Yes, the title of this section does indeed highlight the events of the past few days. On April 22 we left Charleston and headed for Lightkeeper's Marina in North Myrtle Beach, SC, for what was a nice reunion with our good pals earlier on"the loop", Mark and Vicki Hill, from Petoskey, Mi. It was a great meeting as we enjoyed a lobster feast with the lobster that we had purchased from local fishermen while in the Bahamas. Lightkeepers was perhaps the nicest marina of our entire loop experience. It had a beautiful pool, wonderful showers, and some great people who we befriended. The dock master even lent us a car in which we visited a gorgeous Atlantic Ocean beach and did some re-provisioning at the grocery store. One of the more interesting people we met was Bob Bassett, a college football official who had been a Big Ten football official for several years, but moved south and bought a 70 ft yacht that he named "It's Official" on which he now lives full time, and he now officiates for the ACC conference. While in college, Bob went to Pen State where he played for Joe Paterno, which made for a very interesting discussion.
We left together with Blue Willow (Mark and Vicki) and rafted together at a beautiful anchorage in Wrightsville Beach, NC. After dinner, we played cards before going to bed as we have done every night since traveling with Mark and Vicki. The next night we stayed at a new marina in Swansboro that was not yet opened, so we had no water or electricity. But it was in a nice little resort town that reminded us a lot of Pentwater with cute shops. Connie did indeed make a deposit in the local economy, buying some strings for the house. Upon leaving, Blue Willow(Mark and Vicki) got stuck when they left the marina and went the wrong way. So we got to observe for the first time a Boat US tow boat get a boat off a sand bar. Fortunately, they had insurance to pay for it, a must for all loopers!
Upon our arrival in Beaufort, NC, we stayed at the town boat docks in the middle of the waterfront downtown, This town again reminded us of Pentwater, with its little shops. While here we went through a fascinating Maritime Museum, where we learned a great deal about the famous, violent pirate and terror on the seas, Blackbeard. He had spent much of his time in the surrounding waters in the 1700's where he hijacked numerous merchant ships. His primary objective was to be remembered in history, in which he was certainly successful. Today, Connie and I got in our dingy and visited the small island across from the mainland, Carrot Island, which is known for the heard of wild horses on the island. We actually got quite close to them and were able to take some great photos. We ended the day by enjoying another Bahamian dinner (with Mark and Vicki) with some conch that we had purchased from local fishermen on the docks before we left the Bahamas. Again, we enjoyed a spirited game of cards before retiring for the evening.
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These are two of the wild horses we saw on Carrot Island across from Beaufort, NC
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| Enjoying breakfast in Swansboro, NC with Mark and Vicki Hill, looper friends from Petoskey, Mi |
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| Towboat US is pulling Blue Willow off the sandbar in Swansboro, NC. |
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| A beautiful sunset from our slip in a North Carolina marina |
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