1.07- Dinghy Dry-Dock

The Dinghy Dock crosses mud where water normally allows small boats to tie up

Strong Southwesterly winds all day today, in the 15-30 knot range, have done their usual trick of blowing all the river and creek waters out into Pamlico Sound, leaving water levels extremely low.

A surfboard would have been about the only watercraft capable of reaching the Dinghy Dock this afternoon.

For my out-of-area readers, we don't get lunar tides in local waters, due to the protection of the outer banks islands separating Pamlico Sound from the Atlantic Ocean...

We only get "wind-tides"... Sustained Northeasterly winds push the Pamlico Sound waters up into the rivers and creeks, raising the water levels locally, while SWy winds do the opposite.

When the mud flats appear under the Dinghy Dock, the water is about as low as it's gonna go.

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11.15- Tow time

A newly-anchored itinerant sailor with a motor-dinghy gives a tow to another itinerant in her two-armstrong powered "Dink"

I met this young woman at the Dinghy Dock today as I was riding by.

She had come ashore to go grocery shopping, leaving her "old man" on their sailboat at anchor out in the harbor (not in camera shot above).

She had rowed ashore in a "Dink" dinghy.

When she returned to the Dinghy Dock after a couple of hours, she found the winds had grown fairly stiff... about 15 to 20 knots... out of the Southwest.

(Notice two of the anchored sailboats in the picture are pointing straight into the fresh breeze... the third/middle sailboat, flying Netherlands flag, is not pointing into the wind only because she is aground)

Finding it impossible to row the light dinghy straight into the wind far enough to reach her boat, the woman had been embayed for at least an hour before I showed up.

As we were chatting, another sailboat came into the harbor and began trying to anchor.

We watched as her captain dropped anchor, hoping he would dinghy ashore soon and maybe be able to help the woman return to her boat. The anchor dragged, and the sailboat drifted towards another anchored boat. The guy weighed anchor, motored around, and tried again. Anchor dragged again. Guy weighed, moved and dropped the hook yet again.

By this time, another woman had walked up to the Dinghy Dock, introduced herself, and explained she was waiting for the guy out there trying to anchor to come pick her up.

By this time there were four of us watching this guy try to anchor... Watching someone struggle with anchoring, particularly in a Southerly or Southwesterly blow, is considered better-than-TV entertainment in Oriental.

After the guy dropped anchor again, we saw him finally lowering his dinghy from the stern davits into the water. Great, we all thought... one woman was waiting for the guy to come take her to his boat, the other woman was hoping the guy could tow her dinghy back to her boat, and myself and another guy were watching all the drama with great interest.

The guy got in his dinghy, hauled in the painter, and started motoring... away from the dinghy dock! Where is he going, the watching crowd wondered in chorus, while at the same time noticing that the guy's sailboat was swinging awfully near it's anchored neighbor.

The guy motored his dinghy about a hundred feet ahead of his sailboat on the starboard side, then stood up in the dinghy.

"He's dropping a second hook" we all said, again in chorus.

So the guy dropped his second anchor from the dinghy, motored back to his sailboat, went aboard and hauled in his hawsers to satisfaction, neatly pulling his sailboat away from the threatened neighbor.

He then came ashore, and happily gave the stranded rower a tow back to her "old man" just as the sun set.

Another exciting 90 minute drama at Oriental anchorage!

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10.12- Red-bellied Woodpecker

Red-bellied woodpecker hunts for bugs in a Persimmon tree next to Oriental Harbor.

I heard a very noisy bird call as I was riding past the Dinghy Dock this afternoon (returning home from sailing in the Bauer 10)...

I stopped and listened until I finally spotted the source up in a Persimmon tree.

I got a few pictures of the bird, which I did not recognize, but suspected was a woodpecker due to its' behavior (pecking at the tree bark and pulling bugs out).

Back at home I found the bird, officially Melanerpes carolinus in one of my bird guides. The bird in today's picture is a male.

I'm not sure where the "carolinus" in the latin name comes from, but this bird's habitat extends across the U.S. from Atlantic Ocean into the Great Plains (excluding most of New England)...

It is a fairly common bird, but it is a brand new addition to my own life-list.

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10.10- Rumors of Mimosa's hibernation are greatly exagerated (Skywatch Friday is prior posting, below)

A Mimosa tree near the Dinghy Dock is sprouting new leaves while seed pods from its' last cycle still hang from its' branches... Three "snow-bird" cruising sailboats lie at anchor in Oriental Harbor in the background.

My favorite reading tree, a Mimosa next to the Dinghy Dock on Oriental Harbor, is sprouting new leaves just about one month after it dropped its' last batch on going to seed. (See picture of same tree gone to seed in my posting of September 9)

I was afraid the tree had shut down for the winter... According to Wikipedia:

"In the Northern Hemisphere (the mimosa tree ) blossoms and produces fruit from November to June or July...In the Southern Hemisphere it blooms primarily from September to January."

Looks like this tree isn't sure which hemisphere it is in, so it is blooming twice just in case.

I'm glad of it, and look forward to the branches being full of leaves again... bare branches offer little shade, and shade makes for a better reading spot.

See more of my pictures of this same tree as it has gone through its' cycle this year:

• 9.09- Mimosa leaves falling off
• 6.02- Mimosa Flowers
• 5.29- Mimosa Flower buds
• 5.22- Mimosa leaves
• 4.13- Mimosa Tree Budding

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9.09- Mimosa leaves falling off

Brown seed pods and drying, falling leaves of the mimosa tree next to the dinghy dock on Oriental Harbor.

Yesterday I was browsing through my favorite "City Daily Photo" blogs, and I came across an August 29 posting from Brian's "Terrell Texas Daily Photo" blog showing bright green leaves of a mimosa tree... Brian noted that he "can't wait for the pink blooms to come out on my mimosa tree - it usually gets them in the fall."

My favorite reading shade tree, the mimosa next to the dinghy dock, has shed most of its leaves since tropical storm Hanna came through a few days ago.

I think some leaves were already turning brown, and the tree's thousands of seed pods went brown some time ago, but I was surprised to see it losing its leaves completely at this time of year.

Seems like last year this mimosa, like Brian's Terrell TX mimosa, was in blooming mode, though I can't remember if it was still flowers from the summer, or if maybe it flowered in spring and again in early fall.

Anyway, I offer today's picture as a contrast to Brian's Terrell TX mimosa, and as another in a series of pictures of my favorite mimosa on the waterfront. My other pictures, located on my "Dinghy Dock" blog, can be seen at the following links:

-- 6.02- Mimosa Flowers
-- 5.29- Mimosa Flower buds
-- 5.22- Mimosa leaves
-- 4.13- Mimosa Tree Budding

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8.22- Dinghy Sailing Rig version X-3

Here I am testing out the third version of the sailing rig my dad (Capt. Dave) and I have been working on for the past couple of months. Capt. Dave took this picture from the Dinghy Dock as I headed into the harbor... I eventually rounded the breakwater for some sailing in a good 12 to 15 knot easterly winds on the Neuse River.

Version X-3 features a boom, which neither of the earlier versions had. This is the same sail as version X-2, but we have rigged the former sprit spar from X-1 as a boom to see if it helps the sail trim at all, hopefully to increase windward ability and perhaps add a little speed (after testing X-1 we made a larger sail for X-2, which required building a longer sprit, so the sprit from X-1 was abandoned... you can see it is a tad too long for a boom on X-3, sticking out in front of the mast, but this was a concept test, so we did not cut it shorter yet.)

The boom definitely helped keep the sail from flailing about so much when luffing, but it also meant one sure as hell better duck when tacking and especially when jibbing, cuz that stiff boom is a lot less forgiving than the sail on its own when it comes to contacting one's head.

I reached a good (and consistant) 1.5 to 2 knots close-hauled into some good 1 to 1.5 foot waves out in the Neuse... Seems to be an improvement in that the waves did not appreciably slow the dinghy down, as they did when sailing X-2 on the same point of sail. Of course, some of that can be marked up to the fact that during the last two weeks I have learned a bit about using my body to "work" windward waves by watching the dinghy racing events in Qingdao, China, on NBC's web-casts of the Olympic sailing events.

On broad reach and running points-of-sail, I still only hit about 4.0 knots (same as with X-2) [Addendum 8.23- today hit 4.7 knots!], which is probably close to hull speed for this Bauer Classic 10 dinghy.

Not sure if she is pointing higher on windward reaches... the wind was a bit high today, as were the waves, so it probably was not a good day to compare handling with my experiences with X-2.

More testing is in order. If we decide to incorporate a boom on X-4, we will need to rethink how to rig it... we really just jury-rigged the boom for these tests with available hardware, and it was awkward to handle.

Also, as it was rigged today, the boom fouled the sail on the starboard tack (we could switch the boom to the other side of the sail, but then it would just foul the sail on the port tack), and it fouled it right in the belly that we worked so hard to form on this sail (the sail on X-1 was basically flat, and would not go to weather at all, so we added broadseaming on the second sail to create a lot more sail draft, which helped a lot in windward ability.) Now we need to figure out how to rig the boom so it does not interfere with the draft on windward points of sail.

All in all, though, I think the boom will prove to be a benefit, though it does complicate what started as a very simple rig. Oh, well, simple isn't all that great if you can't get where you want to go.

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8.19- Tree Crab

Found this shore crab clinging to the Mimosa tree next to the dinghy dock... those are the handlebars of my bicycle, which means the crab is a good 3.5 feet up the tree.

It was difficult to get a picture of it because, like a squirrel, the crab scurried around to the other side of the tree every time I moved to take a picture of it.

I have never seen one of these tiny crabs outside of the rip-rap of breakwaters, so I was quite surprised to find one climbing a tree.

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8.11- Raccoon Creek Shrimp

These kids spent all afternoon fishing from the Dinghy Dock on Oriental Harbor (Raccoon Creek) with their dad.

The kids were happy to show me some of the (still alive) shrimp they had caught in their casting net... I was told that these are "white-tail" shrimp.

Mostly they were catching menhaden minnows with the net, and using them to bait their crab pot as well as their rods.

The youngest pointed out a box of cinnamon donut-holes they had with them, and explained that she had tried to use them as bait, but they tended to fall off the hooks.

I asked what kind of fish could be caught with the donut-holes... "Any fish that likes cinnamon" she explained. Boy, did I feel stupid...

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6.08- Itinerant Season

Itinerant boater season is at flood tide here in Oriental... more than a dozen boats at anchor in the harbor and Smith Creek. Here are the seven visible from the Dinghy Dock this evening:



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