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It was an interesting day on the 13th. We left  a small anchorage south of Abelmarl Sound with a forecast for light drizzle. The drizzle got very chunky after a while. I mussed that at least there isn’t any lightning" then a moment later THUMP! THUMP! A bolt hit very close! But just then who passed us but Paul and Cheryl Chard in their new boat. Now what timing. Not only are they great people, but more importantly their mast was MUCH taller than ours. But soon they were gone. We started into an open passage when the wind hit us and the rain prevented our view of the next mark in a narrow channel. We stayed back along with another boat. We debated about returning to our anchorage or staying at a local marina, but realized, thanks to the weather radio on the chart plotter, that in an hour the rain would probably stop. We waited then went on focusing on the marks rather than the weather data. The rain returned along with 25 knots of wind filled rain when we were in a narrow channel. It was a bit unnerving finding our way. But we got through. Upon arrival at the anchorage in Beaufort a pod of about six dolphins were swimming up and down the channer by our boat. The universe is now in balance.

Our ability to communicate is now impaired in the short term. Unfortunately, during the heavy rains we talked with another boat on the VHF (located in the cabin) with another boat and rain got on the computer we use for our SSB email/blog communication. The old laptop is now acting very strange and we are pessimistic abouts our ability to use it. We have a backup, but it has not worked properly yet. This update is made from a wifi connection in a cafe. These are infrequently found since we are often in small places, or just an anchorage in the waterway.  

We hope to have soon a few more pictures in the photo section of this blog. Just click on the botton labelled "photos".