I've been surprised this week that Aurora (3 year old niece) wakes early and the minute she sees sunlight through the windows thinks it's time to go boat. This was her first overnight trip on a boat and she was with us for six days.
NC Marinas
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I've been surprised this week that Aurora (3 year old niece) wakes early and the minute she sees sunlight through the windows thinks it's time to go boat. This was her first overnight trip on a boat and she was with us for six days.
Besslb
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Maybe try north? Manteo has an airport just a mile from the waterfront....either the town waterfront docks or shallowbag bay marina. Nags Head just a few miles away....super fun for the end of summer!
If you will have a car, Deep Point Marina on the Cape Fear River is a great, modern marina with floating docks, fuel, laundry and a nice pool. It's a couple miles to drive to Southport for shopping.
It's also a short walk to a beach on the Cape Fear River.
WifeyB
Fantastic, she will remember the trip all her life.
Wifey B: I'm missing her so much today but she just called me on her way home and told me what a great time she had and we do have an 18 year old and three 22 year old kids still with us to keep us entertained.
The car shuffle options differ in every location too. You mentioned Uber, but we haven't found Uber available in very many cruising areas.
Car rentals have been a very mixed bag. In many areas, you can't find a one way rental or, if you do, you find it's not really as you're paying an extra fee for the renting agency to go retrieve their car.
We've also had situations where the only rental available was Enterprise and they were not open on weekends, or only until noon on Saturday. We did once make arrangements with the manager based on the promise of a significant tip to bring us a car after hours and once had one left at the marina based on us being a corporate client and all paperwork in advance.
A few marinas have good relationships with rental companies but many are local only.
Once found a town had one taxi. The older man was willing to drive us 70 miles.
Once we had to get a limousine to transport us. No taxi's, no uber, no car rental open on weekend. However, limo driver would drive from 40 miles away to pick us up.
And a couple of times it's just been nice friendly, dock hands or marina guests.
You'll make it work, just it won't be the same answer all times.
Moonstruck
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Wrightsville Beach or Southport would be good bets. Also, you may want to think North like Hampton, VA or Atlantic Yacht Basin at Chesapeake, VA. AYB in just behind the Great Bridge locks, so in fresh water. Lot's to do around both. Plus you would have the whole Chesapeake Bay for some extended cruising. Just a thought.
Steve91T
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Change of plans...we're headed north! We're going to spend the rest of the month in Georgetown then we're going to take two long weekends in September and bring the boat to Wilmington with a stop in Myrtle.
We just found out we have a bun in the oven! We want to get the boat to Wilmington while we can. Then early next year we might ship the boat back to the lake for 6 months or so when we have a new born. Not sure yet.
So you're having a hard time finding a marina?
We just found out we have a bun in the oven! We want to get the boat to Wilmington while we can. Then early next year we might ship the boat back to the lake for 6 months or so when we have a new born. Not sure yet.
So you're having a hard time finding a marina?
OP
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Eddie
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Congrats!
Yes, we have struggled finding a slip by the month over the last few weeks. Where you going to stay in Wilmington?
When you say ship to the lake, are you talking about Norman?
Steve91T
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Thanks! I've got no idea. Figured we'd figure that out later, but maybe we should start sooner rather than later.
Yeah we are thinking about shipping the boat to lake Norman when she's getting ready to pop. About one month before the kid is due till several months after, she's not going to want to spend 4hrs in the car to go to the boat. We just think we would be able to enjoy the boat a lot more if it was on our lake.
But we are going to miss having a boat on the coast, but it might make sense for a bit.
We have a 20' bowrider that we've had for 8 years. It's a great boat, our Mainship would be so much more fun ok the lake. And we could spend the night on the lake instead of having to come home late at night.
My dream would be to keep the Mainship on the lake and find another boat to keep on the coast. But we'd damn near have to win the lottery for that.
Steve91T
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Wifey B: And that trip home at night is how many miles?
Oh c'mon. You know what I mean.
Our favorite time on the lake is the evening. And the last thing we want to do is go home.
There would be nothing better than to find a quiet cove after a day of swimming, fire up the grill, eat dinner, watch a movie with our daughter then once she goes to bed, sit on the bow with a bottle of wine and look at the stars.
Compare that to getting back to the ramp, get the boat on the trailer, driving home, backing into thr driveway, unpacking the boat, putting our daughter to bed waaaaay past her bed time, putting the cover on the boat in the morning, then dropping it off at the storage place.
I choose wine and stars.
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Eddie
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We will be at the lake this weekend if you want to grab lunch or dinner some where on the water. We have a pontoon and a condo at Davidson Landing. My cell is 828.429.5331.
Wifey B: You trailer the boat? No wonder. Don't think you'll be trailering the new one.
I agree completely if trailering, way too much hassle going home and back, but if marina then pretty simple and trouble free. I've never actually done that trailer bit. When I lived in NC, drove a Miata, so not very much a possibility. Hubby drove a convertible too, bigger, but still not for pulling things. Trailer 
I still see it nice sleeping on boat, just not many do it when they live a few blocks away.
Steve91T
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Wifey B: You trailer the boat? No wonder. Don't think you'll be trailering the new one.
I still see it nice sleeping on boat, just not many do it when they live a few blocks away.
Yeah I trailer. It's only $40/mo to keep it on a trailer and it's less than 10 minutes away from me. Plus the boat gets to dry out. Getting the boat and putting it in the water is really easy, it's putting it away that's a PITA.
The cool thing about the lake is it feels like we are on a vacation. We love being out there. We could boat all the way to the northern part of the lake where it's much quieter and throw the anchor up there in a quiet cove. Like what you said in another thread, we plan on using the boat a ton, weather its in the coast of here on the lake.
Wifey B:
Silly man. I understand the spending night on the boat on the upper end and such. I still don't understand if you use the boat a lot trailering. Let's see, wear and tear on vehicle (I'll say $100 a month) + $40 a month + the hour getting it from storage and loaded up and to water and the hour getting it back to storage and then home so let's see if thats 6 days a month at 2 hours, then 12 hours times let's only value the time of two of you at $10 an hour each, so $240 a month plus then the days you don't do it because too much trouble so lost opportunity, priceless so I'll say $200 (Wifey B math) so I'm up to something like a bazillion dollars a month plus the darn inconvenience and annoyance factor. Simple question. With it on trailer, in storage, how many summer afternoons do you use it after work? If it was in the water, how many would you? Ok, case closed, Wifey B wins.
I've never trailered a boat so really don't know
but it just seems that boats aren't cheap and that's not the way I'd want to save. We use to use ours at least 3 times a week after work and both days every decent weekend plus some not so decent over the winter when suffering serious withdrawal pains when we lived on the water, but before that (and we didn't live as close to the water as you), we'd still go once or twice a week during summer and the same weekends. Well, when you move the new boat there, it will be in water waiting all the time. So, problem solved.
Wifey B: I never would have believed how true that is and hubby, pre-hubby days, would describe it. Then I experienced it.
It washed all life's problems away. I remember one time texting hubby at work and saying, "meet you at boat. I'll be waiting" and his response was "Sorry you had a rough day. I'll leave the office right at 5." He got there, no questions asked and we went out for a few hours, and I didn't tell him about my day until we got home. Sort of a problem free zone. As usual, the problem wasn't the child, but the parents. A child so in need of help, parents so in denial and defensive. I gained strength, refreshed myself, and I tackled them again the following day, successfully.
Steve91T
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No wear and tear on the truck. It's an old diesel F250. It doesn't feel 4000 lbs at all.
From the time we leave our house to the time we are in the water is usually less than 45 minutes. Recovering the boat is really quick as well. We almost always just go straight home, so that takes us about 25 minutes from the time we pull into the ramp to pulling into the driveway. Usually that's when I'll clean up the boat and put the cover on and bring it back to storage in the morning. That round trip is only 30 minutes. So it's really not bad at all. Definitely not worth spending an additional $200/month.
Our schedules are not the normal 9-5. While having the boat on a slip would be really convieneint, the wear and tear of the boat sitting in the water isn't worth it. Plus it's expensive on the lake, even for a 20' boat.
But, once we have the big boat on the lake, we will sell the little one. We get our butts kicked on the little one. The lake is just so rough from all of the boats that it's not enjoyable. We usually throw the anchor and swim all day anyway. The big one would make that even more enjoyable.
We are going to miss the coast though.
Honestly my latest dream is once we bring the Mainship to the lake, it doesn't leave. Then I think it'd be awesome to buy some sort of old trawler that would be even better for the coast than the Mainship. Fix it up here over the next year or so then ship it to the coast. Then we'd have our lake boat and our boat for exploring the coast. But the biggest problem with that is the slip fees for both boats would easily be close to $1k/month alone. So that kinda crushes that dream.
So idk know we are going to do.
From the time we leave our house to the time we are in the water is usually less than 45 minutes. Recovering the boat is really quick as well. We almost always just go straight home, so that takes us about 25 minutes from the time we pull into the ramp to pulling into the driveway. Usually that's when I'll clean up the boat and put the cover on and bring it back to storage in the morning. That round trip is only 30 minutes. So it's really not bad at all. Definitely not worth spending an additional $200/month.
Our schedules are not the normal 9-5. While having the boat on a slip would be really convieneint, the wear and tear of the boat sitting in the water isn't worth it. Plus it's expensive on the lake, even for a 20' boat.
But, once we have the big boat on the lake, we will sell the little one. We get our butts kicked on the little one. The lake is just so rough from all of the boats that it's not enjoyable. We usually throw the anchor and swim all day anyway. The big one would make that even more enjoyable.
We are going to miss the coast though.
Honestly my latest dream is once we bring the Mainship to the lake, it doesn't leave. Then I think it'd be awesome to buy some sort of old trawler that would be even better for the coast than the Mainship. Fix it up here over the next year or so then ship it to the coast. Then we'd have our lake boat and our boat for exploring the coast. But the biggest problem with that is the slip fees for both boats would easily be close to $1k/month alone. So that kinda crushes that dream.
So idk know we are going to do.
