental, North Carolina, which is about eighty miles northeast of where Fran is making landfall. It is a large storm with winds of one hundred and fifteen miles per hour. Oriental may get winds of nearly hurricane force, and certainly some high water. What a summer. We usually keep Misty in Washington, North Carolina, but we moved her to Deaton's a few weeks ago to be repaired from damage caused by hurricane Bertha. Washington is well up the Pamlico River. Bertha, which was not nearly as powerful as Fran, came through south of Washington. The easterly winds forced the water up the Pamlico. It was three feet deep in the office at Haven's Wharf, and almost four feet higher than the dock where Misty was tied up. She was backed into the slip, facing the onslaught of wind and waves, with doubled dock lines. Both the starboard bow lines chaffed through, chafing gear and all. The other lines held, but Misty was pushed against the boat alongside and damaged both. The repairs are not quite finished and along comes Fran.
A week ago it was Edouard. We drove down to Oriental, made up several new dock lines, and doubled everything up. Edouard missed but the preparations are still in place for Fran. This time I used plastic tubing for chafing gear. I hope it works. The slip there is much better protected. I took down the sails, the Bimini, and the wind generator. All we can do now is wait and see.
My son John, who lives in Miami, bought a Tartan 30, Flight, in Manchester, Massachusetts. This Saturday, September 7, two days from now, He and I plan to sail her south. Our goal is to sail Flight to the Washington, North Carolina area and to dock her there until the next trip south can be scheduled. We have two weeks. There is sufficient time, if the weather permits. John and I are both flying to Boston on Saturday and will be hoping for some luck with the weather. We won't take any chances. Fran will leave a path of destruction through Virginia and Pennsylvania over the next several days. There is another tropical depression approaching the Leeward Islands that will probably turn into a hurricane and may come up the east coast in a week or so. It is not the right season to do any extensive cruising in the Atlantic. We are hoping for a break between Fran and the next storm that is already beginning to threaten.
Besides what I hope to be a great sailing trip, I am looking forward to the opportunity to spend two weeks with John. John is a professional Captain and runs week long sail and scuba diving cruises in the Bahamas. He doesn't get home very often. Time with him is precious. I taught John to sail, but he definitely now has a lot more experience and knowledge than I do. The last cruise we made together was on my boat, so I was both the father and the captain and was, though I deferred to John's expertise, in charge. This time it is his boat. He has the expertise, and he is the captain.
***************
The last two days have been busy with packing to leave. It is 8:00 AM,
Saturday, September 7. I just kissed my wife goodbye and am on the airplane
to Boston. I will meet John in the airport and rent a car to drive to Manchester.
We will need the car for provisioning, but I must take it back to the airport
and find a way back to Manchester before we sail. Hopefully, we will be
ready to sail by tonight.
I still haven't heard anything from Oriental about what Fran left in her wake. It may be a few days. I am optimistic that Misty came through OK. My son, Steve, was going to drive over and check, but the roads were flooded and blocked with downed trees. I expect that the damage near Wilmington will be very bad, but Oriental is about eighty miles north and it should not be too bad there. Fran is now dumping rain near the Great Lakes and will probably bring some showers to the Boston area this evening. The tropical depression approaching the Leeward Islands is being watched for further development. We may just get in two weeks of sailing between the two.
****************
It has been a long day. It is now 10:00 PM and I am sitting in the Fleet
Center in Boston waiting on a commuter train, drinking a large coffee and
eating doughnuts out of a box of a dozen. I probably shouldn't eat more
than two or three. The train to Manchester doesn't leave until 11:30 PM.
I'll get there about 12:15 AM. I called my wife a few minutes ago. Steve
had checked on Misty and the report, a brief recorded telephone message,
was good. No apparent damage. I feel much better knowing that.
Everything went as well as can be expected today. I rented a car, picked up John at the airport, and we drove up to Manchester. The closing on Flight was already done. All John had to do was pick up the paperwork and pay the marina bill. We moved Flight from the mooring to the fuel dock just a few minutes before the marina closed for the afternoon. We spent the next few hours shopping for supplies and provisions. It was a different experience with John pulling out a credit card and paying for things. I did manage to contribute a little here and there. I left John working on the navigation lights about 8:15 PM and drove to the airport. After asking advice from strangers, I took the "T" to North Station which is across from the Fleet Center and the commuter train station. I did not know the schedules, so I have an hour and a half to wait. At least I will catch the last train out.
John wants to get underway tonight. It is raining cats and dogs. We want to get through the Cape Cod canal tomorrow and have to do it on a ebbing tide. High tide is about 7:00 AM. We should be able to make the passage in about ten hours. We have a favorable northeast breeze. If we get underway by 1:00 AM, we should get to the canal about 11:00 AM and still be able to ride the ebb through. The old Atomic-4 engine cranked OK and sounded good. The only problem was that the navigation lights would not work at all. John should have that fixed by the time I get back to Manchester.
I think I will eat one more doughnut.
After a day and a half at sea, I am tired and wet. It is now past noon on Monday, September 9 and the fog is thick. We are south of Montauk Point on Long Island, sailing south at about four knots. The wind is southwest at about six knots. There is less than a quarter mile of visibility. I feel safer sailing rather than motoring because you can hear approaching vessels. We have heard a few engines in the distance and steered away from the sound while blowing our fog horn. An hour ago, all of a sudden, I heard people laughing. I leaned over and looked around the genoa. There was a drifting party boat with several people fishing about thirty yards ahead of me. It is a good thing they were laughing and having a good time or I would have run right over their fishing lines. I had to pull up hard into the wind to miss them. Very near the party boat, we saw a large shark swimming slowly on the surface.
When I finally got back Saturday night after midnight, I found John still working on the navigation lights. They had not been hooked to the DC panel at all. It was pouring rain. I had walked about a half mile down the railroad tracks from the Manchester station to Manchester Marina and was soaked. About two in the morning, we were ready to go but decided that it would be foolish to go out with such poor visibility. We would be late for the ebbing tide anyway. We planned to sleep a few hours and to get underway at first light. During what was left of the night, I heard the rain stop and the wind began to whistle through the rigging.
The rain had stopped but the wind had picked up to about twenty knots out of the east. We discussed whether or not to head out to sea and decided to go ahead. It was pretty rough motoring out of Manchester harbor. Flight had her bow under with white water coming down the cabin top a number of times. We put the sails up with a single reef in the main and continued to motor on a hard tack as we left the harbor entrance and headed for deep water. The water was clear and the scenery was beautiful as we threaded our way between the islands coming out of the harbor. The genoa was catching wave tops, but Flight didn't seem to mind at all. I was pleasantly surprise at how easily she slipped through the choppy five foot seas. Once we got out into open water and were able to turn south and sail, it wasn't bad at all. The tide wouldn't ebb until 7:00 PM, so we had plenty of time to make the canal. We shook the reef out of the main and were making about seven knots on a reach. The sea was rough and there was a lot of spray, but it was great sailing.
As we got into the lee of the cape, the wind shifted to the southeast and the sea smoothed out. We had to tack twice to make the canal entrance. By the time we reached the canal, it had fogged in. We only had a few hundred yards of visibility, but the GPS put us right on the buoys. We were an hour ahead of high tide, but the current in the canal was mild, so we proceded to motor through. The fog was thick, you couldn't see both banks. We met a couple of barges, but had no problem.
I sacked out near the end of the canal passage and John took the first watch. About 10:00 PM Flight's Atomic-4 started sputtering. John was tinkering with it, but it kept getting worse. It was still running, but sounded as if it would quit any minute. There was no wind. I was concerned that we would be drifting in a heavy fog, in the middle of the shipping lanes in Buzzard Bay. We headed towards the east shore, limping along with the thought of finding a safe place to work on the engine. It was too dangerous to try to anchor in an unfamiliar area with zero visibility, but we wanted to be out of the main channel. Mysteriously a few minutes later, the Atomic-4 began running smoothly again, a pattern that we would become most accustomed to. John sacked out and I took the mid watch. I steered with the compass and GPS toward the open Atlantic. Steering with a tiller and a compass, with no visibility, is very tiring. John relieved me about 2:00 AM just as we were leaving the bay.
***************************
We spent another night in the fog. We are sixty miles east north east of Atlantic City, New Jersey, headed towards the Jersey coast. It is 11:00 AM on Tuesday and still foggy. It looked like the fog might clear some this morning, but it has actually gotten worse. Visibility is less than a quarter mile. We are motoring to windward with the mainsail up, just catching enough breeze to steady us. The plan is to move in near shore and head south. The weather forecast is for the wind to shift to the west and then northwest. If that is correct, we should be able to slide on down to Norfolk with ease.
There was thick fog all afternoon yesterday. I took the evening watch and about 11:30 PM the stars came out. It was a beautiful night when I woke John at midnight. The clearing only lasted a couple of hours, then the fog returned. When I took over again at 4:30 AM, it was still and foggy and we were motoring. About 8:00 AM, the Atomic-4 did it's thing again, only it completely stopped this time. The wind had returned out of the south, so we unrolled the genoa and were able to hold a port tack due west. After a few minutes, we cranked the engine and it was fine. We were doing pretty well without it, however, and we sailed for an hour or so before having to start motoring to hold a course toward Atlantic City. We eventually got headed and tacked back to the south. Cape May looked like an easier destination.
****************************
We finally found some sunshine. We have been in the fog since Sunday and
it is now 9:30 AM on Thursday. All around the horizon are the remnants
of squall clouds. We have a northwest wind at about 10 knots that is driving
us on a beam reach towards our next way point, the entrance to the Chesapeake
Bay. Once we get there, we plan to overnight in Norfolk, clean up, and
then take the Intracoastal Waterway on down to the Pamlico River. We hope
to be in Norfolk by late afternoon if the wind holds.
We had one other small period of sunshine on Tuesday afternoon. We were about thirty miles east of Atlantic City. The wind was calm, so we decided to take down the sails and go for a swim. We were both much in need of a bath. There was still only a few hundred yards of visibility on the surface, but the sky was blue and the sun was out. We hadn't seen a boat since the fishing boat I almost hit in the fog the day before. After putting out a float line and rigging a swim ladder, John stripped down to go in first. As soon as he was standing on the stern in the nude, a fishing boat powered by. When John was out of the water, I stripped down and was getting up the nerve to jump in the cold water. Another fishing boat powered by. If you are lost in the fog and you need assistance, I guess all you need to do is take your clothes off. The swim and soap made us both feel better. An hour later, the fog closed back in.
We had been alternately sailing or powering against the shifting southwest wind since we left Cape Cod. By Tuesday evening, we were down to about four hours of fuel, so we had no choice but to sail towards Cape May. When we had wind, it was against us, so we had to tack. The weather forecast was for a shift to the northwest, so we were hoping that the southerly tack would eventually pay off. We didn't want to sail northwest away from our destination. We had another miserable, foggy night with only a brief period of any wind to speak of. The shift to the northwest never came. Instead, on Wednesday morning, we got a light northeast wind and more fog and rain. The wind was at least in the right direction, but we could only make two or three knots, wing on wing, with the spinnaker pole holding the genoa out. We drifted along all morning. Everything was soaking wet. Even our clean clothes in out duffle bags were damp. Foul weather gear kept the pouring rain out, but everything underneath still got soggy.
Just before noon, we were fifteen miles from Cape May. John
did a quick calculation and decided that we had sufficient fuel
to crank the engine. At 2:30 PM, we pulled into a fuel dock with
about a gallon of gas left in the tank.
By 3:30 PM we had fueled up. I had called my wife to let her know where we were (she hadn't heard from us since Saturday night), and we were headed back out to sea. We motored with the sails across the mouth of the Delaware Bay toward the Delaware, Maryland, Virginia shore. I turned in early. At midnight, I woke with Flight pounding through, and seemingly flying over, six foot seas in a squall. The wind was blowing about thirty knots out of the southeast and was gusty. I called up to John, from my warm bunk, and asked if he needed help. He said for me to stay below, that he was having too much fun. He had the full main out but was letting it luff some, and had rolled in about a third of the genoa. Flight was flying. I stayed below, thinking that when he got tired, I should be rested. Besides it was warm and somewhat dry in my bunk. Neither of us ever felt that Flight was in any trouble. She was slipping through the seas on a tight port tack at over six knots and felt very stable and capable of handling it. At around 3:00 AM, I knew that John must be getting very tired and cold, so I got up and put on my foul weather gear. The squall had slacked a bit when I took the helm, but the wind driven rain still stung your face. The wind was still blowing at least twenty knots. I told John to go below, but not to go to bed because I might need him. We talked about putting a reef in the main, but he had been able to cope with the gusts by just easing the sheet and letting the main luff. Not long, about an hour, after I took over, the wind eased some but it headed us so that we were not able to keep an off shore course. I cranked the Atomic-4 and pulled in the genoa. Somewhere, about ten miles off of Assateague Island, I was watching the compass and trying to keep a lookout in the still blowing rain, when I went by a large, unlighted, black can buoy. It was so close that I could read the number "5" on it. If I had hit it, it could have sunk us. John checked the chart and there was nothing in that area.
We passed by the Assateague light house just before daylight this morning. The sea was really mixed up. There was a three foot swell from the southwest wind, a broad four foot swell was rolling in from the southeast from hurricane Hortence, and there were remnants of seas from the nights squalls. It was a little disconcerting how fast Hortence had moved up the coast. We had been keeping track and the day before, it was threatening the Bahamas. It only took a little over a day for it to move up off of the southern North Carolina coast. We are thankful that it moved out to sea in the process.
***********************************
We are in the Norfolk channel drifting and waiting on a railroad bridge
to open. It is 11:00 AM on Friday the 13th. I am not superstitious. We
have been here for over an hour. There are several sailboats here with
us, waiting. I shouldn't feel in such a rush. In fact, we are well ahead
of schedule and should be in Washington, North Carolina with a few days
to spare. John is anxious about having time to find a suitable place to
leave Flight in that area, so we are hoping to have a couple of days to
look around.
Coming into the Chesapeake Bay yesterday afternoon there was a lot of unexpected activity. We crossed the northern opening in the bridge tunnel about 1:00 PM. We saw four Navy hovercraft go by, throwing up a tremendous spray. A formation of several helicopters buzzed us twice. A smaller Navy ship thundered up the bay at cruising speed. We dodged tugs pushing barges and container ships as we motored into Hampton Rhodes just as the sun set.
We selected a marina in Hampton Rhodes from an ad in the cruising guide, based on the lowest rate (I won't mention the name). We arrived just as it was getting dark. I hailed two men on the dock and asked them for directions. As we pulled in to the transient dock, they were there to help us tie up. One of them offered to find the dock master. A few minutes later, he came back and said that the dock master was indisposed. The other commented that he had probably had too much to drink. They opened the showers for us before retiring back to their boats. John and I took a much needed hot shower, put on clean but damp and wrinkled clothes and walked about a half mile to a seafood restaurant that we had noticed as we approached the marina. While we were eating, it began pouring rain. We hadn't brought our rain jackets and commented that it was probably appropriate that we get soaked again walking home. Luckily, the rain stopped about the time we finished. We turned in early to end a great day.
This morning, we were on our way at first light. We topped off our fuel at the first fuel dock we saw and motored through Norfolk harbor. I never imagined that there were so many Navy ships. They were tied up for miles. Some were at dock with crews at morning muster. Some were in dry dock for refitting, and some were seemingly being salvaged. They ranged from aircraft carriers to submarines. It was quite a sight.
*******************************
The railroad bridge is opening now and we will be on our way in a few minutes. We hope to take the Dismal Swamp Canal to Elizabeth City. There are two ways to go on the Intercostal Waterway. The commercial traffic takes the route through Currituck Sound and Coinjock. The Dismal Swamp Canal is a little out of the way, but should be quieter and more interesting.
*******************************
We are anchored in Grapevine Bay, a shallow bay on the west bank of the
Alligator River. We arrived here and dropped anchor just after dark. We
should have good protection from the westerly winds. It is 9:00 PM on Saturday,
September 14, a week since our journey began.
Yesterday, after finally getting through the railroad bridge, we motored on to the lock entering the Dismal Swamp. Because of the delay, we had missed the morning openings of the lock and had to wait on the 1:30 PM opening. This meant that we would have to spend the night in the canal, because the last opening at the southern end is at 3:30 PM. Two of the boats that had waited at the bridge with us were also waiting for the canal opening. A middle aged couple on a Tartan 37, and an older gentleman single handing an old Morgan 33, were all headed south for the winter. We tied up to pilings and had a nice conversation as we waited. They recommended the North Carolina Welcome Center as the best place to spend the night.
The lock raised the level of the canal by about eight feet. We pulled into the lock along the bulkhead, put out fenders, and looped lines over the ballards which were higher than we could reach from Flight's deck. Watching what the other boats were doing, the lines were simply thrown over the ballard and we held both ends so that we could easily take up the slack and slide them free when necessary. As the water came into the lock, there was a bit of turbulence. The gentleman single handing the Morgan had his hands full keeping it under control. The couple on the Tartan didn't seem to mind their rub rail banging into the bulkhead timbers. John and I had no problem.
Just after leaving the lock there is a draw bridge. We had been busy socializing and handling the boat and had not had lunch. As we passed through the draw bridge, John spotted a Bar-B-Que restaurant. There was a place to dock right along side the parking lot. Our family is addicted to Bar-B-Que, but of a particular kind, the North Carolina kind. Some people may argue, but the best Bar-B-Que does come from North Carolina. I was a little apprehensive about eating it in Deep Creek, Virginia, but after questioning the waitress, we went ahead and ordered minced pork sandwiches and fries. I was happy to find that it was very good and as much like North Carolina Bar-B-Que as you could expect to find in Virginia. Perhaps this was because we were only a few miles from the state line. As we left the restaurant, we spotted a grocery store just across the highway. Since we were getting low on supplies, we decided to stock up. We had not expected to find such conveniences on the Dismal Swamp canal.
The canal was historical and somewhat scenic. It was actually a ditch that ran along side of U.S. highway 17. The original road bed had been built as the canal was excavated well over a hundred years ago. The water was stained tea colored from the cyprus trees and you could see creeks that threaded back into the swamp and farm land on the west side away from the highway. There was not much wildlife. There were a few water birds and turtles. We passed a cow up to its knees in the canal, trapped in bushes along side a high steep bank and reported it to the canal management that evening. There were quite a few snags and logs in the water, so you had to keep a close watch. It was obvious that there had been quite a lot of work done to clear away downed trees from the two hurricanes that had recently come through the area.
We arrived at the North Carolina Welcome Station at dusk. The other boats were there and had saved us a space at the dock. It was a typical highway rest area with an information center and restrooms. Highway 17 was on the east side and the canal and docks were on the west. I really hadn't expected to be spending the night with highway traffic. It was not bad. Everything was well kept and relatively clean. We had an interesting conversation with the folks from the other boats. People from the highway, mostly kids, wandered down occasionally, but, all in all, it was a peaceful evening.
The next morning we left early so as to make the first opening of the locks at the southern end of the canal. The locks were much the same as the ones at the northern end. After the locks, we were in the upper part of the Pasquotank River, which was a much more pristine environment. It flowed through a natural cyprus swamp and was really beautiful. By noon, we reached Elizabeth City, where we stopped briefly for fuel. Elizabeth City is a quaint little town. The water front has been renovated and there is free docking (no facilities) in the downtown area. I would like to have spent more time there, but we wanted to keep moving. South of Elizabeth City, the Pasquotank opens up into a fairly wide tidal river. Along the southwestern bank, there is a Coast Guard airfield. I spent six months there in 1962, when I was twenty years old, attending Aviation Machinist Mate School. A few miles further down river, there is also what used to be a large U. S. Navy blimp hanger. It had been out of use when I was there in 1962. I am not sure what it is used for now. I couldn't see much from the river, but as far as I could tell, the area had not changed much in the last thirty-four years.
As we got into the open water of the Pasquotank, we picked up a nice northwesterly breeze and were able to cut the engine and sail. The wind carried us down to the Albemarle Sound and into the Allegator River. We were reaching all of the way doing between five and six knots, occasionally seven knots on a gust. Towards evening, we passed through the draw bridge at highway sixty-four and the wind immediately died as if it were cut off by the bridge. We cranked the Atomic-4 and cruised on down the Allegator until the sun was fading and then eased into Grapevine Bay and anchored for the night.
***********************************
We have reached our destination days ahead of schedule. It is 9:00 PM on
Sunday, September 15. We are docked at Haven's Wharf in Washington, North
Carolina. It is obvious that Fran was not a friendly visitor here. You
can still see the waterline on the buildings near the top of the front
windows. There must have been six feet of water in the offices. A lot of
the planking on the dock is pulled up and the water and power lines have
been broken. The offices are completely gutted. I feel sorry for the guys
that run the place. They had just refurbished from Bertha. The yard and
parking lot are muddy. All of the pilings have held and I don't see much
apparent damage to the boats, although some are gone and others are moved
around. A power boat, about a twenty footer with cabin and stern drive,
is sitting on top of the seawall next to the dock. A Hunter 32 is in my
slip. I think that I am glad Misty is in Oriental. I hope Steve's observation
of no damage is correct.
Before light this morning, we pulled anchor in Grapevine Bay and headed south. We were able to steer the lighted markers, and as the sun came up, we entered the Alligator River to Pungo River Canal. This was another run through what seemed a vast wilderness, except for an occasional creek dumping pollution into the canal. What a shame. For miles, the tea colored, cyprus stained, water was covered with clumps of ugly foam. I do not know what it was or where it came from, but is was shameful.
As we neared the Pungo River, the signs of the pollution diminished and we began seeing signs of civilization again. We were motoring into the breeze as usual. Near the mouth of the canal, although it looked as if we were in the middle of the channel, we felt the keel slide gently into the soft bottom and we grounded firmly. We tried backing off, but the folding propeller didn't provide enough power to move us at all. We turned the tiller to port and kept the engine in reverse. Slowly the bow swung to starboard. With wind now on the port bow, we unfurled the genoa and let the wind push the bow on around. Soon we were headed down wind and back toward deeper water. We were able to put the engine in forward and push out of the soft bottom.
When we reached the town of Belhaven on the Pungo River, The ICW turns south and we were able to sail the next few miles, into the southwest wind, to the Pamlico River. We turned up the Pamlico toward our final destination, Washington, North Carolina. We motored with the sails on a hard port tack all afternoon, and, as the sun was fading, pulled into Haven's Wharf. The Atomic-4 was sputtering off and on just as it had done the first day that we left Manchester, but it was still running.
************************************
Postscript: Misty was not damaged by Fran. She was covered with leaves and small branches, but there was no damage. I moved her back to Haven's Wharf a few weeks later. The offices there had cleaned up and put down new carpet just in time for Josephine to flood them with a foot of water again. Neither Misty nor Flight was damaged.
The problem with the Atomic-4 was resolved by replacing the coil and spark plug wires. In November, I took Flight down the ICW to Charleston, South Carolina where I met John and his girlfriend. After waiting out a terrific noreaster for a day (the swing bridge couldn't open because of too much wind) they got a steady westerly wind and sailed on down the coast to Miami in less than a week.