Heading to North Carolina

 Log 21552

Mosquito Creek off the Ashepoo River

It was raining hard when I awoke at 6:30 yesterday morning at Skull Creek Marina on Hilton Head. The coastal forecast for the area had deteriorated badly overnight, and there were marine warnings posted for severe thunderstorms and possible waterspouts. We had to abandon our plan to run outside to Charleston and instead head up the Intracoastal Waterway. Given that, we didn't leave until around 10 am, planning to arrive at a few shallow spots at high tide.

Help getting through the shallow spots from our new forward-looking Sonar

We passed through Beaufort, SC at noon, survived one shallow area, and arrived at the Ashepoo River at around 3 pm. Rather than turning right to follow the ICW, we turned left up the Ashepoo to Mosquito Creek. We were hoping for dock space at B&B Seafood where they charge a flat $25 a night to dock and where fresh shrimp is available inside. Alas they had no space, and when we anchored nearby our dinghy wouldn't start. So no fresh shrimp for us last night. Our anchorage though was quite nice. There are a few houses nearby, but we were in a very peaceful spot for the night. The Lovely Laura Lee prepared lamb chops and we dined on the back deck overlooking the beautiful marsh at sunset.

Sunset view at dinner on the aft deck

We had departed Thunderbolt in Savannah Tuesday at noon, and the trip to Hilton Head was uneventful except for a wild ride when we went out the Tybee Roads ship channel with a strong thunderstorm ahead, and wind blowing into an outgoing tide. It was pretty rough for about an hour until we turned back in behind Hilton Head. 

Tuesday night we walked from our marina about 3/10's of a mile to the Old Fort Pub Restaurant. It was surprisingly good food served to us outdoors on a deck overlooking the water. A very nice night until around 8:30 when the mosquitoes came out in full force. 

We should be able to easily make it to Charleston today. It is a little foggy this morning with low clouds. It should become partly cloudy by mid-morning. We are bound for Oriental, NC on the Neuse River in what I call the "Inner Banks" area. We have reserved a slip there for a month at River Dunes, which looks like a good place to hang out for a while. We'll keep you posted.

Leaving Charleston

The city of Charleston, in the green feathery modesty of its palms, in the certitude of its style, in the economy and stringency of its lines, and the serenity of its mansions South of Broad Street, is a feast for the human eye.

                                           Pat Conroy, The Lords of Discipline.

If I were able to compose a sentence like the one above, I would. My writing is far more pedestrian. I was trained in journalism and was told by the advisor to our college student newspaper to "put the hay down where the mules can reach it". Somehow my simple style  survived the corrupting influence of law school and has served me well. But I am no Pat Conroy.

So here are some thoughts about Charleston. We have spent just over three weeks here. The boat has been at the Charleston Maritime Center, which has proved to be the best possible location for walking the city. All of the other Charleston marinas are not within easy walking distance of the main parts of town. We are a mere block from the grocery and an easy walk to shopping and dining. We are on a busy part of the harbor, just north of where the Carnival Sunshine comes and goes on Bahamas cruises every four days, and just south of the main cargo port facilities. Sightseeing boats come and go from the Maritime Center, and we are at a main stop for the water taxi. Our only minor complaint is the occasional rough water. But we do get rocked to sleep at night.

Our dogs have done well staying on the boat, and tending to their needs has led us to dog-friendly beaches and parks that we would have never discovered without them. They are time-consuming and sometimes sleep-disrupting, but we would not have wanted to be without them for this length of time.

Charleston has been not only a feast for the eyes, but also simply a feast. The spectacular food available here is nothing short of magical for a city this size. We have eaten our way through the city, and if anyone wants a list of recommended restaurants, I will be glad to furnish it.

More important than the sights, shopping, food, and drink have been memorable good times with friends old and new. From The Ford Plantation, Dwight and Jennifer Davies joined us overnight on the boat our second night here to celebrate my birthday at "Chez Nous". They got a quick taste of living on a boat, and we hope they will join us again soon for a longer visit. We got in a lunch and visit with Thomas George, son of Rebecca George Ogden from Ford. We toured the old building he is renovating into a bar and wine club. From Birmingham, our old and dear friends Bob and Ashley Spotswood were in town for four days, and joined us for sightseeing and dining experiences at several of the best restaurants here. Finally, also from Ford, our good friends Austin and Marti Sullivan were in town for just one evening a week ago. We met up with them where they were staying in a friend's charming old home on Meeting Street, proceeded to the private rooftop garden of another friend of theirs for cocktails, where we were joined by another couple, and then our party of eight had an amazing Italian dinner at "Coda del Pesce" on Isle of Palms.

While here, we met up one day for lunch with Brantlee De Brux, my daughter's best friend from college, who is a successful real estate agent in Mt. Pleasant. Her dear parents Sumter and Clydie invited us to join them, their extended family, and several friends and neighbors for a fish fry on Sullivan's Island last night. It was truly a fabulous evening full of charming and interesting people. We haven't laughed as much in a while. A great evening amongst a family full of love.

So now the trip is coming to an end. The lovely Laura Lee leaves tomorrow with our dogs and car. I move the boat Wednesday to a boatyard to have it hauled out for bottom paint, stabilizer service, and a few other needed maintenance items. It should be completed by the end of July.

Charleston is a "feast for the human eye", a mere two-hour drive from home. We shall be back.

Charleston

For two weeks now we have been docked at the Charleston Maritime Center. This is a fabulous location for exploring the city. Both shopping and restaurants are just a short walk away. The only issue is that the marina is sometimes very rough and rolly caused by wind, current, and occasionally by gigantic wakes from ships and inconsiderate boaters. But despite the motion, we have been enjoying things immensely.

At last report I said that the dogs were doing well. They are quite adaptable, with the puppy Belle immediately taking to the artificial turf bathroom put out on the bow for them. We have taken them for lots of walks, and one morning to run free on the beach at Sullivan's Island across the river from us. 

There have been a couple of minor dog issues. Rhett fell into the water once while trying to get from the boat to the dock. Luckily, we were both here. The Lovely Laura Lee jumped into the water and pushed him up, while I lifted him by his harness. All ended well with just a wet wife and dog. The other issue has been caused by the fact that we let Rhett sleep with us at home, where we have a king size bed. It hasn't worked as well with the smaller bed on the boat. We tried for one night to make him sleep on a dog bed outside of our room, but it was a long night of a loving dog letting us know of the injustice. I think it will mean some adjustments to where everyone sleeps. We can't blame anyone but ourselves for the dilemma. 

At the moment though, we are getting a break from the dogs who are at their favorite vacation spot Camp Green Dog. We have guests in town and wanted to be free to hang out with them rather than be concerned with the pets. 

The Samfords and the Spotswoods

Our guests are dear friends Bob and Ashley Spotswood. They are not staying on the boat, but have done so in the past when they visited us in the Exumas and stayed on our previous boat Steel Magnolia. Following the habit of using nicknames for friends on the blog, they were referred to then as "Dahling Ashley" and "Bonefish Bob". We are glad to be able to spend a few days with them exploring Charleston. They are two of the people we dearly miss since we moved away from Birmingham.

One of the more interesting things about our location here is the steady parade of container and other cargo ships that pass us by. We are adjacent to the port facility used by what are called "RORO carriers", which means roll on/roll off car carriers. These massive ships come and go daily at all hours, both delivering foreign-built cars to the U.S. and picking up U.S.-made cars for delivery all over the world. Interestingly, we tend to think of foreign cars being imported to the U.S. But with Volvo, Mercedes, and BMW, among others, all having plants in SC, it is not unusual for these ships to be fully loaded both coming and going from the port of Charleston. Watching them pass close by keeps the size of our boat in perspective.

Division Belle at bottom left

Dogs and Boats, and a Distant Relative

I've always thought that dogs and boats don't mix well. This was reinforced back in the 1990's when I moved my boat up the west coast of Florida accompanied only by our young Lab "Moose". My trip plans constantly revolved around getting the dog out for his walks. It seemed annoying, much as I loved the dog. Then one evening I went out for dinner and left him alone on the boat for an hour or two. He found two large bags of potato chips on the counter and ripped them open, eating what he wanted. When I returned to the boat, it looked like it had snowed potato chips in the saloon. And of course the dog got ill later that night, causing other unspeakable problems. The next night when I went to dinner, Moose bit into a plastic gallon jug of bilge cleaner, a very strong soap that poured out and ruined the saloon rug.

But I am older and softer now, and I really can't love my dogs and my boat as much as I do, and somehow try to make them mutually exclusive. So we boarded the dogs while we got the boat from Beaufort to Charleston last Friday and Saturday and while we had friends Dwight and Jennifer Davies staying aboard Sunday night to celebrate my birthday. Then yesterday, the lovely Laura Lee picked them up. Last night was our first night with two dogs living with us on board.

I must say that it requires some planning, and consumes a lot of each day. But the dogs are remarkably adaptable. So far so good. The puppy, "Belle Watling", is actually somewhat easier to manage on the boat than at home because she can't wander out of sight around a big house getting into trouble, and she can't leave the property. The older dog, "Rhett Butler", is pretty cool most anywhere as long as he gets walks, water, and food. We are all adjusting. If they can handle living aboard in a marina, we will move to the next step to trying to travel with them on some trip where we have short hops. Just in case, we have a strip of astroturf available on the bow for times when we can't get the dogs ashore.

While walking the dogs this morning, we started chatting with the owner of the boat next to us in the marina. At some point I introduced myself, and he said "Wait, your name is John Samford?" I said yes and he replied "The friend on my boat helping me move it is also John Samford". As it turns out, it is a distant cousin from Albany, GA that I first met at Auburn in 1968 when we were assigned to ROTC platoons by alphabetical order. The two of us were standing next to one another and both answered the roll call when our name was called. The instructor thought the roll he had been given contained a mistake, and John and I briefly considered taking turns attending drill. I ran into John on occasion while at Auburn, and I understand he lived in Birmingham for some period in the 70's, but I don't think I was aware of that at the time. It was good to catch up. There aren't many of us in the world.

John Samford and John Samford

Church Creek

 Last night was our first opportunity to spend a night anchored out 
on Division Belle. We are about 20 miles south of Charleston in a beautiful anchorage called "Church Creek". The Waterway Guide says that the name derived from the practice of going to church on the flood tide and returning home on the ebb. The tidal currents here are certainly strong enough to require travel to be carefully timed.

The area we traversed yesterday and our anchorage are stunningly beautiful, and match every description of the marshes ever written. It is hard to capture in a photograph, but the vast grasses are greening for summer close to the water and still a delightful straw color behind. The currents and many shallow areas of the Intracoastal Waterway made some of the going very tough yesterday. We departed Beaufort at slack tide around 

7:30 am, and had the current with us much of the day. But at one point approaching low tide we were literally touching bottom in the middle of the channel, meaning depths at low tide were right at six feet.

We stopped here at 1:45 pm yesterday. We could have made it to Charleston, but our slip is reserved for the month of June begining today, and we also wanted to be able to arrive at the Charleston Maritime Center at slack tide this afternoon, to make docking easiest. 

A cold front passed through yesterday, bringing late afternoon severe storms that passed north of us and caused some damage in Charleston, and late evening huge storms that fortunately passed to our south. The storms and strong current led to a fitful night of sleep, checking the holding power of a new anchor and watching the location of strong storms.

We enjoyed a fine dinner on the aft deck prepared by the Lovely Laura Lee. We will take our time this morning departing to arrive in Charleston just after lunch time. This is pretty much what it is all about.


Update: We departed Church Creek at 10 am and arrived safely at The Charleston Maritime Center at 1:45 pm. While the marina here is exposed to wind and wakes, we are tucked into the best spot it has, and the only one that will accommodate our boat. We will get our sea legs quickly and be prepared to rock and roll for most of a month.

Heading to Charleston

I first met Captain Mike Lamson in around 2001, in my early days of having a boat at The Ford Plantation. He was a fishing guide who owned an older Bertram fishing boat that he had restored. He took some of my family members on a couple of fishing trips, and offered to help take care of my boat, primarily with periodic washing and detailing. Mike's nickname is "Lumpy", which I understand was bestowed upon him in his younger poker playing days. He won so much money one evening that a friend changed "Lamson" to "Lump Sum", and the name was further corrupted to just "Lump" or "Lumpy".

Lumpy has little time to fish these days, as his boat care business has flourished. He employs his son and stepson, and several others, and takes on cleaning, painting and varnishing projects for both individuals and various boatyards in the area. Some customers are so pleased with his work that he or his employees will travel to great distances to take care of their boats. He has maintained two previous boats for me: the big Fleming named Suladan and Steel Magnolia, now called Vector by its owners. He also maintains the lovely Laura Lee's small fishing boat "Blossom". And so it is that the varnish issue on Division Belle was turned over to Lumpy.

When teak rails (or brightwork) on a boat are properly varnished, they simply need to have a new coat or two added once or twice a year to be kept beautiful, depending on climate and where the boat is located. But on my boat, the varnish had gone for years without maintenance and then had varnish added on top of the mess that was there. Lumpy and his crew removed all of the old varnish down to bare wood, and methodically added 11 new coats, fighting love bugs that landed in the varnish whenever they added a coat. It is finished now, and is a work of art. I cannot imagine a more beautiful job. I'll do my best not to scratch it up.

We find ourselves at Thunderbolt Marina this morning, after a six-hour trip here yesterday. By car, it would have been a 30 to 40-minute drive, but we were taking our time down the Ogeechee River and the sometimes tricky passage to connect to the Intracoastal Waterway. I am with my dear friend Paul Hamilton again, helping out on his third trip with me. He calls himself the "Bosun". We could have spent the night most anywhere in the area, but Thunderbolt Marina has a tradition of delivering fresh Krispy Kreme doughnuts to every transient boat docked here. So this was our first choice.

The Bosun and the doughnuts

We will shove off later this morning heading for Beaufort, SC, where Paul will head home tomorrow and the lovely Laura Lee will join me later in the week to move the boat to Charleston. I don't mind spending a couple of nights in Beaufort, as it is one of my favorite spots. To get ready for the visit, I have pulled out the classic Beaufort movie, and will watch it while there.

Update: We arrived in Beaufort at 4 pm after an uneventful six-hour trip. I decided to run our "wing engine" or "get home engine" for a couple of hours today in gear and under a load. I did everything to turn it off properly, but when we arrived at Beaufort and shut everything else off, it turned out that it was still running. Something seems to be wrong with the pilothouse shutdown button. A friendly mechanic who lives on a boat in the marina came by and showed me how to shut it down at the engine. The shutdown solenoid works at the engine, but not from the control in the pilothouse. Thankfully, I don't anticipate needing this engine at all on this trip, and if I do, it is better that it will start and not stop rather than vice versa.

It is 9 pm now, and the temperature has dropped from near 100 at our arrival to about 86 degrees now, a blessed relief. We are in a record-breaking hot spell, but the breeze on the water makes everything more bearable. It is great to be out enjoying the boat, regardless of the temperature.

The ocean is way more fun than the Intracoastal Waterway

We arrived safely at the Charleston City Marina yesterday afternoon around 5:30. It was a spectacular day at sea, and very relaxing compared to the constant attention required to drive in the Waterway, with twists and turns, bridges, and shallow spots to look out for. With another day of calm seas promised today, we decided to change our plans and go to sea again. We are headed now to Port Royal Sound at the north end of Hilton Head, so we are bypassing Beaufort altogether, and giving us a short run tomorrow to Savannah. We should get inside the sound and somewhere to anchor or tie up before dark today.

Check out the photo album, as I have added a few this trip. 

First time at sea

It is 10 am Wednesday morning, February 6, 2019, and we are officially at sea for the first time on Division Belle. Seas are very calm with gentle swells of less than two feet. The wind is from the east at six knots. We left Georgetown, SC this morning at 8 am and came down the river to enter the ocean from Winyah Bay. We are headed for Charleston and should reach the ship channel there by around 4 pm.

Our first two days have been outstanding with beautiful weather and only a few shallow spots to navigate in the Intracoastal Waterway. Monday night was spent in North Myrtle Beach at a friendly marina called Barefoot Resort. A guy there runs a "concierge" service and for less than the price of Uber he took Paul Hamilton to Walmart to purchase a mount for our new salon TV. It is now installed with satellite TV working, but only a temporary antenna stuck to the window (purchased for $15 to allow us to watch the Super Bowl Sunday night, such as it was). There was no restaurant open on the property so we dined onboard.

Yesterday, Tuesday, we spent the entire day in t-shirts driving from the flying bridge. We departed Myrtle Beach at 9:45 and arrived at 4 pm in Georgetown, a historic and quaint little town with houses dating to before the American revolution. We had dinner last night at the "River Room", which was excellent. 

The high in Georgetown today is expected to be 74 degrees, and Charleston will be even warmer as we continue to move south. We expect to travel from Charleston to Beaufort, SC tomorrow and on to Savannah Friday.

Back on the boat

We are back on the boat. Paul Hamilton and I drove up from home to Southport, NC yesterday in a rental car. It is interesting that we could drive up in just over five hours, but the trip home on the boat will take more than five days (50 miles per hour or 50 miles per day). The weather was cold and rainy when we arrived, but promises to be great for the week. We had planned to head out this morning with stops in Myrtle Beach, Georgetown, Charleston, and Beaufort, SC, but it now appears we will be here one more day to finish up a few items.

We might have some options along the way to go offshore, depending on the weather. Georgetown to Charleston would be a good day to do so, as would Beaufort to Savannah, but we shall see.

The boat has been something of a movable repair project so far. Many issues have been resolved in Southport and there will no doubt be many more as we arrive close to home. This is, all-in-all, a great boat, but apparently no one did any maintenance for the past several years. We are making progress, and I won't bore you with the details.

We came up bearing the new flag of our home port at The Ford Plantation. We hoisted it today on the bow.

UPDATE @ 10  PM Monday 2.4.19: Many things came together early today, and we did indeed get away from Southport at around 10 am this morning. It was a beautiful day of cruising, with temperatures reaching around 70. We arrived mid-afternoon in Myrtle Beach, SC. 

Please click "Where's the boat?" above to track our progress.