Brian | 
12 31st, 2008| 
December 31 - We got up this morning to a very windy day - most wind we’ve seen in quite a while. Ah, now for the fun part, pulling up 110′ of chain and the anchor, with the wind blowing the boat and the current pushing us the other direction. FUN. Unfortunately, the windlass is on the fritz, so I am the human windlass this morning. We realized too, when we got up, that we had been very lucky the previous evening - we had managed to avoid getting wrapped on one of the copious lobster/crab pots that were all around in this anchorage, including the one that was right next to where we’d anchored. We managed to get the chain up and as I secured the anchor, Brian piloted us out of the little cove and back into the ICW. We had a very uneventful trip until we reached the Ben Saywer Bridge at about 1:15, where we encountered another familiar boat, the Tharsis, who we had met when we stopped at Barefoot Landing. The couple aboard this boat were from Alaska, and had bought the boat in Connecticut and are in the process of sailing it back to Alaska! What an undertaking! We hailed the bridge and were informed that they were waiting on an electrician to come for a repair, and that they would keep us posted. As the Tharsis circled past us, we hailed them to inquire how long they had been waiting… about an hour and a half. Brian and I decided that we’d just edge over to the side of the channel and drop our hook. No point in driving around in circles. Soon the Tharsis joined us. We were hailed by the bridge operator at about 2:30 saying that if she hadn’t heard from the electrician by 3PM she was going to try to open for us, so we stood by on 13 and waited. At about 2:45, she hailed us to let us know that she was going to open at 3, and that we should pull anchor to come through when she opened. We pulled the hook, and fired up the engine and coasted around in idle, then passed through the bridge when she opened up. The Tharsis followed right behind us, and we came through the last of the ICW before entering into the Charleston harbor. Just as we entered the harbor, we bumped bottom again, as we had aimed for the wrong mark, we quickly corrected course, and I hailed the Tharsis to try to steer them away from the shallows, but too late, they came aground as well. We hauled out our Genny, and with the 15+ kt wind were able to pull ourselves over to port and break free of the mud/sand, but we coouldn’t get close enougn to the Tharsis to get them a line 
They deployed their anchor, and as we headed off they were working to get themselves freed. We had a really choppy and wet ride across into the Ashley River Channel, but we were able to get over to the anchorage across from City Marina, drop two hooks, and we settled in for the night. We made a flat bread pizza for dinner, I talked to my family and to Sandi, Bill, Laurie, Jay and the kids, and we settled in to watch a movie until it was time to watch the fireworks from the boat. We tucked in for the night after my traditional midnight call to my parents after wishing eachbother a happy new year and a quick call with John and Pat who are also in Charleston.
December 30 - We woke up a little later than we’d planned, and taking a look at the charts, and at the wind prediction, we made the decision to continue down the ICW rather than jump outside at Winyah and head to Charleston on the coastal route - it is both a shorter route to go the ICW, and the wind prediction had shifted to be much less favorable. That decided, we hopped off the boat in search of ice, a coffee, and a shower. We ran into John and Pat coming back to their boat, and after hugs and handshakes they cast off to head down the ICW. Brian and I walked into Georgetown stopping at a great coffee place on our way, and walked over to the showers at the marina, where we took a quick shower, stopped for ice, and then headed back to the boat to get underway. We set off at about 9:30 and plotted our course down the ICW. This stretch is really pretty, much nicer than the approach to Georgetown. I forgot to mention in the previous post, that there is a paper mill in Georgetown, so when the wind blows the “wrong” way, the smell is really distinct and strong. Fortunately, we didn’t get too much of that during our stay there, but it was also still noticeable when we got a little ways away and the air lost the acidic tinge that it had in Georgetown. We made our way at a good clip down the ICW, catching sight of Pat and John off and on as we wound down the ICW. At about 2:30, as we came around a bend, whoomph, we grounded into the sand right outside of the channel. We were close enough to in the channel that it was a surprise, but thankfully, we weren’t going along at 7kts as we had been when we grounded in Lockhearts’ Folly, and Brian was very quick to react to the low water alarm. Unfortunately, the tide was still going out, and we weren’t quite quick enough to get ourselves unstuck. We tried putting out the Genny, tried backing off, pushing forward, all to no avail. We were stuck, and we were going to be witing on the tidal change. Oh well, we sat outside for a little while, and then decided to go below and watch the rest of Wall-E… why not, we weren’t going anywhere! Brian fell asleep at the end of the movie, and I went upstairs to see how we were doing on the water level. -0.4 well that was better than the -1.0 we’d been at last time that I checked. I sat outside and read my book, watching amusedly when a couple of teenagers came by in a little whaler and were making fun of us having gotten stuck (they couldn’t see me from where I was sitting, but I had stood up so I saw them) got themselves stuck in the mud for a good 10 minutes. They did finally get themselves freed up, but it did make for a little laugh for me. When the depth indicator started flashing between -0.1 and 0.0, I went downstairs and woke Brian up from his nap, and we fired up the engine and set off to the anchorage we’d ID’d in Skipper Bob’s as the closest anchorage to where we were. By this point it was getting dark, and by the time we were making the turn off into Awendaw Creek. We carefully navigated in, and found a spot with about 11′ of depth. I dropped the anchor, letting out 110′ of rode (chain) and we settled in for the night. Again, we were the only boat in the anchorage, and it was beautiful and peaceful. The sky was unbelievably clear, and we were able to watch the meteor shower later that evening. The only downside to this anchorage, no internet access, and limited cell reception, so we couldn’t take care of some of the parts ordering that we’d hoped to take care of when we arrived in Charleston (which had been our destination for today).
On the bright side… I FINALLY used my new PRESSURE COOKER that Laura and Allison had given us! Now, I have to admit, every book I have read about cooking on a boat praises the virtues of the pressure cooker right-side up, upside-down and backwards as the most useful piece of cooking equipment you can have on a boat. I also have to admit that I was a little afraid of this piece of cooking equipment… I mean you hear all of these stories about them exploding and putting pea soup all over the kitchen or what have you, and although I knew I’d brought them with me, I’d misplaced the manuals somewhere in my organizational frenzy. Well I am here to tell you that the pressure cooker ROCKS!!!! John and Pat had recently acquired a pressure cooker as well, and they had made a pork roast for Christmas dinner that they were raving about when we saw them in Georgetown. Pat had had a similar view on pressure cookers as I did, although hers was borne from real experience of having had one explode at her grandparents house when she was a child, so like me, she was a little leery. However, after hearing about their fantastic experience with theirs, I had bought a pork tenderloin when I went to the Piggly Wiggly and was going to get brave and follow Pat and John’s recipe. NO joke, from start to finish, the entire pork roast, potatoes, carrots and onion dinner took 35 minutes. That includes the time it took to braise the pork and for the pressure cooker to get up to pressure. The total cooking time for this dinner (which was by the way FABULOUS) was 25 minutes! And for those of you who, like me are a little leery of underdone pork, rest assured, this was more than cooked all the way through, it was fully done, succulent, and fork tender. The veggies were also completely done to the point that I may have even slightly over cooked them. On pot, one cutting board, one knife wonder dinner!! Incredible! I’ve read through the cookbooks and the manuals, and I can’t wait to try some of the other recipes I’ve uncovered!
December 29 - Let me start this post with an apology for the delay in posting the previous few days. Our internet connection has been spotty at best, and in some cases non existent, so I have been keeping the log going, and we’re finally somewhere where we have a good steady connection so I am playing a little catch up!
Happy Birthday Barbara!!!!
5:30 AM first alarm. 6:00 AM second alarm, and Brian is up and turning on the coffee. I was in the middle of a dream when the alarm went off, and a bit hazy as a fumbled out of the Vberth about 15 minutes later. Brian handed me a cup of coffee, and I pulled on some additional layers before going outside to cast us off. Brian had fired up the engine, and it was purring like a kitten. He’d already taken the spring lines off, so I walked up the dock to the bow and cast it off, then cast off the stern line, gave us a big push and we turned and headed out continuing down the ICW. This morning was beautiful coming through Myrtle Beach, the sky was beautiful as the sun rose, rosy clouds against blue, and it was incredibly still. We motored along for about an hour and a half before it started to drizzle. Bless his heart, Brian suited up in his foulies, and although I’ve offered, he’s kept the helm for the past 4 hours in the rain and drizzle, while I’ve been down here intermittently navigating, cooking up some breakfast, and making ample cocoa all the while finishing catching up on these posts and editing some of the ones we haven’t yet put up on the site. Thus far we’ve made excellent time today. We left about 6:30 AM and it’s now 12:18, and we’ve come 40 statute miles, with only 13 left to go today before we reach our destination. We called ahead to john and Pat, who we knew were at Georgetown until Tuesday, and they let us know that they were at the Town Docks, and that given how late it is in the season, they’d gotten permission to tie up overnight, and that there was a spot in front of them for us. They also invited us to join them for dinner, which we were really excited to do, and really excited to see them again!
At about 1, the weather had cleared up and I suited up in my foulies (just in case) and relieved Brian at the helm. Poor guy had been steering this whole time, but despite my several offers to relieve him previously, he remained at the helm. I made up the Starboard berth for him and we swapped so that he could come downstairs, warm up, and take a little nap, since we’d gotten up so early, and he wanted to be awake to visit with Pat and John. The stretch down the Waccamaw River was really quiet, not much in the way of birds or other animals. When I came up, brian warned me to keep an eye out for “Deadheads” floating logs and stumps and the like. I kept a really watchful eye, and fortunately we made it through the Waccamaw without incedent. The part of the drive that I did was really quite pretty, wide open, and deep (30+ feet) but very desolate - a few spanish moss covered trees on each side, lots of tall marsh grass, really quite pretty, but still what I kept thinking of (although not geographically possible) was the moors they describe in Wuthering Heights.
I awoke Brian at about 2:30, as we were pulling into the channel for Georgetown, and he came up to pilot us in, as I put the docklines and fenders out and we glided up to the dock in front of Pat and John, with John giving us a hand bringing the boat alongsides.
We got ourselves situated, and I decided to walk over to the local Piggly Wiggly which was about a mile away. I called the number for the manager listed in Skipper Bob’s on my way there, and indeed the store offers a car service to pick boaters up and bring them back to their boats with groceries… VERY SMART. I let them know that since it was such a beautiful day, I was walking over to them but would love a ride back - “not a problem at all!” I ambled up and down the aisles, and for once managed to get everything on my list but one item… grocery shopping has been an interesting part of this trip - sometimes because I’ve forgotten to put something on the list, sometimes because I forget to get something on the list, but most often because the store just doesn’t have whatever it is that I was looking for. Anyhow, with my multitue of bags (I did a pretty big shop here as the plan was to go outside from Georgetown down to Savannah) I located the store manager and one of the customer service reps gave me a ride back. John, Pat and Brian all helped me to bring the groceries down to the boats, and while Bri and I put away our groceries, Pat started cooking up an amazing dinner of garlicky chicken, parsley butter potatoes and asparagus - YUM! We enjoyed a delicious meal, relaxing with Pat and John, and while the guys talked after dinner about navigation equipment, Pat and I went and sat upstairs in their cockpit underneath the stars and talked about family, and kids, and just generally had a really nice time. We really enjoyed ourselves and it was such a treat to get to see John and Pat again and next thing we knew, it was 9:30 and we all decided we’d better call it a night since we were all planning to get underway in the morning.
December 28 - 8:00AM Today is my sister’s birthday! I called my sister, and I sang her a silly birthday song on her voicemail and then called my folks. I made up some breakfast and some coffee, and Brian set to work on the engine. I did some tidying up, and handed Brian a few tools, which unfortunately is about as much help as I can be when it comes to the engine. At about 11:30 Brian called his Dad to see if Mike might have any suggestions. We changed out the coolant, and we tried to do an oil change but the oil was too cool to siphon through the pump system. At noon, we decided to give it a shot and see if the engine was any happier, and pulled anchor and headed back down the ICW to Barefoot Landing, about 20 Statute Miles away, but an area with more resources, and the closest point that we could put in at. About 5 miles in, white smoke. Bah. We kept the engine speeds low, and putted our way down the ICW. Happily I can report that there were no groundings at all along this stretch, which is doubly good because the area that was reported as having shoaling wasn’t our “friendly” sand shoaling, but rocky outcroppings… yikes! Happily, we made it easily to Barefoot landing, with the help of a couple of favorable openings from the bridge operators at Little River Bridge and the Barefoot Landing Swing Bridge, and we pulled up to the Barefoot Landing Docks at about 4:20 PM, where we were able to tie up so that we could continue to sort out the engine issue. I helped Brian with changing the oil, which was my first oil change experience ever! This time, thankfully, because the oil was heated up, it came out easily, and Brian was able to complete the oil change with no issues! We tested a few things that Brian had thought of and that Mike had suggested in their conversation (well really Brian tested, I turned the engine on and off at his direction, and lo and behold, he ID’d the issue, we weren’t pumping water through the salt water coolant system. He’d already checked a few other components of this system, but when he got to the impeller, he found that three teeth had sheared off! AHA!!! We decided that we’d wait on getting a bite to eat until after we’d finished changing the impeller, and see if that was the sole source of our issues. About 45 minutes later, new impeller installed we fired up the engine and waited… NO WHITE SMOKE HOORAY!!! We shut her down, and closed up the boat and walked over to Tbonz to grab a burger and a tase of their microbrew. We toasted Brian’s success in getting the engine to be happy again, and set our plans for the next day, a 5:30-6:00 AM start and a 60 mile journey to Georgetown where we’d meet up with John and Pat, and hopefully be able to jump out at the Winyah Sound on Tuesday and head out to the Atlantic and from there to Charleston.
December 27 - 7:30 AM Unfortunately, neither of us slept well. For whatever reason, it was too hot, then too cold up in the V-berth, so we’d both had a really restless night. AND the wind had changed. We took a look at the upcoming days. Bah. We looked at the ICW route, and knowing from our conversation with John and Pat that they were a little more than a day ahead of us, we decided we’d head down the ICW, making a stop at Calabash Creek on the first night and then pushing on to Georgetown (with an early morning start) the next day, where we’d catch up with Pat and John. Given that we had ample depth, we pushed off from the town dock, but not before hailing the marinia next door to see about fueling up, replenishing our water and possibly… showers?? The marina directed us as to where to tie up when we pulled in and we headed over to the marina at about 9. We tied up, and began fueling and refilling our water tanks. Unfortunately, the docks in Beaufort had had their water turned off so we weren’t able to top off our tanks, and prior to Don and Brian fixing the bulk of our water issue, we had already gone through one entire 50 gallon tank between Belhaven and Southport. We inquired about showers and were told that since we were filling up, there’d be no charge for us to take a shower in their facilities. A the joy of HOT HOT water and really strong water pressure! Showered and fueled, we thanked the marina attendant and cast off, heading down through what we knew would be a treacherous stretch, both from Skipper Bob’s and from an email from John and Pat warning us of a shallow area in Shallote’s Inlet where the boat behind them had grounded.
We plugged along, taking turns at the helm. As we approached Lockheart’s Folly, an area warned about in Skipper Bob’s we were making good time, and I was at the helm. Forewarned that this area would be tricky, I slowed the boat engine to cut our speed, even though we were still drawing 9 feet below the keel, but we had a strong current still behind us, so even with the engine running practically at idle, we were doing about 6kts. 10′…9′…9.5′…-0.5′ WHOOMPH we were aground. IN THE CHANNEL, and I mean DEAD on IN the channel, and not even at low tide!! We were on the rising cusp of the tide, about an hour into the tide coming up, but we were aground and hard. Thankfully in sand, but still. We went from 6kts to 0kts in a matter of seconds. I tried to ease us backwards off the sandbar, but no luck. Brian came up and took the helm, but we were well and truly stuck. We tried putting out the Genny to see if we could tip ourselves off. I hung my body over the leeward side, holding onto the stays, no luck. We got passed by a couple of power boats, one of whom hailed us as they went by, saying it looked like we weren’t making much progress. Ha ha I thought, and yelled back, “nope but we’re trying!” about 30 seconds later, this same boat turned around and came back to us. Two guys aboard (the driver as it turns out relocated from Burlington, VT about 12 years ago) and they kindly offered to give us a pull off of the sandbar. We quickly threw together some lines to form a tow rope, cast it over to them, and with a couple of really really good tugs, they pulled us free! A little alarming in the process since we were pretty well stuck in, but they got us off and even came back and gave US a beer! Nice people. We didn’t relly get into good water until a couple of markers up, and then we were fine until we got to Shallote’s Inlet depth wise…Unfortunately, the engine wasn’t so happy about our grounding. A few minutes after we hit, we noticed some white smoke coming out of our exhaust. grrrrr. Brian went below and began checking things, the temp, the coolant, etc. We reduced our speed pretty dramatically, and coasted where we could. We killed the engine for a little while and took what advantage we could of the slight breeze off our side by pulling out the Genny. Coming through Shallote’s we were really grateful for Pat and John’s heads up about G81, we stayed slightly to the right side of the channel, honoring ALL markers, and although we had one very slight touch on the ground, we made it through without incedent, although the engine still wasn’t happy and was still producing intermittent puffs of white smoke. All of a sudden, it began to get foggy, and I mean REALLY foggy. We cut our speed, and Brian dug out the Nav rules book to see what we should be doing as far as sound signals to keep ourselves safe. We put on all the lights, Nav, Anchor, and all the interiors to make ourselves as visible as possible, and I set my watch timer to go off every two minutes. We quickly plotted our course below on the nav system, so that we could ensure that we stayed in the channel - since we couldn’t see much beyond the bow of the boat, never mind the markers or the sides of the channel! We started blowing our airhorn the prescribed number of honks, and kept a sharp ear out for any approaching boats. We hailed the Sunset Beach Pontoon Bridge as recommended in Skipper Bob’s and were told that they had changed their schedule and were now only opening on the hour, so we’d have to wait for the 5PM opening. It was 4:10 PM, we were about a half a mile away (not that we could see the bridge) and so we edged over to the right side of the channel, and dropped our hook to wait for the bridge to open. We sat there for about 30 minuts, honking our airhorn every 2 minutes, one long, two short to indicate a sailboat at anchor, and stood by on channel 13 awaiting word from the bridgemaster. at 4:40, we heard Tow Boat US hail the bridge, and almost immediately the bridge hailed us to tell us that we could cross through behind Tow Boat US, so a few minutes early. We hauled up our anchor, restarted our poor engine, and eased behind the towboat and through the bridge… and about 10 minutes later I popped a bottle of champagne we’d been saving for just this occasion, we’d crossed into South Carolina!
About 3 miles up, and having seen a couple of dolphins despite the thick fog, we turned to our right and following the markers, pulled into Calabash Creek where we found, as predicted in Skipper Bob’s, a beautiful anchorage with good depths right off of the channel on the northeast side right behind channel marker R2. We dropped our anchor and cut the engine. Whew, good little Yanmar, still got us to a safe place where we could try to sort out what was going on, despite being overheated! I cooked us up some fajitas, using the delicious steak left over from Christmas dinner, and Brian broke out the Yanmar manual to start his diagnosis. I poured us some of the champagne I’d opened, and we toasted our arrival in SC.
I have never in my life heard as much radio traffic as we did that evening, and though we were well out of the channel, we did hail back several boats who had hailed that they were coming through our way. We put one of the lights that Joe (from Green’s Point Boat Yard) had given us onto the tail end of the boom, just to help light the boat up, and a few times we went out with the huge flood and shone it up the mast, with accompanying airhorn blasts when we had approaching boat traffic. At about 10PM, we decided to call it a night, and with every light except for the ones in the V on, we tucked in for the night. By that point there was pretty much no boat traffic, so we were able to get a good night’s sleep.
December 26 - 7:30 AM, thank goodness that while we slept the tide came fully in, so when we woke up, we were not only afloat, but with ample clearance below us! We hauled up our anchor, and headed back out the channel and into the ICW. Our trip down to Southport was great. We had beautiful weather, finally some sun, and the depths were good so all in all it was an easy trip. In Skipper Bob’s they list that in Southport there is a free town dock, so we decided that we would check it out and see if it was available. We pulled into Old Southport Harbor, and following the directions in the guide, called the local police for permission to dock. Granted! We began to nose up to the dock when all of a sudden, we were sitting in mud. Hmmmmm. we backed off and re-approached, this time successfully getting the nose of the boat up to the dock, where I threw a line around the piling. Brian tossed me the stern line, which I wrapped around the back piling… but the stern of the boat was about 5 feet off the dock! The connecting “dock” in between these two points is about a foot maybe 14″ wide (think trapeze platform!!!) and it was about 4″ up from the water… how to pull the boat over??? our primary winches of course. Laughing, Brian wrapped a couple of wraps around the primary, and began scooting us through the mud by winching the boat alongside the dock. Hilarious! We were JUST touching bottom but it was a pretty funny way to come into a dock! We got the boat secured, and after popping online to see what was around, we took the garbage up to the garbage cans and set off to walk into town to find some pizza. After walking about a mile, past a couple of pizza places closed for the holidays, we popped into a small convenience store, which turned out to be a Mexican convenience store… how cool!! The yahd all kinds of great stuff, canned mango juice, mango gatorade, a wild selection of hot sauces, chips, tortillas, and eggs (ah, yes I was in search of eggs since I’d used up the last of them on Christmas breakfast). We bought a bunch of stuff, and walked back a couple of blocks to a small restaurant/bar we’d passed along the way, Loco Jo’s.
Turns out that Loco Jo’s opened on Christmas Day! We were among their first out of town customers, which was really cool! They had a great selection of microbrew beers, and FABULOUS food. We shared some beer battered onion rings and some pork wontons as starters - both were excellent. I had fish and chips and Brian had their burger all the way. Best fish and chips I have EVER had! Bri’s burger was excellent as well. We ended up sitting next to a really nice couple who had moved to Southport from western Massachusetts and had a nice chat with them between courses. I’d absolutely recommend this restaurant as a great stop along the way for anyone coming this route. It’s not too far of a walk, and the food was worth walking a little further than some of the closer places. We stopped on our way back at the wine store across the street to see if they happened to have any Root1 (our new fav) which they did, and they were having a wine tasting of four wines. We tried the tempranillo, the chardonnay and the moscato, and bought a bottle of the chard to have on board when we finally start catching some fish! We ambled the rest of the way back to the boat and settled in for the night with the plan to get up in the morning early, and set out.
December 25 - 8:00AM We awoke to a slightly foggy morning, but it was at least warm! I fired up the stove for some coffee, and made us some Christmas breakfast - blueberry coffee cake. We had a little bit of a leisurely morning, calling home to our families (who we miss very much), finally pulling anchor at about 9:30. We set off down the ICW heading for our next anchorage at Sloop Point. Again, we had a very uneventful trip which was accompanied by dolphins at a couple of points throughout the day. The weather wasn’t quite what we’d hoped, we had sunshine when we set out, but by about noon we were being rained on, not hard, and it wasn’t a cold rain, but rain none the less. We reached Sloop Point at about 3:45, only to discover that there was already one other boat there, and not only that, but they had anchored dead center in the limited anchorage, making it a real challenge for us to find a spot to anchor. Now it does say in Skipper Bob’s that it can be shallow, but we nosed into the ground at least 4-5 times trying to find a spot that was deep enough to accomodate us while staying a reasonable distance away from the other boat that was anchored there. Settling on a spot behind the other boat, and out of the channel, we set our anchor, and I set about making us Christmas dinner. I had bought us some special steak fillets when I went to the grocery, as well as some Boursin, and I whipped up some Boursin potatoes au gratin and we made Adina asparagus (not nearly as good with canned as it is with fresh, but tasty nonetheless). We opened the other nice bottle of wine we’d purchased for Christmas dinner, and sat down to enjoy our second Christmas together. Although it was sad not to be with our families (and I was a little homesick) we had a great dinner, chatted with a few friends and family, including Don and Terri and Pat and John, before turning in for the night with the plan being to make it to Southport the next day so that we could jump out into the Atlantic and head to Charleston.
2:20 AM - I woke up to use the head and lo and behold, we were heeled over about 15 degrees to port! Apparently while we were sleeping, the tide went out. Hmmmmm.
December 24 8:30 AM We got onto the boat, tucked our purchases downstairs (I forgot the eggs at Don and Terri’s WHOOPS!) and pulled up our anchors. We pulled back up to the town docks to disassemble the Portabote and to purchase some ice. By 9:15 we were all set, and we cast off - our destination for the day was Mile Hammock, an anchorage on the ICW in the midst of Camp LeJeune. We had a very peaceful, very pretty trip to this anchorage. We made one little wrong turn coming out of Morehead City, taking the wrong channel (which we discovered pretty quickly when we encountered the sandbar LOL) and had to turn back to go back around to the proper channel. We saw dolphins along the way, a white crane and quite a few other boats. We were expecting that when we pulled into Mile Hammock Bay we’d have other boats there as well, but when we turned in at about 4PM, we were the only boat there. The anchorage was really pretty (and nice and deep). We set our anchor and I dug into our provisions to cook us up a nice Christmas Eve dinner of Burbon steak tips, twice baked potatoes and baked beans with cheese and garlic biscuits followed by fresh baked cookies. We opened a nice bottle of wine we’d purchased in Beaufort and settled in for a quiet and relaxing evening. We watched a movie, and after it was done decided we’d give the salon berth a try since we were all snuggled up from having watched the movie. We’ve decided that if we were to sleep there moving forward, we’ll definitely have to acquire a foam topper. That berth is a wee bit uncomfortable since the cushions are pretty thin. Of course too, after two nights in the supreme comfort of the guest bed at Don and Terri’s too, it might not have been a fair comparison…
December 22 - 24 So usually I try to write these posts each day, and capture our adventures as they’re happening and I have tried to do this day by day… however, I’m taking the approach of capturing this whole experience of our visit to Beaufort, which has to be one of the best, and nicest experiences I have had in my life, and certainly on this trip. I’d like to start with a huge thank you to Don and Terri (and Tug) for all of their hospitality, kindness and friendship during our time in Beaufort. Their kindness made our stop in Beaufort an amazing experience, and we formed a friendship over those few days that will last a lifetime!
On Monday morning, Don called to check in to see how we were doing and we let him know that we were about to head into the town dock to grab a shower and to start our provisioning process and about an hour later, while we were tied up at the dock, he popped by to talk with Brian about one of the issues we’ve been having on the boat, our hot water heater which had been leaking and we’d discovered that the company who’d manufactured it had gone out of business some years back. Don said he’d given it some thought, and thought that he might know what the issue was, so Bri climbed into the aft berth and pulled out the part that he and Don had been discussing. Don took a look and said he’d pop into the hardware store and be back in a bit. Bri and I continued our process of packing up some items to be shipped home, It was COLD on Monday, like in the low 30s, not what we’d been expecting in Beaufort at this time of the year, so we were pretty bundled up, but we had the Post office right there and we were pretty determined to start sending at least some of our cold weather clothing home. Next thing we knew, Don was back with the part! We couldn’t believe it! Brian installed it, and immediately our leak issue was improved… still not 100% fixed, but a heck of a lot better than it had been. By this point it was about 2 in the afternoon, and we asked Don if it would be an inconvenience to him for us to borrow his car for one more day, as we hadn’t done our provisioning yet, and we knew that we would be staying until the following day to try to get the freezer fixed and to try to take the outboard to the local Nissan shop. Don said that it was no problem, and then extended an invitation to join him and Terri at their house for dinner that evening, to bring our bathing suits for the hot tub, and to please stay over at their house as it was going to be in the 20s that night. He was quite persuasive, and I was eager to have the chance to visit with Terri again, so we said yes and set a time to head over to their house. Don left, taking our outboard with him as the Nissan dealership was right down the street from his house, and we weren’t sure that it would fit in the Miata’s trunk. We took care of a few more items around the boat, and returned out to the mooring field to anchor. Interesting to note that in the Skipper Bob’s cruising guide, the docks are listed as the Beaufort TOWN Docks, when in fact it’s just Beaufort Docks and they are a private organization, so unlike most other places where town docks are listed, and the town has free dockage or moorings as a part of that enterprise, this organization is pay only and has no moorings whatsoever, so we went out, found ourselves a good spot and dropped two anchors per the recommendation of the crusing guide. We rowed back into town (no outboard and all) and set about taking care of a few of our provisioning needs and of mailing off one package before heading out to Don and Terri’s.
We were warmly received and told to make ourselves at home. Their house is lovely, comfortable and beautifully decorated, but the thing that makes it so much more than that is that it is a home and a very welcoming one. We joined Don and Terri in the kitchen (Don designed the kitchen and great room, and it’s amazing space!) and settled in with them for an absolutely wonderful evening. We watched the Marquette v. North Carolina game on the television (their daughter attended Marquette and was at the game with friends) chatted, cuddled and played with Tug and had a wonderful time. Over those hours, and an absolutely delicious dinner (I want to know how Don prepared that grilled chicken, it was fantastic!) we talked and talked and talked, until next thing we knew it was 11! At Don and Terri’s suggestion, we popped into their hot tub for a little soak, easing the aches and bumps that are inevitable when sailing, and watched for the meteor shower that had been predicted for that evening. We all turned in for the night, and Bri and I settled down in thier extremely comfortable guest room for a great night’s sleep. In the morning, Don made us all breakfast (also delicious) and then while I popped over to the neighboring Dollar General, Terri left for work, and Brian and Don headed over to the Nissan dealership to try to resolve the issues with the outboard. I met them there a little bit later, many provisions in hand. Unfortunately, the guys had been less successful. I think with the holidays the dealership was less than enthused about taking a look at the engine, so Don offered to take it back to their house, saying that he’d take a look at it later in the day, and Brian and I set off to the scuba shop that Don recommended to check out and purchase some gear we needed for our trip. The previous evening, Don and Brian had spent quite a bit of time discussing gear, as Don had a commercial diving business, and had a ton of great information for us. We stopped at Discovery Diving where we were helped by a great guy named Roger, and we were able to pick up quite a bit of the gear we needed and wanted at a really reasonable price. We went back to the dinghy, loaded up our goodies, and rowed back out to the boat. At about 3:30 we called Don, as Brian was interested in working with him and learning from him about the outboard. Don suggested that when he came back through Beaufort in a little while, he could pick Brian up and while I went to do the last of our provisioning the guys would go back to Terri and Don’s where they could work on the engine. My provisioning was successful (including a trip to Tuesday Morning where Don had seen an unbreakable french press YAY a working coffee maker again!) and I called to see how the progress was going on the engine… not so well… but they were still working on it. I asked if there was anything else that they needed for parts etc. and when they said no, I headed directly out to their house, expecting to find that they’d have called it quits. Not these guys! They were out in the garage working away on it, trying all kinds of things to get the carbeurator working. Terri and I retreated to the kitchen, where she invited us to stay for dinner, and when I protested saying that they’d done more than enough for us, she insisted, saying look, the guys are having a good time out there and they’re not done, let’s just prep up some stuff and we can all eat when they come in. So we girls settled in, chatted about Brian’s and my wedding plans, talked about all kinds of stuff. It was really relaxing and fun. I really enjoyed getting to know Terri and Don while we were in Beaufort, as did Brian. When the guys finally called it quits on the engine, having cleaned out the gelled up gasoline and unfortunately still not able to get the darned thing to start, Don fired up the oven and made some incredible tilapia and Orzo for dinner. As we were just finishing up dinner, and after Don and Terri had insisted that we just stay the night rather than go back to the boat that evening, we heard a terrible crash outside. We all went out to see what had happened, and found that there had been an awful head on crash at the entrance to the Dollar General. Both cars were totalled, fortunately all of the occupants of both cars were alive and although injured were out of the vehicles. Several people had called 911, and in the interim, we all jumped into the fray to help out. Don checked on the passenger in the truck, Brian and I ran into the Dollar General and with the permission of the manager and help of the staff there got latex gloves, ice, paper towels etc to help the injured people. We waited until the ambulances arrived and took our leave, however Don remained outside directing traffic, re-routing oncoming cars through the parking lot across the street until he was finally relieved by the fire department. By this time, we were all exhausted, so we all called it a night and turned in, planning to get up in the am for Don to take us back to the boat by about 8 so that we could depart Beaufort at 9.
In the morning, we said our goodbyes to Terri, and promised one another that we’d get together again, perhaps on our way back North in the spring, and a very sincere invitation to Don and Terri to please come and visit us in Andover/Boston. Don drove us back to the dinghy, and we said very fond farewells with many thanks for all of their hospitality and friendship. I am still struck by their kindness and hospitality, and am very much looking forward to when we’re all able to see one another again.
December 21 - 8:30AM we pulled anchor and got underway for our last 20 miles to Beaufort. This morning there couldn’t have been enough coffee in all of Costa Rica for me. We set off for Beaufort, and I placed a call to our contact there Don Thomas, a colleague from my dad’s company Moran Tugs. We’d had a few items shipped on to his address, as there were a few items from Defender that we needed that had been on backorder, so our plan was to stop in Beaufort and collect them, as well as to add a few provisions. We had a windy but fun trip down to Beaufort, including a two visits from our favorite animal companions, the dolphins! I keep forgetting to write about the fact that we’re seeing them, a lot! We actually saw a baby dolphin on this part of the trip, and Brian saw a dolphin jump clear out of the water! It’s pretty cool, because they swim alongside the boat, not quite close enough that you could touch them, but still really close, and they swim along with you for quite a while, it’s very neat. Our entry into Bueafort was kind of funny, since Brian was on the phone letting Chief know about our engagement and catching up, and all of a sudden, we were approaching a bridge… now have no fear, this bridge was a fixed bridge with ample clearance, with a RR bridge that remains open except for when in use. Of course, I’d missed that part in my brief review of Skipper Bob’s so I called down to Bri, who promptly hailed the next bridge on the list, the Beafort Bridge, which opens on the half hour. Patiently, the bridge operator explained to us that we were hailing the wrong bridge (whoops!) but that he’d gladly open for us when we came through on the other side of Radio Island. We cruised through the Hi-Rise bridge, and passed the Moran operations on our Starboard. Brian took the helm as we headed around Radio Island and we pulled up and waited for the Beaufort Bridge to open. We crossed through, and anchored in what we thought was the designated anchorage to be near the town docks. Hmmm…. after anchoring, and checking the internet, we discovered that we were on the wrong side of the bridge. Damn. I called Don back to tell him of our mistake, and that we would be coming BACK through the Beaufort Bridge at the 3:30 opening. At 3:15 Brian and I pulled up the anchor and began to make our way over to the bridge when suddenly… whoomph… we were aground in the mud. We tried backing up, we tried easing forward… we were thoroughly stuck, so we pulled out the Genny (thank goodness that there was some wind!) and we heeled the boat over to Starboard JUST enough to get ourselves unglued from the muddy bottom. Now mind you, all of this is in MORE than full view of the bridge operators tower… and from down below we heard the bridge operator hail us “Three Sheets, this is the Beaufort Bridge, will open when you get over here”. He was very nice about it, but I am sure we gave him a few good laughs in our efforts to get unstuck. We crossed back through the bridge, and found ourselves a nice anchorage in the mooring field outside of the Beaufort Docks - directly across from the Post Office. We loaded a few items into our trusty Portabote, including our garbage, and began our row into the beach. As we pulled up to the beach, we heard a hail “hey is that Lynne? Don!” and standing at the water’s edge was Don Thomas, along with his wife Terri and their puppy Tug. As we hit the beach, Don grabbed our bowline and gave us a tug up onto the sand, and we did our formal introductions. The Thomas’ couldn’t have been nicer or more welcoming. Not only had they brought us our packages that had been shipped to their home, but they also offered us use of one of their cars while we were in town, so that we could do any provisioning and run any errands that we might need to run! Not only that, they brought us a fun car to use!! Don’s Miata! We walked with them along the beautiful Main Street of Beaufort, and made the suggestion that we would like to take them to dinner for all of their kindness. We initially settled on a beer, and went to the Royal James, which is a great local place, and as we got to talking, we decided that we’d indeed grab a bite of food, since we were all having such a nice time. GREAT burgers there, and Yuengling on tap… couple that with great company, and you have the makings of a terrific evening! We said goodbye to Don and Terri at about 8, and collected our packages from the trunk of the car before rowing back to the boat. When we got back to the boat, I called my folks to tell them about how nice Don and Terri are, and to let them know that we were safely in Beaufort, then we settled in to watch a little “TV” on the computer before heading to bed. About 20 minutes into the show, I felt the boat swing around. We were butt to butt with the boat next to us in the mooring field (they were on a fixed mooring) with only about 12 feet separating us. I looked at Bri and said, I think we need to do something about this, and maybe take Don’s advice and snag a mooring for the night (there were several empty moorings in the mooring field) and the liklihood that a mooring’s owner was going to come back at 9:30 at night was slim. We fired up the engine, and hauled the anchor, and with me steering, we attempted to snag one of the moorings a little way down from where we’d been anchored… no luck. We turned around and, fighting the current, motored up to a mooring across from the Beaufort Docks, after a couple of passes (I am NOT yet good at driving to snag a mooring) Brian and I switched positions (and don’t worry Mom, I was wearing my lifejacket just in case) and Brian eased us up to the mooring allowing me to snag it on our first pass! (He’s definitely WAY better at mooring approaches than I am!!!) We secured the boat to the Darlin’ Arlin’s mooring - thank you to whomever owns that boat, and sorry that we snagged it on you but you weren’t here and we wanted to be safe for ourselves and everyone else in the mooring field! Good thing that we did, that night was a howler, with wind whistling through the shrouds, and the current fighting it. When we looked at the anchor alarm graph in the am, we’d swung in quite a few circles.
