Timing, the essence of life

We left Morehead City at 7:05, totally unaware that the Marines from Camp Lejeune had decided that day to do live firing across the waterway.
Fortunately, David heard by chance over the radio that the area would be cleared for passage at no later than 11:35.
We had adjusted the speed to avoid having to wait and we got to the first observation tower at around 11:43, so 8 minutes later than the optimum time.
Then we had to worry about the Onslow Beach bridge (the slowest bridge on the Waterway according to the tender) which opens on the hour and the half hour. Again, we adjusted the speed and got through almost in time, although we had to dance in front of the bridge with Andiamo (Andiamo 35 from Vancouver, Canada recently bought brand new from Annapolis at the boat show in October).
Then it was racing towards the Surf City bridge which opens only on the hour. We did not want to have to wait almost an hour, so we revved up the engine to 3100 rpm (and almost 200 degrees on the temperature guage) and we arrived at the bridge in theory 43 seconds late, but in fact had to wait one minute for the bridge to open.
The tide pushing up, we got to Harbour Village Marina within 45 minutes of passing the bridge. Andiamo came in just minutes behind us.
I was looking forward to an early night. Alas, the acting dock master told us that his wife had gone to work with the key to the office so we couldn't officially check in until 9:30 p.m. However, the extra wait allowed for an extra cup of wine after a dinner of yellow fin tuna. And so to bed and tomorrow morning we will shoot for the 7:00 a.m. opening of the Figure Eight Bridge bound for Southport in what are expected to be air temps in the low 20's.