ICW Week 1: Norfolk, VA to Beaufort, NC
Find out how we are settling in and what our first 7 days have looked like.
It has officially been one week since we began our journey south on the ICW. Since leaving our home port of Deltaville, VA on November 1st, we’ve experienced the culture of the southern boat migration, savored the early days of friendship with other cruisers, and started adjusting to the daily rhythm of boat life.
Before diving into those topics, here’s a quick look at our week by the numbers:
Miles traveled: ~235 NM
Towns visited: 3 — Belhaven, Oriental, and Beaufort, NC
Mechanical failures discovered: 3 — autopilot, galley light switch, and headsail furler (don’t worry, we have repairs in progress - as I write this, Michael is taking an an Uber to town to ship our autopilot ram to a specialist to have it rebuilt )
Boat bakes: 2 — Skinny Taste Easy Bagels and pumpkin muffins. I HIGLY recommend the bagel recipe - so easy and delicious!
Travel days: 6
Rest days: 1 — Oriental, NC
Grocery runs: 2 — shout out to the Piggly Wiggly in Oriental for providing a free shuttle!
Early Days
Day 1 of the ICW brought us from Norfolk, VA—with its cargo ships and military vessels—to the outskirts of Chesapeake, VA, where we transited our first lock. Just south of the Great Bridge Lock, the Great Bridge Battlefield Museum hosts a free dock where transient boats can tie up for up to 48 hours. This is where we met our friends on S/V Alboe, after they thoughtfully helped with our dock lines.
If you read our Greetings from Annapolis, Maryland blog post, you know that Michael and I are very excited about the idea of making boat friends—especially with folks who are also taking the ICW to the Bahamas. We were thrilled to learn that the crew of Alboe have similar plans to ours. Since that first evening in Chesapeake, we’ve gotten together to enjoy the early days of the ICW voyage—and the early days of what we hope will be a lovely friendship.
Day 1 was also the end of daylight saving time. This quickly showed us just how synced we are to our natural environment when living on a boat. Michael and I continue to wake with the sun and grow ready for bed a few hours after dark—which, over the past week, has looked like 5:30 a.m. wake-ups and 8:30 p.m. bedtimes. Quite literally, early days.
The Great Migration
The next several days brought us to the headwaters of the Alligator River–Pungo River Canal and featured several locks and bridges with timed openings. The entertaining side effect of these timed openings is that as boats arrive and wait, traffic gets organized into distinct waves.
For example, the Great Bridge Bridge (double “bridge” intended) opens every two hours. That means every two hours there’s a wave of boats that had been waiting and can now make forward progress. These little clusters of boats move down the ICW together, visible both on our GPS display and in real life.
There are also natural waypoints along the ICW where boats tend to congregate for the night. For instance, Coinjock Marina and Restaurant is a popular stop for powerboats (and some sailboats) since there are few suitable anchorages nearby. The restaurant is also famous for its prime rib—which we missed this time but hope to treat ourselves to on our return north next spring.
One morning, I was up particularly early, enjoying a cup of coffee in our cockpit, when I watched more than 20 boats start their southbound journey one by one. They reminded me of a tidy class of kindergarteners walking down a school hallway.
All of this creates a wonderful sense of community. As we monitor Channel 16 on our VHF radio (something required of all boats), we hear the same boat names day after day. Most powerboats travel much faster than sailboats, so we’ll be in the same “pod” of powerboats for a few days before they move on. But we’ve seen and heard from the same set of sailboats since we left.
Settling into a Comfortable Cadence
From the Alligator River–Pungo River Canal, we traveled to what I’d consider our first real town visit: Belhaven, NC. To make it there in time to explore for the afternoon, we left our anchorage around 7:30 a.m. Between rising with the sun and wanting to reach our next destination early enough to explore or rest, we’ve settled into a comfortable routine: waking early, enjoying coffee in the cockpit, taking Maisie for her morning shore walk, then getting underway.
We typically sail (or motor) for about six hours each day. Any more than that, and we start to burn out—but we’ve had a few longer days when needed.
We’re also thinking through what the right balance of non-travel, or “zero,” days might be (so called because we travel zero miles). So far, we’ve taken one zero day—in Oriental, NC—where we enjoyed a slow morning, explored town, and socialized with other cruisers.
Boat Life Bits and Bobbles
Daily living takes on extra layers when you’re on a boat. The one I’m becoming most familiar with right now is food management. Our galley kitchen is very well equipped for a 35-foot sailboat, but it’s still a boat kitchen—not a house kitchen. Our refrigerator is small, only slightly larger than the mini-fridge I had in college, and its temperature control is finicky.
Because of that, I have to plan strategically what goes into the fridge and where it goes. After half my vegetables froze, I learned they need to be stored on the top shelf. Meat goes on the bottom—unless it’s thawing, in which case it hides behind the veggie basket for a day.
Grocery visits require a bit of multi-factor decision-making:
When will I next have access to a grocery store?
Will I need to walk there (meaning a small run) or can I order delivery for a larger haul?
Do I have any available space in the fridge, or do we need to eat down what we have?
Are we facing multiple long travel days, meaning quick-prep meals? Or are we resting, with time for more involved cooking?
Other daily tasks—like trash management—take similar forethought, but I’ll save those details for another post.
Foul Weather Ahead
It’s currently 72°F in Beaufort, NC, which makes it hard to believe that temperatures will drop close to freezing tomorrow night. Strong west and southwest winds are forecast for the first half of next week, making forward progress down the coast of North Carolina (which is surprisingly more westward than southward) difficult or impossible.
We plan to wait out the cold and wind at a marina here in Beaufort, where we can plug into shore power to run our heater and tackle a few things on our to-do list. I’m sure by the time the weather turns more favorable, we’ll be eager to get moving again.
If you’ve made it this far, thanks for following along! We love all your comments of support—both here on the blog and on our social media pages. We’ll keep you posted on the next leg of our journey, which promises to be much saltier as we cruise a portion of the ICW that runs closer to the Atlantic Ocean.
Cheers!
— Jen, Michael, and Maisie
So glad y’all are making some fun connections and that you are waiting out this first cold snap. Continued prayers for health and safety.
So glad to finally be able to read up on your progress. You will both be old hands at this in no time. Praying for friends and safety for you!