"Trip North 2002" Southport Travelogue by grandmaR

Tug in the river south of Southport

We left North Myrtle Beach early, and got through both the Little River Swing Bridge, and the Sunset Beach Pontoon Bridge in good order. We stopped at Southport after 39 sm, but ARCTURUS was going on to Masonboro. We wanted to have lunch, but I took so much time doing email that Bob walked over to the shrimp restaurant by himself. He thought it was way expensive for what he got. There is a whole historic area in Southport for a walking tour with nice little Victorian cottages.

Gulls on marina pilings

At Southport Marina we paid $1.15/ft, and $4 electric and free cable. They put us on the face dock south of the gas dock. Their restaurant is closed on Mon. They will let you do email in the office. I noticed that you cannot go down the concrete pier, you have to walk on the floating docks. This is because the rebar in the concrete under the pier has rusted, and parts of the concrete have fallen off, so it isn't safe.

Several boats came in after us including a power boat named ESCAPADE going north, and a sailboat which was put behind us that is going south. We can watch the ferry boats going to Bald Head as they pass on their way to the Cape Fear River. There is some wake from the ICW here.

We ate dinner at the Provision Co. which has seating outdoors on the deck, and is cheap, good, and quirky. Drinks are on the honor system. (See Restaurant tips.) After we walked back in the dusk, I took pictures of the boat and the gulls.

Ferry Dock

The wind was pretty fierce yesterday, but died off during the night. The power boat with bow thrusters left at 6, and ESCAPADE left as Bob was coming back from the bathroom. We left about 6:45 while the sun was coming up. We pushed off from the pier pretty easily in spite of Bob’s dire predictions. He made me take the wheel.

We went up the Cape Fear River, passing the ferry dock

Fort Fisher Ferry

thinking that it would be too early for the ferry, but one did come out and cut across ahead of us. We have to weight the current in the Cape Fear River as well as the current in Snow's Cut so that it is never full against us, but the two bodies of water are not in synch, so where it is with us in one place, it will be a little against us in another.

Snow's Cut

As the charting program predicted, the current was with us. We went through Snow’s Cut. I tried to take a picture of the current trails on the bridge in Snow's Cut. If the current was against us in this channel we could hardly make any progress.

Traffic on bridge

I did take some photos of the bridge from the channel, including some of the traffic.

Snow's Cut fixed bridge

Bob and I had an argument as to whether he should try to make the 10:00 opening of Wrightsville Beach, and he didn’t, and we probably could have. He complained about that for the next hour and a half.

Next Hampstead (no additional narrative at this time) and then Swansboro NC