We loved our time in Beaufort, North Carolina. What a beautiful town with something for everyone: history, shopping, food, nature, water,…it’s all here in Beaufort. We also really liked our marina, Beaufort Yacht Basin, and its location. The people there are so kind and friendly, and we had nice boat neighbors. The marina is just a few blocks from the cute waterfront tourist area, which is how we like it. There’s a marina right on the main drag, but we prefer to have a little more privacy.

It took us until almost our last day there to discover the Beaufort Creamery. Because we have no will power when it comes to ice cream, we had two scoops. Owen had one scoop each of AB Pie (lemon ice cream with a hint of lime and saltine crackers blended throughout) and Cookie Butter (made with creamy Biscoff cookie butter and chunks of Biscoff cookies). I had a scoop of Cooke Butter and one of blueberry cheesecake. If that wasn’t enough, we took home pints of pumpkin cheesecake and the previous week’s Star Wars homage: Darth Mault, which was Whoppers blended into vanilla ice cream. As usual, ice cream lasts a very short time in our freezer. It also takes up a lot of space in our minds, which has resulted in ice cream taking up a lot of space on our midsections. It’s a vicious cycle, and may it never stop.

I made grocery-getting needlessly difficult. The marina has both a golf cart and the owner’s truck to use, but I chose to walk the 1.4 miles to Piggly Wiggly because I don’t mind walking. The temperature had been in the 60s all week, so I thought it would be no big deal. But apparently, summer decided to come back that morning, and it was warm and humid. I only planned to get a few things, and I had my little waterproof backpack and my “keep cold stuff cold” bag. It was fine, but who doesn’t take advantage of the use of a vehicle when it’s available? This girl, apparently. The walk was safe and nice, so no harm done.

After waiting out the windy week, we decided to take advantage of the increasing later sunsets and make the relatively short run to our next destination, Oriental. We threw off the bowlines after Owen finished work, and off we went.

Oriental has a marina, but it also has a few spots at a free dock that are first-come, first-served. The cool thing about the free dock is that there’s a webcam there that updates every five minutes, so you can know before you get there if a space is available. How cool is that? When we got close, we were able to check out the webcam to know there was a spot waiting for us. We had two backup anchorages, just in case.

Thankfully, one spot was empty when we arrived. There was a small tug on one side, and we took the spot on the other side. A couple sitting in lawn chairs at the end of the dock proclaimed themselves the welcoming committee and helped us with our lines. We assumed they were the people on the tug, but they were not. They were just locals who liked to watch the boats come in. I don’t think they have ever pulled in a boat before. But they were helpful and got us secure enough that we had a nice and safe dockage.

Like about 1/3 of the people we meet, it seems, they were from Wisconsin. They had moved to Oriental a few years before and vowed never to return in winter. I don’t blame them one bit!

As we finished tying up the lines, our neighbors in the tug returned on their electric bikes. They had arrived just a few hours before and rode their bikes along every street in Oriental. We introduced ourselves to these Gold Loopers (which means they had completed the Loop one time) who were making their second trip around (which will make them Platinum Loopers!).

The downside of the free dock is that there is no power hook-up and absolutely no generator use allowed. So any plans for me to cook were immediately tossed out the window. We walked over to the nearest restaurant, Toucan, and had ourselves a pretty yummy dinner. Our server was so nice, my painkiller cocktail was delicious, and our food was really good. Owen had prime rib, and I had mahi kebabs. We splurged on dessert, too, which was ridiculously rich. Ugh, why does unhealthy food taste so darn good?

When we got back to the boat, rain came and went. We ended up talking to our neighbors in the tug for a long time. They were so nice and shared their travel experiences with us. We want to be them when we grow up! They had done a Loop and a half, but they have also traveled extensively in Canada and Alaska and elsewhere by a lot of different modes of transportation. It seems like everywhere they went, they had a unique and memorable experience. We could have listened to them all night! I wish I had taken notes, because they named so many places that are now on my list.

There was a commercial fishing dock next to us, and there were five boats lined up there along the docks. A couple of the boats were lit up bright as day and running all evening, and we expected them to go at any moment. But they never left (don’t they know the price of diesel?!). We sat on the back deck for as long as we could to see them off, but we ended up going to bed disappointed. I mean, it wasn’t that big of a deal, but we thought it would be fun to see them off.

It was a short run that ended up being a late night, but we packed a lot into those few hours! Thank you, late sunsets!