Glad We Departed

North Edisto River, SC
N 32 37.124 W 080 16.027

We debated leaving Beaufort today. The winds were forecast to be from the north until tomorrow. We had thought to take a short 10 mile ride south to Port Royal sound and go out to sea from there on Thursday. Anyhow, we got tired of sitting in the same place, nice as it was. We left about 0900 and headed north on the ICW.

Boy what a nice choice that was. This section of the ICW really is beautiful. The salt marshes are extensive and exquisite in their beauty. During the day we saw cranes and pelicans and dolphin and deer and an alligator. I understand now why cruisers speak highly of this region.

We took a side trip up Mosquito Creek to find a place called B&B Seafood. It turned out to be a trashy looking trailer with a little dock and a very big shrimp boat tied up. However, their price for diesel fuel is $0.30 less than anyone else's, and they have fresh fish and shrimp for sale. Libby bought us 1.5 pounds of shrimp for supper. I would rate B&B as a very charming stop.

Tonight, we're going to anchor on Steamboat Creek. We are only about 5 miles from the mouth of the North Edisto River, where we can go directly out to sea tomorrow. The forecast calls for 72 hours of southerly winds at 15 knots starting late Thursday. That should be just perfect.

I can recommend another book. It is called "Inlet Chart Book: Southeastern United States." Before having this book, we were super conservative on choosing inlets to the ocean. It would be the worst possible nightmare to run aground at an inlet where waves and currents are most treacherous. To make things worse, the chart books usually blank out the information exactly at the inlets because things shift and the charts become out of date. We chose only the "class A" inlets, which means those
good enough for the Queen Mary. Now, having this book, we find that there are perhaps 3 times that many inlets that we can use safely.

Let Down

Beaufort, NC
N 32 25.226 W 80 39.181

I walked to downtown Beaufort today to see the sights. Mostly, I wanted to see the famous Beaufort Museum that I heard was really great. Unfortunately, when I got there it was closed for renovations. Too bad.

The rest of downtown Beaufort had art galleries, and antique stores. There wasn't much to interest me.

It sounds like the winds we want to go outside won't begin until Thursday night. We'll probably work our way more north on the ICW rather than just sit here another day.

The picture below was posted by our daughter Jenny in Vermont. It has nothing to to with cruising, but we like the picture. Not that we are biased, but she sure looks beautiful and charming.

Not Much Action

Beaufort, NC
N 32 25.226 W 80 39.181

We're staying here until Wednesday to wait for favorable weather. Today the weather was nice but a nasty front is expected to show up at any time now.

We didn't explore the city today. Libby has a painful sore throat that we think she caught from my brother Ed a couple of weeks ago. Anyhow, that dampened our activities.



My recovered anchor appeared all covered in rust today. Darn, it sat on the bottom so long that the zinc coating wore off.

Beaufort

Beaufort, SC
N 32 25.226 W 80 39.181

As we traveled north yesterday out of that little maze of twisty passages all alike, I discovered that we could have taken a short cut. Instead of entering the Savannah River, we could have turned north and come behind Hilton Head Island. It would have saved us 20 miles. Oh well. If we had done that, we would not have gotten to see the maze of little twisty passages all alike.

We were passing Parris Island, and I was thinking about the stories I heard about those poor marine recruits undergoing basic training there. Especially the stories about sleeping on the beach among the sand fleas. Anyhow, a call on the radio woke me up from my day dreaming. I heard "Tarwathie". It was our friends Ray and Pat on Reflection calling. They were overtaking us. We last saw them in Vero. What a coincidence.

Now, we're anchored in Factory Creek. We followed Reflection in here. It's nice and pretty, and I'm getting free WIFI from some nearby house. However, there are severe storms coming tonight, and the creek makes me nervous. We have lots of room to swing up/down the creek, but limited room across the creek . I don't know which way the wind will blow. It makes me nervous.

Our own anchor fished up an abandoned anchor and chain from the creek bottom yesterday. It took me about 3 hours to get the crusted salt, lime and oyster shells off the anchor , but now the deed is done. My new anchor is a top of the line Danforth TII-2500, considerably better than our existing Danforth 22S anchor. It was well worth the trouble.

A Twisty Little Maze of Passages All Alike

South Carolina
N 32 06.717 W 080 53.824

We're back in from the sea. Actually, we are in a huge salt marsh cris-crossed with countless little creeks and rivers running in every direction. It's like a little twisty maze of passages all alike. Now is the time to pay very close attention to the charts to follow the one true path. Otherwise, we'd soon be lost in the maze of twisty little passages all alike.

Actually, it's very beautiful. I'm glad we came in here. This is the only part of the Intra Coastal Waterway (ICW) that we never saw before. I heard one cruiser before remark that it is the most beautiful section. Now I understand what he meant. There is wildlife everywhere we look. There are very few buildings of any type visible in the distance. Yet, last night we enjoyed a fireworks show about 10 miles distant.

Before getting here though, we had to navigate 5 miles of approach to the Savannah River plus 5 miles of the river. There is lots of ship traffic on this river so it makes us nervous. We encountered a huge LNG tanker doing 17 knots. That's enough to scare anyone. It's also a place full of hazards. Somewhere nearby is the Savannah River Project site where they made plutonium for America's nuclear weapons for many years. The site is still full of very hazardous radioactive waste. Also, obviously,
there must be an LNG terminal near by too. In case of accident, LNG is capable of causing enormous explosions.

Yesterday afternoon I was agonizing about the decision to come in here instead of remaining at sea. We had to motor 20 of the past 24 hours because of no wind. I hate motoring at sea. However, true to Murphy's Law, as soon as we reached the first buoy of the Savannah River entrance, a nice wind came up. It blew nicely for the next 5 hours until sunset. Damn I thought, if we stayed at sea, we could be another 100 miles north by tomorrow and avoid 5 days of motoring on the ICW. Such decisions
always agonize me, because Murphy's Law seems to apply always. In reality, that nice wind stopped at sunset and hasn't come back yet. We made the right decision.

Tonight, we'll stay in Beaufort. They say that is a very nice city and fun to visit. Good. We'll let you know how it turns out. All we have to do is to find our way there in this little maze of twisty passages all alike.