Washington & Oriental NC

We have time this year to do some side trips so we turned left off the ICW and headed up to Washington NC for a pig roasting festival. We made a quick stop on the way at Bath, whose most famous resident, briefly, was Blackbeard. This was a second home, away from his yacht which he kept at Ocracoke where he ran his import/export business. The governor of NC tolerated him and the citizens of Bath liked the cheap merchandise he provided local stores. Eventually other more law abiding citizens persuaded the governor of Virginia to send in an attack force and Blackbeard was killed in a battle at sea. Legend has it he had 30 wounds before he died. I don't believe the part about his beheaded body swimming three times around the ship.
As we approached Washington we were hailed by a man on condo docks. He wanted us to dock there, plug in to the electric and make ourselves at home. Turns out he was selling slips and condos, having the ribbon cutting ceremony the next day. He needed some boats as window dressing. We were all happy to oblige. We stayed four nights, enjoyed condo tours, a luncheon, a visit to the estuarium museum, an art show, as well as the festival. We had a great time visiting with our friends on Shangrila , whom we met years ago in the harbor at Solomons. It was hard to leave and tempting to test how long this free dock thing could last, but we headed out for Oriental on Monday. Lee got all the sails up and we moved right along down the Pamlico in the 25 knots of wind, my visions of 30 and 40 knots tempered by the fact that it was only a river. We anchored in lots of mud Monday night, having to put the anchor down twice, leading to our new anchor, now on order, a 66 pound Bruce. Lee's been wanting this for a long time.
As we neared Oriental we were able to check the cam (towndock.net) and see that there was a spot for us at the town dock. This is the first time the question of the real value of a free towndock has come up. Is it really worth it, if the pile drivers next to us pound all day and the seafood processing plant produces these odiferous smells. It is nice to be able to step off the boat at will, have folding bikes set up on the dock and go our separate ways without coordinating the dingy ride. But... So we have moved out to the tiny anchorage for the night and will head south in the morning. Who knows where our next free dock will be?