January 17, 2007 Kilkenny Creek Marina, GA

The last few days we’ve been meandering south from Charleston, SC where we spent one night. We had a planned set of anchorages heading south toward St. Simons, Island where we are going to visit Rick’s 1st grade buddy. Of course one can only execute such a plan based on short term weather. As we always do, we listen to the National Weather Service on the VHF radio daily. Hearing that a cold snap was coming along with 20 – 30 mph winds, and rain were headed our way, we moved the plan ahead. So we anchored on the next night and then ran the following day to a little marina we had visited when we brought the boat home. The weather guys are again right … it’s cold and very windy.

We will be in this marina for two days, waiting out the weather. The wind is blowing hard and the rain is coming. So we decided to have a down day in this marina in North Georgia, in a funky little creek called Kilkenny, behind Ossabaw Island, GA! The cool thing about this marina is that it probably hasn’t changed in 100 years, I’m not sure if that includes the docks. There are live oak trees with Spanish moss hanging on them that look to be hundreds of years old.

This morning when I woke up I looked out and saw about 30 or so hunters on the dock, all decked out in their hunting gear, their dogs, a few kids and loads and loads of stuff that looked like it was for camping (except for the guns!). Rick went up and talked to them and they told him they were going ‘wild boar’ hunting on Ossabaw Island until Sunday. Now, it is freezing here, and the rain is coming but these guys are given the date based on a GA State quota system, and they can go do this fun thing, only on the dates they are given by applying almost a year in advance, so they have to go no matter the weather. So, there are whole families going off on this adventure. Yikes! I guess just different kinds of hobbies.

The other weird thing is that last night Rick woke up at about 1:00 am to see a flashlight being shined all over the boat. Then they came back after 2:00 am. This isn’t the kind of marina that has “uniformed security guards.” In fact, it is a rickety, old, very small marina and except for several small boats we are the only ones here! I didn’t wake up for that but Rick felt real uncomfortable and stayed up for a bit. He thought that someone was thinking about breaking in. Oh well! Always exciting.

The winds are now blowing at 25-30 mph. All in all, a good day to be safe and warm at the marina. One of us did boat chores, the other gave herself a manicure and pedicure!

(Ed:Rick: So today I worked on a few little items that had been on “the list” for some time. After wrestling with the heating system to bring forth warmth, I managed to fix two things and only broke one … so, I guess I’m winning … for the moment.)

January 15, 2007 At anchorage in New River, SC

We covered 63 miles today, about 7 hours. We had planned only half that many miles but there is a cold front moving in and the weather guys are expecting 25 - 35 mph coastal winds starting tomorrow afternoon so we thought we better hurry up. So tomorrow we plan to be safely in a marina at Kilkenny Creek. We had several random pictures that we wanted to share. Rick and I took a walk down the street leading to Wacca Wache marina a few days ago.

This little guy was waddling down the street and stopped for Rick to take his picture. He literally froze, so Rick assumed he might have thought it was a gun or something. Then he happily went on his way!

The tidal range where we were anchored last night is about 4 feet. We are used to more like 1-2 feet. We checked the tide table and did the math, finally anchoring in 10' of water, which would give us about 2' under the keel at low tide. So we discovered tides are analog systems as well ... they're close, but not necessarily dead on. Rickshaw hit the mud and the low water alarm kept beeping until the tide turned at 11:30 last night, but since we were at anchor no harm done. Another lesson learned. This is a picture of the mud flats as a result of the receeding tide.

More pictures of the birds behind the boat.

These are vultures drying their feathers.

South Carolina palm trees.

The Charleston bridge raising behind the Battery...old and new!!

More Battery homes. We read that the small ones start at a $1 million and the larger ones go for $7 million! View of one of the streets of the Battery from the water.

January 14, 2007 South Edisto River Anchorage, SC

Southward!! On Thursday, we traveled 30 miles from North Myrtle Beach to South Myrtle Beach. We docked in Wacca Wache marina because it is close to where my brother and his wife live. It is on the Waccamaw River which is fabulous. It is a wide, winding river full of cypress trees with hanging Spanish moss. We knew we were in South Carolina. Tom and Carolyn came to the boat and then we had a great evening at a Thai Restaurant and got caught up with what everyone has been doing. We even got treated to dinner! We hope to get the next dinner on the way back north. It was great to see them again.



We left on Friday morning and headed south to one of the best anchorages we have stayed in. It was my first time at taking the boat off the dock and I didn’t hit anything and was very happy! (ed:RR: she did a fantastic job). We anchored that evening in Awendaw Creek in the Santee National Wildlife Refuge. There wasn’t a thing around except for water, endless saw grass, dolphins and lots and lots of birds. It was just a wonderful, peaceful place. We’ll make a return trip there.

Someone enjoying the end of the day.

The next day we were on our way to Charleston. We passed a lot of funky homes and also some palaces. We timidly worked our way across Charleston Harbor, and stayed in one of the marinas near the Battery. On this trip, the only thing we saw of the town was the Harris Teeter!

This was a funky one. Below is, well, you can see for yourself!

This is the new Charleston Bridge. It is a pretty sight.

The Battery.

During this trip we saw our first bald eagle, Sandhill cranes (the tall ones) flew over the boat, and last night in Charleston we saw 3 sea otters playing with a dolphin, all of whom appeared to be watching the sunset, like us. Several dolphins have decided to play in the boat wake and it is great fun to watch them. When they get bored with that, they just disappear to parts unknown .

The forsythia is blooming in SC, so are the azaleas and the star magnolias. The weather is a bit scary!

We are now in an anchorage off of the South Edisto River. It is lovely, but the coolest thing is that we are looking out on a ‘House’ as it is shown on the chart. Turns out that the house is the Prospect Hill Plantation built in 1790. The design of the plantation was by a guy named John Hoban who also was the architect of the White House on Pennsylvania Ave. We don’t see any lights in the house and it looks like it might be abandoned, which is a shame.

This evening at anchor we cranked up the starboard generator to charge up all the batteries and run the house 110V plugs. While Rick was in the shower, the generator decided to drop dead. All the lights went out, so we cranked up the port generator and continued with the evenings festivities which included hamburgers on the grill. At the moment Rick thinks it’s an oil pressure problem; always something to learn. We also anchored in about 9.5 feet of water, which seemed a generous pleanty at the time. It’s now near low tide and we are close to bumping mud; always something to learn.

We have been averaging 38 miles a day so the pace is very slow. Nice, though. These guys followed us for a bit looking for fish in our wake.