Beaufort

Scott-Free’s blog
Steve & Chris
Mon 30 May 2011 15:42
Monday 30th May 2011
 
Beaufort is a delightful little town and we decided to spend a couple of days there.  Our boat insurance will not cover us for named windstorm damage if we are south of 35 degrees North after 31st May, and here we are only about 20 miles south, so the plan is to move on to Oriental, which is just above the 35 degree line of latitude on the 31st.
 
Our first job was to get cleared in and to get a cruising licence, and this turned out to be a lot easier than we had anticipated.  The Customs officer in Beaufort was a lovely lady whose grandmother hailed from Stratford-upon-Avon in the UK and she was extremely helpful and the formalities were soon completed. We have visas for six months and the boat has a permit for twelve.
 
Clearing Customs on the verandah of a local bar!
 
We went ashore for drinks and dinner with Kenny & Sarah and Anne & Michael on the first evening and celebrated our safe arrival in the US.
 
                   
Celebrating with Anne (Nimue) & Sarah(Loon).                                                           Steve, Kenny (Loon) and an ecstatic Michael (Nimue)
 
We enjoyed wandering around the town which has some useful yachtie shops where we were able to get some new clothes, footwear and charts and found delicious ice-cream in the general store.  Whilst eating lunch in a waterfront cafe we recognised a British boat pulling into a slip just outside, and went out to say Hi to David & Lyn on Moonbeam.  We had been behind them all the way from the Caribbean,not quite being able to catch them, but they had been back to the UK for a couple of weeks as David's father had sadly passed away when they were in the Abacos. They had left Moonbeam in a yard in Wilmington, and were now catching us up!  Needless to say we all got together that evening and enjoyed catching up on news and experiences and plans.
 
               
Catching up with David & Lyn (taking photo!) aboard Nimue.                                 Lyn (Moonbeam) with Michael & Anne (Nimue)