I received an email from a retired co-worker (HB). HB stated if you ever go single-handed sailing again, then give me a call. It was Columbus Day weekend and early Friday afternoon, I decided to call my friend and see if he wanted to go sailing over the weekend. The weather forecast for Saturday was calling for light to variable winds with temperature in the low 80s.
Four years ago we went to the annual boat show in Annapolis, Maryland. The weather that weekend back in 2006 was horrible. It rained every day. The worst thing was that it was hard walking around the Marina with inconsiderate people with umbrellas. After one day, we were soaking wet.
I was planning on going again this weekend with my wife, but she was unable to go so I went down anyway to check out the boat. I wasn't going to let light and variable winds dampen my weekend. I explained to HB on the way down that they were calling for light to variable winds.
When we arrived at Oriental, we ran into Captain Ron. I knew that HB was thinking about buying a sailboat. HB was a west coast sailor and used to sail to Catalina out of San Diego harbor. Ron told him about a 30-foot Bristol sailboat for sale. We decided to take a look at it Saturday morning before going sailing.
The weather forecast was perfect except for light to variable winds. The temperature was cool in the morning, but by noon it was in the low 70s. The winds (if any) were calling out of the West. I wasn't sure how nice of a day it would be for sailing. Light to variable winds usually means no sailing and more motoring. At 09:30, after looking at the Bristrol, we got underway.
When we got out on the river, we were pleasantly surprised. The winds were coming out of the west at 8 knots. So we decided to head out to the middle of the river and then turn into the wind (heading back toward Oriental Harbor), then do a port tack until we decided which way to go. We could tack up river toward New Bern and then be on a run on the way back, or we could start off on the run toward the Bay River (the mouth of the Neuse) and then tack all the way back. The wind always seems stronger at the mouth of the river than down river where we were at. We tacked again, then jibed to start our run toward Bay River.
About the time we reached South River, the wind speed increased to 12 knots with gusts to 14 knots. We were making good time on our run to the mouth of the Neuse River. We were averaging 3.8 knots on our run. We departed Whittaker Creek at 10:00 and arrived at the entrance to the Bay river by 12:40. We were surprised that there weren't many sailboats out on the river. At 13:00, we started our trip back to Whittaker Creek. Unfortunately, the wind shifted and our port tacks were long, while our starboard tacks were short. The best we could do on a starboard tack was to head across the river. We were underway for 7 hours. We moored at 17:00. It was busy coming in. The sailboats were lining up to enter Whittaker Creek Channel.
