Not much going on today on Second Wind as we stayed at Myrtle Beach Yacht Club for another 2 days to sit out the storms tonight and tomorrow.
Sandy came by to pick up Laura for their "girls day out" and I think they both enjoyed it a lot. Sandy's husband (and our friend) John passed away 2 years ago and she is now living alone in Myrtle Beach. I'm sure she was happy for Laura's company and Laura has only had me to talk with for several days so she needed a break too.
I caught up on some finances and my favorite Internet sites. My plans to change the oil and other maintenance never came about but, oh well.... tomorrow is another day.
Lee and Linda on Slow Cruisin' came into the marina around 2pm and tied up across the fairway from us. I went over around 3:30pm to say hello and we decided it was cocktail time a short while later. Laura came back with lots of groceries around 5pm so I helped her truck them down to the boat and put stuff away. We then walked back to Slow Cruisin' for dinner. Lee and I grilled pork loins on the marina grill. Laura made mashed cauliflower plus we had some of her homemade applesauce. It was a fun night since we hadn't seen Lee and Linda since Haverstraw Bay 5 weeks ago.
Friday, November 8th, (Day 43 - start of week 7)
Today was maintenance-day. I started by filling the salt container on our waste treatment system. Then I started our main engine to warm it up for the oil change. While the engine was warming up, I unpacked our hose and filled our water tank. It was pretty low and I put in about 150 gallons which brought it to 7/8s. We have plans to stay in Beaufort in just 3 days so no reason to carry full tanks.
After the warm-up, I drained the engine oil into a 3 gallon container (the engine holds 2.5 gallons of oil). Then I brought in the water hose and Laura put on her "bilge monkey" hat and climbed into the bilge. We had gotten a little oil in the bilge which was making things a little smelly. After cleaning out all the oil we could, we used the hose to flush / clean the bilge. Of course our bilge pump stopped working so we also had to fix that (it had gotten clogged from all our flushing).
I then changed the engine oil filter and drained / filled the transmission oil. After filling the engine oil, I started the engine and let the oil circulate while looking for any new leaks. No problems so onto the next job.
Our new Honda 2200 gas generator was close to the 20 hour break-in so I started it and plugged in Laura's hair dryer on high to put it under load. This generator is the easiest engine to change the oil.... After shutting off, I picked it up and put it on one of our back boxes. I had a plastic quart container which I put under the oil drain then tilted the generator to let all the oil out. After it was drained, I filled it back up with new oil using a funnel through the same hole. The whole process took about 10 minutes and now it was good for another 100 hours.
We both relaxed the rest of the day and I took an hour nap in the afternoon. Linda had made dinner reservations for us and several of their friends that live in Myrtle Beach at the marina restaurant called the Officers Club. We all met up there around 6pm for cocktails and a very nice dinner.
Here are the 5 couples at the Officer's Club, Myrtle Beach Yacht Club -
Saturday, November 9th (Day 44)
A major problem for boats traveling south is the ICW near McClellanville - about 40 miles north of Charleston. This area has been a problem for boats over the past 6 or 7 years because it has become shallower and shallower from currents bringing in silt and sand. Now, there is barely 4 feet at low tide so we typically go around by taking the ocean from WinYah Bay to Charleston Harbor. The seas were going to be high tomorrow so we wanted to take the ICW this trip. The high tide is around 7am with low tide around 1pm tomorrow (Sunday). So, we wanted to get as close as possible today to take advantage of the higher tide in the early morning.
I had the alarm set for 6am figuring we would need about 30-45 minutes to get the boat ready and leave the slip. The temperature was 38 degrees as we got the boat ready. I dug out my long-jons, winter coat and gloves. There were no problems and we pulled out of the marina at 6:40am. We had about 1 knot of current helping us through Myrtle Beach and the three bridges that have to open for us during the first 20 miles. Everything went fine and we pulled into Osprey Marina for fuel around 10am. 61 gallons for the 370 miles from Norfolk. Nice!
We entered the upper Waccamaw just after high tide. We slowed a little than picked up the ebb current on the river all the way down to Georgetown, SC. Slow Cruisin' left about 1.5 hours after us and passed us on the river. Here they are coming up on us -
It was a beautiful but chilly day and we made great time.
We were both upset with the cold weather coming this far south and next week was supposed to be even worse. While motoring through Myrtle Beach, we talked about what we were going to do for the next 3 weeks. We had reservations at New Smyrna Beach for the month of December figuring we would rent a car for the month and drive back to NY for the holidays. But, we were way ahead of schedule. We talked about maybe St. Marys, GA for Thanksgiving which we've really enjoyed in the past. Only problem is that's only about a week from here and we have almost 3 weeks until Thanksgiving. We could stay at a few places we like (Beaufort, SC?) but the moorings there are in lots of current and the marinas are expensive unless you stay for a month or more. Plus, we get bored with staying more than a couple days in places since we don't have a car.
I broached the idea of maybe we keep going and stay in Marathon for the month of December. We had 3 weeks (or more) and could easily make the Florida Keys by the first week in December. Laura and I decided to talk and think about it while we were traveling.
Here are the other parts of our thought process for deciding on Marathon versus New Smyrna for December -
- We like to travel. Bruce Van Sant (a boating author we like) would call us Globe Trotters. We don't typically stay many days in places sightseeing and visiting museums, etc. but would rather keep moving and see the countryside going by.
- The next 3 days are going to be very calm on the southeast coast. It would be easy to jump off-shore for an overnight and be in St. Augustine on Tuesday.
- Temps in this area next week are going to be 50s and 30s for several days. In St. Augustine, it will be 70s and 50s.
Finally, we decided to call Burdines Marina in Marathon to see if they even had a slip available for us. Yes! They did and we could come in anytime the first week or two in December.
So... big change of plans for us. We are going to work our way south tomorrow and Monday then jump off-shore Monday or Tuesday night for St. Augustine. We'll spend the next 3-4 weeks working our way down the coast of Florida and tentatively arrive in Marathon on December 10th. That will give us plenty of time to spend a few days in our favorite places like St. Augustine, Stuart and Key Biscayne.
We made 61 nautical miles today on the ICW which is very good for us. Slow Crusin' and Second Wind are anchored next to each other in Minim Creek about 45 miles from Charleston. Here was the sunset tonight that Laura took with her Nikon. It's very pretty here especially since the cold has driven away all the bugs.
Tomorrow we should past Charleston then Beaufort area on Monday. I'll keep you posted!
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