Pisces the Catamaran - Day 13

January 5, 2025

0530 Crew wakes and brews fresh batch of chai and sings “Take Me Back to Oriental”. The decision is made to go back to Oriental because of incoming harsh weather and generally the crew not really understanding the intensity of the currents and the bridges and the tides closer to the ocean and how they all work together in a way where forward momentum is not always possible.

0640 Depart the fuel dock

0645 Pisces runs aground at the entrance to Spooner Creek Channel. Crew attempts all viable maneuvers to find deep water but to no avail.

0715 Popcorn hails TowBoat US for assistance. OhNo discovers water in the engine compartment from the shaft seal. Popcorn and Swabs watch the sunrise over the Atlantic Beach Bridge. The residents of Spooner Creek watch Pisces hard aground.

0815 TowBoat US arrives

0820 TowBoat pulls Pisces into deeper water! Crew continues north on ICW.

0840 Pisces passes under Atlantic Beach Bridge for the second time in 24 hours (this time going the opposite direction) with no problem

0900 OhNo requests a stop at Morehead Gulf Docks (the same dock from the day before) to see if he can find his retainer in the trash, having unknowingly thrown it away in a handful of other paper towels during their stop the day before.

0910 The crew quickly locates the lost orthodontic gear from the marina trash and departs, wishing their new friend Bobby (the dock maser) farewell.

0915 Capt OnNo discovers he is suddenly missing one of his favorite gloves and deduces that it must be at back at the Gulf Dock. Popcorn calls Bobby on the phone to let him know Pisces was on its way back to the dock to look for the glove. Bobby is able to locate the beloved glove behind the trash can.

0920 Pisces returns again to Gulf Docks. Bobby is waiting with a net containing the lost glove. He extends it out just far enough for Popcorn to grab before Pisces again departs for Oriental.

1030 Dolphins!

1530 Pisces arrives back at Oriental and ties up at the free dock closest to Oriental Marina & Inn. As the boat is docking, Swabs tosses her bow line to Tom who misses and the line

Pisces the Catamaran - Day 12

January 4, 2025

0500 Capt OhNo starts engines to keep them from freezing.

0515 Popcorn climbs in Moroccan lounge to warm up in front of the heater

0600 Popcorn sees 6 shooting stars!

0630 Capt OhNo says we need to get going because there is a shorter bridge up ahead.

0700 Anchor pulled in the freezing cold, duck hunters fire shots, Popcorn at helm

0715 Capt OhNo looks white as a sheet and says he might pass out from being so cold. Swabs monitors OhNo and then takes helm while Popcorn nurses OhNo back to health.

0730 OhNo is feeling restored. Swabs off duty. Popcorn resumes her shift at helm.

1130 Pisces reaches Atlantic Beach Bridge and crew gets nervous when the bridge height board reads > 60’. Crew turns around, believing the boat’s height is 63’5” and takes refuge at Morehead Gulf Fuel Dock behind Sugarloaf Island to wait for low tide and therefore more overhead room at bridge.

1145 - 1400 Crew explores the town. Buy gloves that are good for anchoring for OhNo. Browse the antique store. Eat pizza lunch at Jacks. Get ice cream and warm weather hat at fuel dock store.

1420 Depart fuel dock and make it under Atlantic Beach Bridge with no problem.

1630 Pisces squeezes into Spooner Creek. Popcorn does not like the look of the tiny anchorage so crew ties up to fuel dock that closed a mere 30 minutes before our arrival. Plan is to leave before anyone comes into work in the morning. :)

Pisces the Catamaran - Day 11

January 3, 2025

0945 Depart Oriental Marina after fueling up and filling our water tanks. Heading is Adam’s Creek.

1030 Popcorn alerts OhNo of a low oil pressure reading on port engine. Pisces continues to motor under starboard engine only. Captain OhNo consults our good friend who is a mechanic and runs some diagnostics. The crew decides to anchor in Adam’s Creek.

1307 Capt OhNo calls TowBoat US (Capt Matt) after successfully anchoring. OhNo arranges to have a new sending unit delivered via TowBoat.

1400 Capt Matt arrives with replacement unit and waits while OhNo installs the new one…still low reading. Matt calls his dad who says the gauges on these engines are a “known issue”. The crew tests this theory by rigging the wires of one engine to the other and the reading is the same, confirming Matts Dad was right. All is well with the engine. Matt Leaves. Crew sees dolphins for the first time!

1430 The crew commences to celebrate Rumple Day* - a day of relaxation and rest. Popcorn makes Pad Thai, the traditional dish of Rumple Day. Capt OhNo recounts Rumple Days as a child with his father.

*Rumple Day is a completely made up holiday by the crew of Pisces for sailors who are overtaxed by boat work and lacking fun and play.

Pisces the Catamaran Day 7 - 10

We don’t have official log hours for our days at the free town dock in Oriental but a brief recap follows:

• We discovered the reason our engine shut down was because we were out of fuel. :) But in discovering this, we found a whole host of other pressing issues: the engine mounts desperately needed to be redone on the port side engine and because the engine was vibrating so much, the steering cable had worked its way off the engine block, meaning we wouldn’t have had the capacity to control the engine if we hadn’t left without discovering this.

• Captain OhNo successfully remounted the engine which, in brief, consisted of lifting the engine using a very cool pulley system, grinding the old mounts that had been epoxied to the floor off, resetting the new mounts, lowering the engine and finally aligning the engine. This took 2 full days.

• The town of Oriental included us in their New Year’s Eve Celebrations! Usually, a very festive wooden cutout of a croaker fish is raised to the top of the light pole at the town and at midnight it is dropped just like the ball in Times Square…this year though, we rigged it up between our boat and our dock neighbors Arabella! It was a blast.

• We had fun walking around the town and getting to know the locals!