Beaufort NC Family Time

We left Mile Hammock Bay at Camp Lejeune with less than a restful night’s sleep. See my previous post, “We’re About To Get Hit!” as to why.

We motored along the intercoastal waterway and were having a nice morning when all of a sudden we heard this big WUMP.

Libbie and I looked at each other and asked each other, “What did we just hit?”

We’d gotten through the night without a scratch but we were wondering if our luck was changing.

And then we heard another WUMP. The boat shook.

Then, it happened again.

We couldn’t figure it out.

I stuck my head out and realized that the noise was coming from behind us.

The Marines were practicing with artillery at Camp Lejeune. BIG artillery.

We were miles away by then and yet we were still being impacted by the concussion of those big guns.

Eventually, the artillery faded away as we move further north.

Our next destination was Beaufort, North Carolina.

We were looking forward to our stay there. My sister and brother-in-law live there close to their son, my nephew and his family.

We’d also heard from many people that Beaufort was a nice stop on the Loop.

Beaufort has a lot of history, some of it rather notorious.

Beaufort was founded in 1709 and incorporated in 1723, is one of the oldest towns in North Carolina and a key historic seaport.

It started as a fishing village. However, its location on the Intracoastal Waterway made it strategically important for trade and naval operations.

As the 1700’s finished, Beaufort grew as a hub for shipbuilding, fishing, and maritime commerce.

Its proximity to inlets and natural harbors made it a target for pirates, including Blackbeard, whose ship Queen Anne’s Revenge ran aground nearby in 1718.

During the Civil War, Beaufort was occupied by Union forces in 1862, which spared it from the widespread destruction seen in other southern towns.

The town’s port and nearby Fort Macon were crucial in supporting the Union blockade of the Confederacy during the Civil War.

After the war, Beaufort remained a small but active fishing and commercial shipping town, though it was eventually eclipsed by larger ports like Wilmington and Morehead City.

Since then, Beaufort has become a tourism destination, but the fishing industry remains strong, providing fresh fish, shrimp and oysters that are still widely available… and sought after by both the locals and visitors.

We had planned on having a little family reunion with both my sisters, bro-in-laws and some of the next generation from their families in Beaufort.

We came up the ICW past Morehead City.

Off to the right, we passed the Coast Guard station and Fort Macon as we made our turn off the ICW to head to our marina.

We could see a small herd of wild horses on one of the barrier islands that protected Beaufort.

Our stay was going to be at the Homer Smith Marina. Unfortunately for me, when there I kept referring to it as the Homer Simpson Marina. (DOH!)

I called my brother-in-law and let him know when we would be in, and he met us at the dock.

We tied up and hugs were given.

We had met another objective.

We had arrived after several weeks of travel to be in Beaufort to meet family.

As we say on the Loop, we can say where we are going to be, or we can say when we are going to be, but we can’t say when we will be where.

Any schedule puts additional stress on us when doing the Loop.

However, we were able to quickly recover. Our stay was for eight days.

My younger sister and her family were driving down from Washington DC at the same time where they had stopped for some business, and they arrive later that evening.

In the meantime, we went out to my sister’s house and settled in for a little bit of a visit.

We then had dinner. We all like to cook, so we all had input on the meal planning for the week.

My other sister arrived with their family and hugs were again passed around.

We ultimately had a great week visiting in Beaufort.

We had other friends that we had seen down in Melbourne and also in Florida Alabama who were coming in for a celebration weekend.

As it turns out, those friends have seen us in more places and more times on the Loop than anyone else.

I’m considering giving them a Selkie Participation Trophy.

Being with family and friends is the best time in my opinion.

Libbie got to play a little tennis with the wife of our friends. We also fished most of the days we were there at a dock close to my sister’s house.

For the family reunion, my sister and I chipped in to buy 200 oysters.

We had oysters shucked smoked grilled and otherwise consumed. There was enough of us to make those first 100 oysters disappear in the first 3 days… the rest took a bit more effort.

Luckily, the Homer Simpson (DOH!) Smith Marina had ice to keep the oysters nice and chilled.

The source of ice at the marina wasn’t an ice machine. It was an ice house with a dump truck full of ice. I’d bring a Home Depot bucket full every morning to the house.

We kept those oysters chilled and tasty for most of the eight days we stayed in Beaufort until they were gone.

We had some great family meals. I cooked one of my favorites for my sister and brother-in-law and their grandson and his girlfriend. Sautéed Scallops over Pasta Limon has become quite a popular dish that I make. It was tasty.

In the middle of all this, I had a male bonding experience with my nephews.

The gearbox for the windlass needed replacing as the seal had failed and it dumped some SAE90 oil into our chain locker.

I could do the job, but my nephews has somehow changed from little boys to big strapping people.

Part of the challenge was trying to get your body in a position to hold the gearbox with the motor installed in an awkward position. The assembly weighed about 20 pounds. You really needed a third arm to get it in the proper location.

My nephews were eager to tackle the problem.

They worked it out together, and successfully installed that gearbox.

Then I tried to hook up the motor but quickly realized the gearbox needed to be removed, turned and reinstalled for the wires to reach their terminals.

So I asked the nephews to move the motor. They were successful… two more times… as they didn’t quite get it in the correct position the second time. They did it with grunting but without complaint.

I was proud of the adults they had become.

All good things must come to an end, however. We had to depart as our next big destination was Norfolk, Virginia, where Libbie and I had to fly out of back to Tahoe to deal with some business. Once again we had a time crunch to deal with. So we cast off and headed north.

More later.