Thursday, May 6, 2021.
Temp: 65/58, Humidity: 49/81%, Top Wind: N13 mph, Precip: none, Miles Traveled: 19.9
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It was a nice calm relaxing morning today. The water was calm here in the marina which is a change from what it has been. Looking out at the sound, it looked pretty calm out there, too. However, the wind was from the north, so it was blowing over the top of us and the sound wasn’t really as calm as it looked. We knew that, so we took our time this morning, since the winds were supposed to calm down as the day went on. So – let’s have some yummy goodness from our purchases yesterday! 😋
We left Edenton at about 10:20 and headed out on our long 20 mile journey to Albemarle Plantation. It was just a quick little loop from one place to another, and the water wasn’t bad. We had about a 10mph wind on our face, plus our 9mph speed, with a temperature of about 60, it was a bit chilly! So much for the 90 degree weather. All this wind brought us some cooler weather.
This is the approach to Albemarle Plantation Marina. We were coming into the marked channel (at the bottom of the picture) and the engine sound changed. Yep – we were in 5’ of water. Time to slow down to an idle, kimosabee. We followed the visual markers in, which didn’t actually correspond with those on the charts, and did fine. No thump,thump,thump sound of the props churning up mud.
We were directed to come to the fuel dock where the roof is, and the dock master would direct us from there. We ended up just a couple of slips from the fuel dock, in a giant slip that must be 24 wide by 60 long.
The dockmaster asked how long we were staying, and I said either one or three nights. Friday and Sunday look good for departure, but not Saturday. So, he brought us a golf cart! Like Edenton, the slip is free for two nights, which is a sweet deal Lucille. I don’t know if we’ll have to pay for the golf cart or not, but what the heck – we like motorin around in a little zoomer!
So that’s what we did. This is the intersection at the end of the docks where the dockmaster’s office is. Cute little wooden paths.
We found the clubhouse and pool. The pool looks fantastic, and even though it isn’t heated, it didn’t feel too bad to the touch. Wouldn’t you know it that we are here AFTER the cold front blew in, so the air temperatures are only in the 60’s. Where was I two days ago when it was 90? Not here! 😕. This is the view looking out at the Sound.
And looking back. This building has the bathrooms and showers, and laundry, I think, that are available to the boaters. It’s quite a hike to get here from our boat.
This is the Clubhouse Restaurant. It’s really fancy looking, but their restaurant prices don’t look too bad! We asked about dress code, and the only restriction the lady told us was that men needed to wear a collared shirt. Okeedokee – we can do that! (Alright you smart alecks, I know what you’re thinking. Let’s just assume that she meant that the rest of the body, and women, need to be clothed as well, including some kind of shoes. 😉)
This is the view from the clubhouse out to the sound, overlooking part of the golf course. It is really lovely!
As we meandered around the Plantation in our lil Club Car, this bridge caught our eye. You just don’t see covered bridges very often, even if it isn’t a historic one.
More pretty scenery near the sales office. I think the Plantation is about 1300 acres, and there are many, many undeveloped lots.
In the middle of one area were some huge “estate” lots that were fenced with these pretty Kentucky horse ranch type of fencing. We only saw one house under construction, and later heard that it is over 8,000 sq ft, and the owner is coming from the Seattle area. He was at the marina on our dock talking to the dockmaster about where they’d be able to put his 70’ yacht. 😳
But all of the other homes are not huge – just kind of normal big houses. You know, like the 3,000 sq ft kind. All of the empty lots are maintained green grass, so the whole area is very pretty to drive through.
We tootled our way back to the marina, and drove out to Island Girl. Surprisingly, these docks are wide enough for two golf carts to pass. And we notice that there is another Bayliner 3988 here! We see them a lot in the Pacific Northwest, but it’s unusual to see them in the South.
And here we are! If we didn’t have the four-wheel zoomer, these fixed docks are high so they’d be great for getting the bikes down from the hard-top. It’s not an easy thing to get the heavy bikes down when we’re on floating docks that are low at the level of the swim step!
We lounged around awhile, then changed our clothes to go back to the Clubhouse for dinner. This time we took a right turn at the end of the dock, and found ourselves on the golf course path. Woops! 🤭Oh well – it was nearly 7:00, and there weren’t any golfers around. It was a much more fun road with lots of twists and turns. 〰️ We might have even been going the wrong way – I don’t have any idea which way the holes and course go! (And I don’t know anything about golf!)
The marina is back there through the trees.
We had a great dinner, and it really was reasonably priced! We had two glasses of wine, Kenny had a big thick perfectly cooked pork chop, I had a balsamic chicken apple salad combo thing, and we shared one piece of pecan pie, all for about $55. We saw that it was getting dark and had to high-tail it out of there, realizing that our lil Club Car doesn’t have any lights. So I shined my cell-phone flashlight as we quickly took the regular road back to the marina. 🤭.
The last of the sunset was really pretty as we drove out on the dock.
Tomorrow we have no plans. Now that we know there really isn’t anything to do here, we probably should leave and take advantage of good weather, but we will stay. Saturday is going to be blustery…. so here we’ll be until Sunday. Then we’ll make a 50 mile move, and perhaps be stuck again because Monday looks bad. AAGGHH!😫. STUPID WIND! Even the locals say that the wind this year is bad. It does force us to stay and explore, but at some point we’re going to have to get a move on and may end up skipping some places we had hoped to stop. Afterall, we don’t have totally unlimited time. We’ll see.