Saturday, May 28, 2011

Oriental, NC for a Week

5/22 – 5/28 – We decided to stay in Oriental for a week at the Whittaker Point Marina. We stayed here last year as we were finishing up the Great Loop and really enjoyed it. They have a great rate, especially for MTOA members, a beautiful clubhouse with spotless showers and laundry facilities. They also have a courtesy car. We were the only transients at the marina and so the car was pretty much ours whenever we wanted it and for as long as we wanted it. We used it every day, and a couple of times drove into New Bern where we have a townhouse (currently rented).

While at the marina we cleaned the boat up which included “dejunking”, waxing, polishing stainless, cleaning eisen glass and a bunch of other small stuff too numerous to mention. It was looking pretty ragged after its winter in the Bahamas. As our treat for working so hard, we ate out almost every night. For a small town, Oriental has some great restaurants.

We got a big bunch of mail forwarded to us at the marina.  That usually takes several hours to go through.  There's always a few surprises when you get mail in one big shipment that's been accumulating over the past month or two.  Oops, boat insurance due in 5 days.  Now you think we would have remembered that since we're on the boat -- nope, totally slipped our minds.  Linda has an excuse - she's getting old.  In this bunch of mail she got her "welcome to Medicare" package.  Holy crap!*#!#*! -- been declared old by the Federal Government.

Since this is a marina where you buy the boat slip, most of the other folks were only around on the weekend – but with this being a holiday weekend, many arrived early. We got to know our neighbors quite well. Weather permitting, we’ll be heading further north on Sunday. It was a great stay, but it’s time to move on.

View from Whittaker Marina -- our boat is
right in the center of the picture

Nice porch, rockers and view

View during an early morning walk

We had great food (twice) at this unique restaurant
named -- appropriately -- Silos

Cheers !!

Typical view from the club house

Pelicans at the dock

Clubhouse at dusk -- notice the port and starboard lights


No comments: