Fri June 5: Carolina Beach Mooring Ball to Mile Hammock Ancorage

In which the military are hands off...


Here is my favorite way to be awoken in the middle of the night:  the person next to you sits straight up in bed and yells RAIN and then you both LEAP from bed to close all the hatches before everything is soaked.  Then that same person falls back to sleep as though he has been hit over the head, while I lie awake practicing deep breathing to combat adrenaline poisoning.

It was, therefore, a  LITTLE hard to drag me out of bed at daylight.  But cruising away from the mooring ball a big turtle in front of us lifted his head and gave us the a look (that I interpreted to be a wink) and dove.  He look so much like the turtles from Finding Nemo that I was immediately quite cheered up, and spoke in an Australian accent the rest of the day (it makes sense if you have seen the movie). 

Coming up on the Wrightsville Bridge Rick decided to really let his hair down and go for it, even though it was a low bridge (our height 19.5, bridge tide height boarding reading 16).  As usual I crept forward while he stood at the back to see if we were going to lose our Bimini top.  Turns out we are much shorter when the radar mast is lower.  He was so chill it was like he had been replaced by a Jimmy buffet pod.

Rick had chosen Mile Hammock for our anchorage, hoping it would be a good open location from which to watch the Strawberry Moon rise. This anchorage is part of the large Camp LeJeune marine base.  It's best to anchor far away from the boat ramp, in case they are doing night time 'amphibious assault training'.  We saw none of that, but did hear distant munition explosions.  We did have to go through the usual Pythagorean Theorem to anchor, tho.  God, I hate maths.

We set up our chairs facing east and prepared to be awed.

How cute is the co-captain?!

Not being, either one of us, known for our patience - soon we were wiggly and frustrated that nothing was happening.  To pass the time we sang all the songs with the word 'moon' in them that we could think of.  Several we had sung to the kids when they were little.  Suddenly Rick did a double take because the moon was coming up over trees in an entirely different direction.  It is a little hard, out here in the winding ICW, to have a very accurate idea of the compass points. The Strawberry Moon did not disappoint - but, as with everything on our trip, pictures just do not do it justice...

I realize that it is completely improbable that every time there is an amazing sunrise/sunset there is a picturesque sailboat there - but I swear that is really the case and I am not photo-shopping them in:

I was so moved by the moon rise that I agreed to get up in the morning in time to see the sun rise.  Who AM I and WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO ME...