14 December - Day #12. We woke early, it's a long run today, and what we found was fog, fog, and more fog. The Weather Service was predicting it to lift so we sat and waited while 7am turned into 8am, 9am, and then 10am. At 10:15 the width of the Elizabeth City's harbor was visible so we pushed back. By 10:30 the visibility was down to 100' so standing watch in the soup means keeping an eye out for crab pots, scanning the radar and making sure Nellie stays on the chart plotter's course. By 1:30pm the fog lifts and we have blue sky and calm seas in the Albemarle Sound. Approaching the Middle Ground, which is just above the Alligator River Bridge on the south side of the Albemarle, we join up with two sailboats. This area is known, nay infamous, for it's shoaling. Nellie and I have bounced off the bottom here twice. Both our accompanying sailboats found the bottom, but Nellie, I'm happy to report escaped unscathed--that makes me 1 for 3. Even with the late start we made the anchorage at the southern terminus of the Alligator River before night fall. At anchor near the northern end of the Pungo-Alligator River Canal, NC. 46nm today and 231nm total. DBH
