April 14, 15

Thursday morning Nebula left to face the winds, they are a sailboat, we aren’t as brave, so decided to stay put for another day or two.

We borrowed the golf cart and drove the 1.5 miles to the Food Lion to reprovision.   We stopped by the chamber of commerce building on the way back, and picked up some information on the town. We later walked downtown and stopped by Steve and Marianne’s boat, who we had met the previous night at Spoon River, to suggest we meet at the Tavern in the evening for drinks.  Sandra and Nelson from Destinées, who are Gold Loopers and docked behind us, were invited as well.

On our way downtown, a vehicle stopped and asked if we were boaters, Diana, from the Chamber of Commerce gave us one of the town’s welcome packages- she was out of the office when we had been there earlier.  We did some shopping at the hardware store and checked out some of the other gift stores.   Andy liked these signs,

and I bought these napkins- which is so true these days.

I also liked these pieces.

On our walk back to the boat, another vehicle stopped and asked if we were boaters, and offered to give us a ride back to the marina.  This lady was the  sommelier/owner from the restaurant we had been to yesterday.  This is by far the friendliest town we have been in so far- they really cater to the transients.

I’ve taken pictures of a number of the houses in town,

as well as the scout hall for Jack.

and the grain elevator.

We learned from our welcome package that there is a crab walk,

we were told we just needed to follow these blue crabs and red arrows.   which is 3.6 miles—we’re going to do it Friday, as well as the trivia contest.

 

In the afternoon we were surprised by 4 of our boating friends & Pearl (Wally&Darcy, Shannon & Pearl and Brian) had come to Belhaven from Dowry Creek so Larry could go to the dentist, saw “On Business” tied up at River Forest and knocked on our door.  They are all waiting out the winds at their marina.  We had a good visit and learned that boats which had ventured out into the Alligator River had encountered high waves and winds earlier in the day.  All the more reason to stay put.

That evening we went to the Tavern at Jack’s Neck for drinks and visited with the other 2 boating couples,    Steve&Marianne, Sandra & Nelson, exchanging information and places to go and things to see on the East coast.

The owner of the tavern showed us there expansion plans of an oyster  and bourbon/scotch bar with cigar room.  Their next expansion will be a steak house.  People are proud of this town and so they should be it is being revitalized!  Earlier in the evening she had also brought us some sweet bites to try at our table that she was developing for Sunday brunch.  Very tasty!

River Forest Manor which was built in the early 1900’s, is currently undergoing renovations and should be completed in the next month.  It will have several suites in it once it is complete available for rent.  Here are some pictures from the outside.

When we were here in 2012, on our scouting trip, parts of the manor looked to be in disrepair.  But it looks amazing now.

It’s still quite breezy here, a sailboat left  the dock but a catamaran,  Cat Daddy soon took his spot at the dock.

We walked around Belhaven  Friday morning in order to complete the history and trivia quiz.

Many of the places were located on Main street or Pamlico  streets.   Here’s some of the sites we had to visit to fill in the answers…

This stain glass window is in the library,

This crab is outside the Bellhaven City hall,

And here is there town seal, representing  farming, shrimping, forestry,hunting, boating and  fishing.  We learned from one of the friendly people that we met that there are lots of tulip and daffodil bulb farms in the area, that export to the Netherlands.

 Found another crab outside Fish hooks café– called Crabby the crabber

We  tried the door for the toy trains of Belhaven and found people taking down the Christmas display,

but because we were trespassing- Andy got put in jail.

Actually the former police station was flooded out during several hurricanes, so they have moved to another site, and it is used for the Christmas display. But because of  hurricane threats and flooding  the train display can’t remain up year round .

Since we were focused on the trivia questions, we didn’t do the complete crab walk, as my fit bit only  recorded 2.48 miles.

We also saw another pseudo-Canadian on our way home.

and this   maple tree (Japanese?).  Neither of them made me want to rush  back to Canada.

Ralph and Linda Azersky are driving up from New Bern to go for supper with us.  We mentioned this to boaters from 2 sailboats  and they had crossed paths with Mazel Tug in Florida, so they are going to join us as well.  Love the boating community!   🙂