New Bern, NC

Along with the boats Mary Frances and My Way we left Beaufort at 7:45 Friday morning, we all had a bridge that would need to be opened for us just after leaving the marina and its first opening of the day was at 8:00.

Shrimp boats taking the day off.

My Way and Mary Frances going through the bridge.

We traveled pretty much with our fellow Loopers until we reached the Neuse River and we turned to the left for our little side trip to New Bern for the next two evenings.  We had heard from someone on our travels that it was a very worthwhile stop.  After we arrived we were able to walk around town and explore some of the shops.  One that was really neat was Mitchell’s turn of the century hardware store.

New Bern by the way is the birthplace of Pepsi Cola, it was a pharmacist by the name of Caleb Bradham who invented “Brad’s Drink,” that later he patented as Pepsi-Cola.  

This seems to be the town's mascot as we saw them on quite a few buildings.

A neat old wood boat from the early 1900's still in operation.

We then headed back to the boat for dinner.  It was an extremely hot and humid day, so we were looking forward to the air conditioned boat but when we came in the breaker had blown and the cabin was even warmer than out side.  John had to hook up another power cord because he said the main 30 amp breaker  was weak and we needed a second connection.  Anyway it did cool off quickly and all was well.

On Saturday we did a load of laundry in the morning.  It was another warm day but not quite as bad as the day before.  After shopping at the Saturday farmers market we visited New Berns Regional History Museum that had just opened last year.  It gave us a very good idea of all the history in this area.

Tyron Palace

After that we toured Tryon Palace, this was the North Carolina government house built between 1767 and 1770, it represented the British crown and became North Carolina’s first official capitol.  A 1798 fire destroyed the original Palace and more than 150 years later a new Palace was built on its original site, reconstructed from the original architect’s drawings. It was furnished with rare 18^th. Century English and American objects.


Included in the tour were two homes close by, one of which was John Wright Stanly home where George Washington stayed for several days in 1791.

George Washington really slept here.

Saturday night we had a nice dinner out at The Chelsea.  It was a one of the towns fine dining places and it was prom night.  I sure enjoyed seeing all the kids dressed up.  My, its hard to believe were we ever that young?  We got back to the boat sat for a few minutes on the bow and then the skies opened up.  It was quite stormy and we were sure glad to be tied to a dock.

New Bern was very enjoyable and we were both glad that we took a couple of extra days to see all of the sights.

Mary and John