Down the Cape Fear River and NE along the ICW to New River Inlet, NC -- June 25

We were a bit late getting underway today, as we slept in after a long travel day, washed down the outside of the boat (amazing how dirty it gets sitting in an urban atmosphere) and got fuel. When we finally got underway just after eleven we had lots of fun boats to see heading down the Cape Fear River, starting with this 2018 Spanish reconstruction of the Nao Trinidad, Magellan's flagship for his 1519-22 voyage of circumnavigation. She was captured by the Portuguese in the Malukus and never made it back to Spain. Only one of Magellan's five ships returned, and he didn't make it either. 

The Port of Wilmington was busy, with four ships docked. Meadway Shipping's Ability is a bulk carrier built in Japan in 2021.

MSC Texas is one of over 800 cargo ships operated by Mediterranean Shipping Company, which is "the world's largest container shipping company both by fleet size and cargo capacity, controlling about 20% of the global container ship fleet" (quoting the Wikipedia article). MSC was founded by Gianluigi Aponte in 1970 and is still owned by the Aponte family.

The Ocean Grand is a general cargo ship built in 2015 in China and sailing under a US flag (which is unusual) for Crowley Maritime Corporation, a family and employee-owned company based in Jacksonville, FL with over 300 ships serving the US and Caribbean. 

And finally, the Balos, a foreign-flagged chemical and oil products tanker that was tied up at the Flint Hill Resources dock and according to various on-line ship tracking sites was due to leave for Baltimore later that day. Apparently there are Jones Act waivers available for moving certain refined fuel products between US ports "in order to offset shortages of fuel supplies in regions impacted by the shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline and disruptions in refinery capacity" (quoting from a 3/19/24 US Customs and Border Protection document that I found online). It is amazing what you can find online about the workings of the global economy. The captain loves this stuff -- although it definitely slows down the blogging process. 

 

Since we were late getting underway we decided we would anchor out for the night, as this would give us the most flexibility for traveling as late as we wanted. This raised the question of getting dinner supplies, which we solved with a stop at a marina in Wrightsville Beach that was just half a mile from a Harris Teeter grocery store. The marina was next to a waterside bar and grill, where we had a very mediocre lunch but got to watch Euro Cup soccer at the bar and visit with the barmaid, who was from the eastern shore of Maryland and had some great advice for us on places to visit when we get to the Chesapeake. The Harris Teeter grocery was quite nice (they are a subsidiary of Kroger) and we took an Uber back to the boat. The Uber driver was very excited to hear that we were cruising on a Ranger Tug, as he and his wife have been thinking about buying one once they empty the nest, so we invited him aboard for a quick tour after our ride. 

The ride up the intracoastal from Wrightsville Beach was very scenic with little boat traffic. It is a long stretch where the intracoastal is dredged near the mainland side of long shallow sounds separated from the ocean by barrier islands and expansive sea grass marshes. It seemed like every other barrier island was protected from development, which kept things nice for the folks who lived on the developed islands. These photos both show the northern tip of Figure Eight Island seen across about a mile of sea grass, but with one magnified and the other not. 

Up in the area of Topsail Beach and Surf City there was a lot of aquaculture in the sounds. Not sure what they are growing here. 

We dropped anchor a little after six in Mile Hammock Bay, just north of the New River Inlet after covering 67 miles in five hours of running time (our lunch stop was two hours). This was a recommended spot in the cruising guide and there were six sailboats at anchor when we arrived and no more boats joined us. (The sixth boat was out of view.) We had a nice dinner of microwaved lasagna, salad, bread and red wine and watched a good show on Grit TV.