Oriental N.C. - May 9

Last night was pretty uncomfortable. The wind picked up as forecasted and the boat was really rocking all night long. It continued today, but fortunately didn’t rain. All the rain and severe weather stayed inland or went north of us. Darrell spoke with someone who had wind instruments and was told the wind had been a constant 25 knots with a couple gusts of 40 knots. The wind is supposed to ease tonight, so we hope it gets better.

Oriental is located on the Neuse River, which is like a very big Lake Pepin, and is the sailing capital of North Carolina. There are 875 residents and 2,700 boats. Oriental has 4 marinas, all located at mile marker 181, with 2 more only 2 miles away.

There are some small boutiques, restaurants and The Inland Waterway Provision & Treasure Company, a store which has nearly everything you can imagine. It is kind of like an upscale variety store selling knick-knacks, shoes, clothes (Columbia outerwear and others), books, greeting cards, souvenirs, nautical decorations, jewelry and all sorts of miscellaneous items. Everything is crammed in. It also has a wide range of marine supplies; at least half the store is devoted to that. Darrell found some things that West Marine doesn’t carry.

The people here are also very nice and friendly. Beth started to walk to a grocery store for some provisions. It was probably about 1 ½ miles away. Each way a woman stopped and offered to give her a ride. She accepted.

We walked by the Oriental Yacht Club and one house where we saw a large carved bear as a yard decoration. We saw child size pirate ship as some lucky kid’s backyard playhouse, a painted shack/house which sells fresh seafood, interesting deck chairs and a very old butler who guards the door to a boutique. He is motion activated and is supposed to start nodding and moving his head and arm. He didn’t work today because of the heavy wind.

Towards late afternoon the sun came out and the wind eased. We hope to have a peaceful night.

NOTE: We have had extremely poor internet connection the past 2 days and we do not know what to expect from here until we reach Norfolk. If we miss posting a day (or more) it is due to no connection.