Underway early again, 6:14 AM. The sunrise was gorgeous. At this point our course became westerly rather than southerly, so this is looking astern at the eastern sunrise. The smooth area is our wake.
An hour later we began to see many fast fishing boats heading due east for the opening to the Atlantic Ocean at Morehead City. We continued to head west against the flood of fisherman.
Dozens of fast boats came our way. Here we look westward to see an unending supply of fast fishing boats, on a Friday morning! What the heck was going on?
The average fishing boat had twin 225 HP outboards, usually Mercury, Honda, or Yamaha. Some fishing boats had THREE such motors.
This nice Grand Banks 42 had a very courteous captain that talked on the radio a lot as he passed other boats.
This home faces south on the ICW just west of Morehead City. I love the architecture of the North Carolina shore homes.
Today was Halloween, and we saw several boats today that were flying the Jolly Roger flag for Halloween, including this fishing boat.
Beautiful weather, pretty contrails going everywhere.
And more beautiful homes along the coast. I like the stairs, decks, and docks.
I like the colors too! Notice the palm trees.
A full walk-around widow's walk and cupola, on stilts! Only one home was still boarded up from the hurricane. We really saw no significant hurricane damage to homes, except one mobile home.
Ah, the Florida look, complete with private lighthouse!
This was the first boat to pass us at 7:15 AM, but now he was passing us from astern at 3:30 PM. The others followed. What the heck is going on?
As we arrived in Wrightsville Beach for the night, the town was flooded with boats of all kinds. This was not normal. What was going on?
A fishing tournament! Carolina Contender came in 10th in what turned out to be the Wrightsville Beach King Mackerel Tournament and got $559 for a 28.65 pound fish. The top twenty all had 25 pound or larger fish. The first place was for a 34.7 pound fish: the winner got $10,640! It cost about $300 just to enter. I have never seen such a serious fishing tournament. Fun!
There were more nice homes at Wrightsville Beach.
We decided to anchor just a mile from the tournament action.
And here is where we spent the night. I wish we could have gone ashore or stayed at a marina here: it looked like they had some very decent services nearby!
Last updated: 2003.11.21.