More times in Morehead City

First of all, I’ll tell about our visit back to Mount Airy. We had a great time. We spent the first night with Shay’s mother and of course ate at Chile Rojo. We went to Daddy’s the next day. I had planned to stay with him a few days and cook for him instead of him cooking for us, like he usually does. He usually grills, has a big fish fry or we eat from the deli. This time I’m cooking for him as part of his Father’s Day.

We had a great time visiting. Michelle, Marty, Ethan, and Michael came up on Friday and we all had lunch. We had poppy seed chicken, mashed potatoes, and green peas. It was good and everyone was stuffed. Jason came to visit us one night. He won’t be able to come to Jean’s for Father’s Day, so we spent some time together at Daddy’s. Shay kept telling daddy he needed to come back to the boat with us and he kept saying he’d think about it. When we got ready to leave, Shay asked daddy what time we needed to pick him up for his visit to the boat. Well, he said he was still thinking about it and if he decided to visit, he’d come to Mount Airy instead of us coming to pick him up. I was shocked that he was even thinking about going back with us. We have been trying to get him to visit since he came down last spring. Who knows, maybe he will.

Back in Mount Airy for a few days. We got together with friends Saturday night at “you know where”. We had a big get together for Father’s Day. We had a picnic at Pilot Mountain after church. Evidently that was the place to be. The parking lot was full. People had to wait for cars to leave to get a parking place. We finally all got there and had a great time. Jenny, Shay’s sister, and all her family were there. Phil, Shay’s brother, Diana, his wife, and Zachery their son was there. That was a great treat since Zac hasn’t been to Mount Airy in a while. My sister, Michelle and her husband, Marty were there. Our son Travis, and his girlfriend, Sarah were there too. We had a great time visiting, ate too much and enjoyed being together.

Zachary and Mamaw

Haley, Zachary and Julie

Travis and Zachary celebrating Father's Day

You might be a redneck, if you hang picnic stuff in trees

Daddy called and told us he’d be down Monday morning. We were shocked and surprised. So we three headed down to the boat. Shay and Daddy installed our fish cleaning table. Now we are really to catch fish.

We made plans to head to Cape Lookout the next day. Before we left, Katrina, a girl at the marina that goes fishing a lot, gave us some freshly caught fish. Shay cleaned them and we took off.

Shay and Daddy putting on the fish cleaning tray.

How does it look?

Now let's see how it works

Daddy fished on the way over even though we had some fish already. Shay cleaned it and we had grilled fish for lunch. It was great. We all agreed you can’t have fish much fresher than that. They guys on Bad Bunny, John and Dave, came to the Cape and we took pictures of their boat in the sunset.

Daddy fishing

Daddy with his catch

Chef Shay

Bad Bunny at sunset

Let's see what we can catch at anchor. Well we didn't have much luck at all.

Daddy at Cape Lookout Lighthouse

Me and Daddy

Us at the lighthouse

We took the dinghy to the lighthouse and went for a walk. Of course, Shay found some people to talk too and we did more taking than walking. We visited Ann and George, on Incentive. Daddy stayed on Escape to fish, but a Coast Guard boat came in and anchored near us so he was afraid to fish, since he didn’t have license.

The next day we took the dinghy to the ocean side and went for a nice long walk. We talked to some fishermen and enjoyed the beauty.

We went back to Morehead City and fished on the way. It was rough and hard to fish, but Daddy caught some anyway. We brought them back and had them for lunch. We could get used to “eating off the land or ocean”. We have made 2 trips to the Cape and have caught fish on the way over and way back each time. We have definitely paid for our license.

We had a good time at the dock until time to take Daddy back home. We had a good time and hope he will come back and visit again. He did say he and his neighbor might come back for a long weekend sometime. So maybe…

Back in Mount Airy, Jean had a good country meal for us all that night. Pinto beans, slaw, mashed potatoes, Mexican cornbread… we were all stuffed. We really miss her great meals when we are away.

Being away from family and friends has been really hard, since we are both very close to our families. We lived less than half a mile from Shay’s mom and his sister. We miss being able to walk or drive over to visit with his mom. We keep in touch by phone, but it’s not the same as being there. I hope all our family and friends know we miss them and think of them daily. I remember talking to another boater when they were leaving to travel and wondering how she could leave her family and I’ve done it myself. Talking on the phone is ok but I need a hug and a smile every once in a while and I miss them.

Back to Morehead City the next day to get ready for our guests. Shay’s sister, Jenny, her husband, David, and son, Luke are coming to visit. Luke didn’t know about the trip until the day they left and he didn’t know where they were going until they got here. We had a great time with them. Luke said the boat was a lot bigger than he imagined.

Luke

David gets dinghy lessons

Luke, Jenny, David go for a ride with Luke being the captain.

Luke decided he wanted to paddle, but decided it was harder than it looked. Especially, when the wind blew him away from the docks.

Luke fishing

Luke shows his catch

Jenny and David

They clean up pretty good.

We were doing our dock walk and talking to Linda and Dwayne and saw something strange in the water. Linda got out her camera and took a picture and we still didn’t know what it was. Jenny looked it up and we think it was a sea cucumber?

Is this a sea cucumber or some new marine life form? Not sure. I got a post soon after this blog was posted that this is a sea hare. They are normally found in warm tropical water. Well, we have been having very warm weather lately.

We took the boat out for some ocean fishing. The water was rough and we really didn’t need to be out there. We headed toward Cape Lookout since we’d had good luck fishing in that area before. Luke caught a few little ones, but not much.

They left Sunday morning and we were sad to see them go and hope they will come back soon.

As soon as they left our next visitors showed up! We are having a busy time with our our visitors, but we love it. Remember, that's why we go a boat with 2 staterooms, so we could have company. They were Lauren, Travis and Sarah. They stayed a few nights and we had a good time.

Of course Travis wanted to fish. He went fishing with a girl from our marina and had pretty good luck. He and Sarah are going to spent a few days at Ocracoke so he cleaned the fish and took them to Ocracoke to grill. He said they were good.

Travis cleaning his catch.

Lauren went to Ocracoke for a day and had a good visit. She had 2 things she wanted to do. One was to replace a ring she had gotten at Ocracoke years ago and lost. She didn't find that ring but found another she liked. The second thing was to eat at The Flying Melon and get a chicken dish that she had eaten before. She did get the chicken and said it was better than before. She enjoyed her day-trip to the island. Back at Morehead, she and I went shopping, found some dresses and a cute top. Hey it looks like she had a good excursion---- new ring, great meal and new clothes. She went back to UNCW for July 4th fireworks. I miss her.

On the ferry ride to Ocracoke

Of course, she had to visit the lighthouse.

The British Cemetery on Ocracoke

My sister, Michelle and family came down to Atlantic Beach for July 4th. We went to the condo to visit while they were there and had a good time with them. We walked on the beach and had a good time just being together. We watched fireworks from the beach and could see them at Morehead City, Atlantic Beach and all along the shoreline. They were beautiful.

Me and Chelle

We got a call from Bobby and Jo Simpson, from back home asking if we were ready for fishing companions. We had been asking them when they were coming down and now was the time. Guess what they brought me? Veggies! Garden tomatoes, squash, peppers and cucumbers. I love garden tomatoes so I was happy. We were glad to see them. Too.

Jo and Bobby

Shay and Bobby

We fished off our dock but not much luck. Now don’t get me wrong. Shay didn’t fish so of course he didn’t catch anything. Jo and I both caught several fish but nothing worth keeping. Did I mention that Bobby didn’t catch anything? Oh no, wait he did. He caught us some bait so he said that counts. The next day we rode around and visited Fort Macon. We haven’t been in several years and they have made several improvements. There’s a very nice visitor center and display area.

Jo caught fish

Bobby did not catch this crab! Jo did.

See I can catch fish at the dock too.

Shay, Jo, and Bobby

We met a boy there and got to talking about him about fishing and realized we’ve seen him at MCYB fishing off our docks. We got all excited, asking him what he uses and of course we got “fishing fever”. We went to Wal-mart and bought a bunch of bait. We went back and got started fishing. No luck. Shay said we could have bought a lot of fish for that bait money. Yes, we would have, but we would have missed the fun of trying.

Bobby and Jo had only planned to spend one night and then head south to try fishing at other areas. I hope they have better luck there than we had here.

We kept talking about how hot it is but when we looked at the thermometer, it wasn’t that bad. One night while watching the news we saw the weather and it said the temp was 89 but the heat index was 100! No wonder we were so hot. It was hot! This has been a crazy hot year all over the US.

They left Tuesday morning after a great visit. We kept telling them they could stay longer but they had other fish to try and catch.

After they left, Shay got back on his to-do list. His next job was cleaning the lazarette. We took everything out and he got inside and cleaned and scrubbed so he could do some painting. That was a hot, dirty, miserable job for him.

We want to install a stereo and speakers so we can listen to music, so he’s been researching. He has literally spent days looking online at speakers and radios. Then we go to stores and look and listen, trying to find something that sounds good and doesn’t cost an arm and a leg.

Shay has been talking to Ted on Aloha Friday about a project Ted was getting ready to start. He needs to work on his stabilizers. He is taking the boat out of the water and doing that and some other projects while it is out. So we left on Friday heading to Solomons, Maryland. Shay, Ted, and Dave, Ted’s brother-in-law spent a hot and humid Saturday, taking the stabilizers off and replacing the seals. Ted had estimated 3 hours to do the job and it took from 9 am until about 2:30. That’s about right. Things take 2 or 3 times longer to do, than people estimate. We enjoyed visiting with Ted and Nancy and hope to see them soon on the way south. Shay and I had a good dock walk around the marinas in the area. We still enjoy looking other boats.

This is the tool they use to remove the stablizer. Looks weird.

Next we headed north to Baltimore to visit Ken, Margaret, Auggie, and Biscuit on Rocking B. Margaret had been busy doing her thing. She had been cleaning, meal planning, shopping and tour planning. She did a great job.

She had home-made crab cakes that were better than the ones we had in Solomons. We have heard that Maryland is famous for their crab cakes, but we think Margaret should be famous for hers. We had great steaks and grilled veggies and Italian sausage and peppers and onions. We were stuffed all the time.

We took a dinghy ride around the harbor and it was great. We talked about doing a bike and/or walking tour, but it was too stinking hot, so we took a car tour. Margaret lived in Baltimore for years and showed us lots of sights.

Shay and Ken worked on a few minor projects while Margaret and I downloaded more music to our hard drive. We can cruise and listen to music for years. Now, we really do need to get the stereo and speakers installed. We also got some more movies from them. Hey, we didn’t come empty handed; Margaret got a zillion books for her Kindle from us. She did make the mistake of saying she’d never have to buy another book in front of Ken. Maybe he’ll forget she said it.

Beautiful rainbow in Baltimore

Margaret said Ken had really missed having Shay around to talk to. She said he’d be talking to some other boaters and start discussing something in great detail and their eyes would just glaze over. We used to kid them about always talking about generators, alternations, solar and other boat stuff. I don’t think they would ever run out of stuff to talk about. Remember, they are “brothers separated at birth”, or so Margaret says.

Our view from Rocking B

Guess who else was in Baltimore, right behind Rocking B? Richard and Connie, on Sea Salt. They had planned to head up to Maine, but changed their mind and are hanging out in Baltimore for a while.

Richard and Connie

Margaret and Ken

We all went to breakfast our last morning there. We will miss our good friends, but hope to travel with them again this fall.

Back to Morehead City for more projects. He spent more time researching radios and speakers and finally got some ordered. Have I mentioned how hard it is to do anything on a boat?  Well, if not let me tell you now. It’s a pain in the… How in the world are we supposed to get speaker wires ran from the salon to the flybridge, bedroom and back deck? It ain’t easy. He’s been opening covers and looking into cubbies looking for a way. Again, it ain’t easy.

Removing the ceiling tiles so he can put up speakers.

Now he's drilling holes in our bedroom ceiling so he can put up speakers.

He had to run wiring for speakers and radio.

Finally, putting in the radio.

Robin and Jim are here at MCYB on Adventures. They are friends of Ted and Nancy and we met them in Marathon. They had some bottom work done and are staying here for a few days. Let me explain, bottom work to the boat not them. We had them over for dinner one night and enjoyed hearing about their boating experiences. They have been living on their boat several years. Robin is not like most boat women. She knows everything about her boat, she pilots her boat, and she does lots of boat work. Not like me, I’m more of a gopher.

We had Dwayne and Linda over for dinner one night. We enjoyed spending time with them. We also had the guys from Bad Bunny, John and Dave over one night. They said it was nice to have someone cook for them.

Since we now have a great stero system, Shay has spend hours and hours organizing our music. We have lots he has collected over the years. He has music from Travis, people he worked with and the music we got from Ken and Margaret. We had lots of duplicates and he worked really hard getting it straightened out...we think. We downloaded some music onto Linda's Ipod. She said she loved it. We told her we have lots more. 

Our friends George and Pam came down for another weekend trip. We love having them visit. We took a trip to Cape Lookout and spent the night. We had a great time. We fished on the way over and Pam went fishing for the first time and caught the biggest fish that has been caught on our boat.

Pam and George

Captain George

Pam fishing

Pam and her catch. Doesn't she look happy?

I got really mad at Shay...he let it go. It was hugh and would have been enough for all 4 of us to eat. I told him I did not like "catch and release". He said then I should have volunteered to clean it.

When we got there we went for a dinghy ride and took a nice walk on the ocean side of the island. there was no one else there. We had the whole place to ourselves. We went wading and the water felt great. We had a great meal. Pasta salad, tossed salad, grilled smoked sausage with grilled peppers and onions. Then we had cheesecake for dessert. We were all stuffed. We had a great meal, great company, and a great location.

We downloaded tons of music to George's phone and then tons of music and books to a newly purchased external hard drive. Hope they enjoy the music on their way home. I am sitting here listening to some of our music as I work on the blog. It's so nice.