Another early start to the day (0730 hrs) allowed us to make the Carolina Inlet at high tide and saved many backtracking miles. Without local knowledge I would be hesitant to have used this inlet. But everything went as described and I am glad we traveled this route for more experience. Which, in the early morning light, makes channel markers difficult to locate and identify. Once we got to the Atlantic Ocean, we had the sea to ourselves again! Waves were <2 ft @ 8 seconds. However, as we got closer to Beaufort, we felt more of a following sea with northerly winds which blew across the port side of the boat as we made the inlet. Beaufort is a quaint little beach town with a great marina located in the downtown area. We can fuel at our slip!

Walked the town tonight and enjoyed an outdoor musical concert at the end of our dock! It will be another early night as we move on to Ocracoke, NC (just south of Cape Hatteras - our insurer’s goal!) for the weekend and a chance to use the bikes again.

We met some people from Hampton, VA today. They have befriended us and passed along a lot of good information about VA, the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays. If I recall correctly, we could make NYC in four stops. Seems to be aggressive but I’ll spend some time this weekend checking charts. Unfortunately, we’ll be bypassing the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays. Over the years we had traveled much of the area by land and we’re focusing on the Hudson River to Harbor Springs destination.

It’s a small world. Yesterday our dock neighbor and I were talking about our Tiara. He asked if I knew Craig Tallberg. I said I sure do. He (and his daughter Mariah) were instrumental in arranging the service work on the boat while we were in Charleston. I’ve known Craig for many years from Harbor Springs. Evidently, my dock neighbor had called Craig to tell him he met me! His local intel was influential in our route choice today. Good goes around!