Day 176: One of our Favorite Places

Little River, SC to Southport Marina, NC (docked)

July 10. 2022

The Southport/Oak Island area is a long-time favorite place for us and our families. We sprinkled my dad’s ashes at the beach here, my brother had a house here, and we have many great memories of spending time with members of the McLean and the Senbertand families here.

When we plan our movements, we usually just figure out how far we want to go and then look for anchorages and marinas in the area. We usually call marinas as we are on the move. Today, though, our goal was to get to Southport and to make sure that we spent the night within walking distance of the Provision Company, a restaurant we have frequented since it opened in 1992.

For most of our northward passage we have been really fortunate with the weather; we haven’t had a lot of rain or clouds. Today was different – it was very overcast.

The riverscape opened back up shortly after we left the Little River area: there’s more small islands and hardly any signs of people. The water gets saltier here and we started seeing dolphins again. There were also no restricted bridges.

I was watching Google Maps so we could mark when we crossed the line into North Carolina – it would have been cool to see a welcome sign like the ones on the highway, but that didn’t happen.

The North Carolina stretch of the ICW is over 250 miles long. There are far fewer anchorage locations along the southern part of this stretch than we have seen in states like Georgia, mostly because the area is so narrow. Although there aren’t as many yachts and powerboats here, it reminds me a little of central Florida.

As we got closer to Southport, we started to see familar places – places that we had visited from the land, like the point at the western part of Oak Island. When I was in middle school, I went clamming here with my dad. Our sons have challenged themselves to swim across the inlet here (with a worried mom watching them the whole time).

When Hurricane Isias hit Southport Marina in 2020, it took out all of its docks while the boats were still attached. The docks have been rebuilt and there is a new owner. Work is still being completed on the decking around the marina, though.

The Provision Company always has a line so we headed out early to grab our meal. We just made it inside the door before the deluge hit. This restaurant is right on the water and has a really simple menu that has not changed in years: shrimp, crabcakes, tuna, chicken, and burgers (and amazing onion rings). The drinks are self-serve so when you check out at the end of your meal, you just let the cashier know what you had. It’s delicious and it was a perfect way to celebrate getting to North Carolina.

Tomorrow we are going to head towards the Wrightsville Beach area. Part of our travel will be across the mouth of the Cape Fear River, with its cargo ships heading to Wilmington and its ferries heading to Bald Head Island and Fort Fisher.