A cold mountain visit

November 19 -22

Clara and some of her friends (Sheila, Carol and Tina) came up to the Mountain House Sunday, November 19 for a girls trip.  They had a great time catching with each other.

They returned to Beaufort, Wednesday, November 16.

Friday morning, Clara and I headed back up to the mountain to close up the house for the winter as we probably won't be back up until April or May.

The weather forecast included a cold front moving through - and we know what that means in the winter - high winds.

We arrived late Friday evening and immediately in the dark started moving all the porch furniture to the garage and putting up the hurricane shutter on the big windows facing the Northwest.

Lucky we did it, because when we got up Saturday morning, the wind was howling.  Saturday night, we recorded 69 mph.  Sunday was in the high 50's a good part of the day and Monday it stayed in the 30's with gust up to 50 most of the day.  This is the most sustained high wind event that we remember.  Usually, a cold front moves through and within 24 hours, the winds have died down.  Not this time.

Finally, Monday evening, the winds abated.

A cold November sunset

The temperature dropped dramatically and bottomed out at 25 degrees with a wind chill of 6 degrees.  It is definitely time to be heading South (which we plan to do on December 14.

The house is buttoned up for the winter

A Happy Birthday

Saturday-Sunday, November 5-6

Happy Birthday to Clara.  She had quite a weekend.

Breakfast Saturday with Carol.

Our neighbors, the Goulds came over with a candle lit cupcake and sang happy birthday!

Of course the staff sang Happy Birthday and stuck this big hat on her

Jean and Madelyn went out to dinner with us (Mexican of course - Clara's favorite.

And Sunday afternoon doing what she loves the most - fishing.  Fortunately, the blues were biting and we landed 15 nice ones.  I wanted to stop after 3 which is a meal for us.  But it's her birthday, so 12 more fish later, she finally relents.  Great fishing!

At the dock.  Not only does she love to fish, she actually likes to clean them.

She accidentally dropped a fish in the water.  I haven't seen her move this fast in a long time.  In went the arm with the watch on it and she rescued the fish!  The watch is still working!

To the Cape

November 10 - 11

It's been nearly 2 years since Joe and I last sailed to the Cape on Eureka, and perhaps this will be the last time.

We've had the boat up for sale for over a year.  A few showings but no legitimate offers.  We're not letting a great boat like Eureka go easily.

It is with mixed emotions that we've made the decision to sale her.   Eureka is a great boat and has served us well for 10 years.  She has taken as far South as Miami/Key West on a great adventure, along with many sails to Cape Lookout, Ocracoke and the Neuse River/Oriental.

She has introduced Anna and Evan to sailing and we've had innumerable friends experience her plowing through Beaufort Inlet in a Southwest breeze running against the tide.

We've enjoyed many an evening watching sunsets from her cockpit while enjoying our favorite beverages and offering prolific insights into personal and public issues.

We have shivered below decks as we started an ill-fated journey South in February, ending with renting a car to get back home and to warmth.

We sailed her offshore overnight into what the weather forecast called for fair winds and following seas, only to wind up galloping into a gale in the darkest of nights and quickly ducking into the nearest harbor of refuge.

Clara refers to her as a "stout ship", and she has proven on occasion that she can handle rough seas much better than her crew.

We've found that with having both a motorhome and a sailboat, we can't seem to find the time for both.  And traveling in the motorhome is a lot easier on the back - and the back is not getting any younger.

We took everything off the boat when we put it on the market, which has made it rather difficult to just get on it and take off like we've always done.  We didn't have to think about what we needed - it was all there.  As a result, we just haven't made the effort.  But we did Thursday and Friday and it was a wonderful reminder of all the great times aboard.

It was a couple of beautiful days for sailing, with winds out of the Northwest on our sail out to the Cape and on the nose from the West coming back in.  It's always a beautiful evening at the Cape, whether it's warm or cold.  And Thursday night was no exception.