We left our dock at 10:30 am on Saturday and headed down the Bay towards the northeast entrance to the Bay Bridge tunnel. A nice sail which continued out into the Atlantic generally South east to give us a wide berth of the outer banks. The wind stayed good out of the north east and we made good time on a close reach with the stay sail and reefed main.
We reached Cape Hatteras at four am and turned the corner. The wind in that corner was not cooperative and we ended up making more distance east than I (Charles) planned before we turned and ran only a postage stamp of genoa out before 20 knots making surprisingly good time. The large problem was the seas there were two wave trains at right angles to each other one fine on Starboard quarter, the other just forward of the port beam. The result was as uncomfortable as I (C) have experienced. Ariel with her shallow keel does not do welll in following seas at the best of times with this wave combination we rolled unmercifully.
Our original plan was to keep off Cape Lookout, Cape Fear and Cape Romain and head directly into Charleston arriving Tuesday morning. At 4:30 am Mon I (C) decided to call it quits an we rounded Cape Lookout into Beaufort Docks arriving at 8 am. Looking at the forecast for the rest of today and tomorrow it turns out to be the right decision. If the winds stays out of the southwest as currently forecasted we will continue down the waterway after a layday in Beaufort. It is time for my nap. (C)
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