Swansboro was a nice stop, but we were only three hours from Beaufort so once again we got an early start. The ride was easy and relatively straight. The ICW channel is narrow in this area so I had to pay attention to the depth most of the way. There were no bridges to account for, so only the no wake zones stood between us and Beaufort.

Beaufort is where the infamous and notorious pirate, Blackbeard, had spent some time. His ship, Queen Anne’s Revenge was sunk not far from the town.

We arrived at the Beaufort City docks to find a pretty swift current along Taylor creek, which made for an interesting docking. I must be learning from my mistakes because it went well despite the water conditions. There is a lot of boat traffic in this area between the ferries, the cruisers, and all the recreational boaters.

The marina sits right along the main tourist area of Beaufort, so it is an easy walk to most of the area attractions. We got out our bikes and rode through the neighborhood and we really liked the town. It was the weekend so naturally there was a lot of families on all sorts of watercraft. They either tied up at the docks or else they set up camp on the beach on the opposite bank of the creek. 

We ended up staying three nights. We enjoyed the food at Beaufort Grocery, Plaza Mexico, Dank Burrito, and Black Sheep. We went to the farmer’s market and didn’t buy anything. We rode to Piggly Wiggly and ate an awesome biscuit. We went to the maritime museum and entered the raffle for a cool wooden speedboat. We ate ice cream. We even saw a wild horse. 

In case you were wondering, the Beaufort scale is a numeric system used to describe the intensity of winds and storms. It was not named after this city. According to google, it was named for a guy, Sir Francis Beaufort. It is unclear if he frequented Beaufort or if he was a friend of Blackbeard, but I doubt it.