It's been 11 days since I updated the blog and I wasn't sure I was going to keep it up for this trip. Sometimes, it seems like a lot of work but I do it mostly for myself. I really like going back through the blog and reminding myself of what we've done. Especially now that I'm getting older and my memory needs a little assistance. Anyway, we anchored early today (April 30th) and I had some extra time so decided to sit at the computer and write a bit. Thanks for tagging along!
Tuesday, April 20th - Day 6
It was a quiet day on Second Wind. We were not moving today because of rain and storms in the area. Our friends Dean and Sue on Autumn Borne were anchored near us and they decided to leave in the early morning to try and see friends in Daytona later in the day. They made it only a couple miles before lightning struck the water near them so they took this as a sign and turned around to anchored in almost the same spot they just left.
I played my flute a bit in the afternoon and we worked a few minor boat projects. We were very pleased with the lack of leaks in the boat after all the work last Winter. We had replaced 14 of our ports and completely re-bedded the new ones. Plus we sanded and painted all the decks and cabin top. No more leaks! Yea!
After the storms passed by late afternoon, it was a colorful sunset.
Wednesday, April 21st - Day 7
The next few days were going to be fairly short at only 45 miles each so I hadn't set the alarm for this morning. I had texted Dean the night before about when they were leaving and, once again, we got our plans mixed up. I thought he was leaving later and he thought I was leaving earlier.
We released the mooring at 8:20am. Autumn Borne had already left and they were far enough away that I couldn't see them. After getting the boat running back in the ICW, I texted Dean and they were only a few miles ahead. They ran slow and we eventually caught up.
Winds were quiet today and we didn't even put any sails out until the last couple hours into Daytona. It was a typical day on the ICW with many powerboats passing us in both directions. Most of them were kind to us and slowed down to less wake.
We anchored in our favorite Daytona spot just before the new Memorial Bridge. Dean had never been in here before because the entrance was a little tricky. He followed me in and we both anchored near each other at 3:45pm.
Our plan was to drop the dinghy, lower the outboard off the deck and motor into Caribbean Jacks for their Mahi BLT dinner. We invited Dean and Sue along and they accepted. After tying up at Caribbean Jacks, we dropped some trash in the supplied bin and took about a mile walk to loosen up legs that hadn't been off the boat in 7 days since Marathon. My legs were a little wobbly until they got used to walking more than 40 feet.
It was a fun evening with friends but we were surprised at the lack of face masks or social distancing. I guess over the past week Florida's Governor decided he had enough with COVID and said it was over. We wore masks in and out of the restaurant with several folks looking at us funny.
Dinner was very good and both couples split a Mahi BLT sandwich. We also split their huge Banana Foster for dessert. See last year's blog for a picture of the dessert. Here we are after dinner feeling happy and full.
Back to the boat and a quiet evening to relax.
42nm today, 326.5 total miles for the trip
Thursday, April 22nd - Day 8
Yesterday we had made reservations for a mooring in St. Augustine for tonight and the next 3 nights to sit out storms and high winds. I wanted to get there a little early so we were up and out of the anchorage by 7:30am.
Winds were on the nose all day so no help from the sails. This sections is always crazy with boaters and today did not disappoint us. Boats were zooming both directions all day.
The wind was blowing 15-20 as we picked up our mooring. When I called the marina and said we were close, they assigned me a mooring way at the south end. I mentioned we probably wouldn't be able to get their WiFi down there so they called me back a little later with an assignment closer to the marina. Yea!
We had made plans for dinner in town with our friend Paul. We met him and his wife Ursula at Burdines Marina in Marathon the previous Winter. They own a sister-ship to Second Wind - another Endeavour 43 - which is on-the-hard in St. Augustine for major repairs. But, the wind was cold and blowing hard so instead we invited Paul onto the boat for one of Laura's home-cooked meals.
I took the dinghy into the marina to pay for 3 nights on the mooring and pick up Paul. Back at the boat we had a nice reunion with munchies and white wine. Ursula is back visiting family in NC. I later grilled a pork loin and I was a little surprised the wind didn't blow out the grill. We had a very nice evening then I took Paul back to the marina.
45nm today, 371.5 total miles for the trip
Friday, April 23rd - Day 9
Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures while we were in St. Augustine for 3 days. Sorry about that....
We made plans to meet Paul (and his car) at the Winn Dixie around 11am. Laura and I took the dink into the marina and walked the 2 miles to the grocery store. It was a nice walk on a beautiful day. A little windy and cool but great for walking.
After grocery shopping Paul drove us back to the marina and we lugged 14 bags of grocery's back to the boat with the dinghy. This is always a chore and I'm happy we don't do it too often.
We all went to dinner together after driving around St. Augustine looking for a restaurant that had availability. The third time was a charm as we pulled into Culinary Outfitters, put our name on the list for a table, then went to the bar area for drinks and munchies. This place was very nice but, once again, we were a little leery of being around so many people without masks. I guess a year of wanting to be "safe" leaves a few scars. Just a note that I've had my COVID shots but Laura has not. Florida lowered it's age limit too soon before we left for her to sign up.
Sitting outside was again a little cool so I put on a sweatshirt and Laura put on her jacket. We asked our waitress for an inside table but our dinners showed up first so we stayed.
Paul drove us back to the marina just after sunset and we spent the rest of the evening quietly on the boat.
Saturday, April 24th - Day 10
Looking at the weather forecasts, tomorrow morning didn't seem very nice to be leaving with storms predicted until noon. I called the marina and extended our mooring for Sunday night.
Winds were up during the day so we didn't even take the dinghy into town. Just before dinner, they calmed down enough to run the grill. We had purchased some nice t-bone steaks yesterday so we decided to grill one up fresh tonight. In the foil are mixed veggies and butter that steam in the bag. They were yummy.
While we were eating dinner, the setting Sun peaked through the trees over St. Augustine.
We moved everything down below out of the cockpit since major storms were coming through tonight. Dean and Sue had moved on to Fernandina and the storms were already going through there. Batten down the hatches!
Sunday, April 25th - Day 11
I was awake much of the night watching the storms on RADAR and feeling the boat getting pushed around by the high winds. A little after 4am we had a major storm cell coming right at us. We were at the blue dot.
Around 6am the last of the storms went through and we slept a peaceful few hours. The weather forecast had been wrong and the rest of the day was beautiful.
We decided to get a little head start on the long trip to Fernandina tomorrow so left the mooring at 2:45pm to sail up the Tolomato River about 10 miles to a nice anchorage we had stayed at before. It was a lovely jib-sail up the river for a few hours.
The anchorage was very quiet and nice after all the powerboats went home for dinner. The almost full moon really lit everything up.
8nm today, 379.5 total trip miles
Monday, April 26th - Day 12
The section of the ICW between St. Augustine and Fernandina was a real challenge in the past. But now, because of dredging and better charts, it's usually not too bad. But, we would be going through some of the worst parts at low tide so I wanted to give us time to wait if we had to.
Anchor up at 6:30am and underway on a clear, calm day. A few hours later we motored through this long straightaway in Palm Valley. Very pretty area. Look how calm the water was.
The tides helped us almost all day and we made excellent time. In fact, we were just before Fernandina as the tide went low-low. Since it was a full moon, the tides are lower and higher than normal as the moon lines up with the Sun to pull / push the water. I checked the tides on our GPS and the tide now was approaching 1 foot BELOW LOW. Yikes! Check it out.
A short while later it seemed like we were motoring down a valley. Even the mussel beds were out of the water on the shore.
We made it through to Fernandina without "touching" and I was pretty happy. I made reservations for Brunswick Landing Marina tomorrow night so we decided to keep going a bit and anchor closer so we would have more time at the marina. We anchored near Black Hill River at 6pm - an 11 1/2 hour day on the water.
65nm today, 444.5 total trip miles
Tuesday, April 27th - Day 13
Woo Hoo! Marina day! Our first fuel, water and overnight marina since Marathon.
Anchor up at 7am as we prepared to motor around St. Andrew's Sound and Jekyll Island channel - two areas of the GA ICW that can be problematic. The ICW actually goes out into the ocean in St. Andrew's Sound to get around the very shallow parts. When the wind and tide are not nice, this can be a dangerous area.
Today the winds were only about 10 knots from the SE so the trip wasn't bad. There was a light, 2 foot swell we motored into on our way out and had on our stern coming back in. No problemo!
A short time later we motored around Jekyll Island which has a very narrow channel for sailboats. Today we were near high tide so no problems with this either. Exiting Jekyll channel, we turned up the Brunswick River to Brunswick Landing Marina.
We've stayed here many time in the past - once for almost 2 months over Thanksgiving and Christmas. This time we needed fuel (down to about 1/2 tank) but our water tank was below 1/4. We also had almost 2 weeks of dirty clothes and this marina has free washers and dryers.
At the fuel dock we took 81 gallons of diesel and 10 gallons of gasoline (for our dinghy and Honda generator). 81 gallons from Marathon is better than normal. Maybe because I'm able to turn off our huge alternator now and let the solar panels and wind generator charge the batteries for free. You know I'll be keeping track to see if this is true.
After fueling, we were assign a slip at the next dock so we motored over there and tied up in a few minutes. I get a kick out of the marina workers who see all kinds of boat drivers and are not sure what to expect. I've docked this boat probably 1,000 times in 14 years and have driven many other types of boats on deliveries and charters. I pulled into this slip probably faster than the dockhand expected because the wind was behind me and I needed to keep my speed up for steerage. If you slow down too much, the wind pushes you around and you have no water going by the rudder to steer. Anyway, Laura handed off the spring-line as the dockhand yelled, "Slow down Captain!". I already had the boat in reverse and increased to almost full throttle to stop the boat nicely along the dock. As I said, the marina worker was pretty surprised at the result.
We tied the boat up and hooked up to power. Laura got the laundry together and hauled it up to the marina with our luggage wheelie. I went to work washing down the boat and filled our water tank with about 180 gallons. The boat was now sitting much lower in the water than 1/2 hour ago with almost 2,000 pounds of fuel and water added.
Laura made quick work of the laundry since all the washers were empty at 2pm. She timed it almost exactly to my sitting down in the cockpit to get back to the boat. Yea! We had clean clothes again.
I gave Laura the choice of where to go for dinner. We were only spending one night in the marina (at $120 a night) so wanted to make the most use of our day. She decided on Mexican so we washed, dressed and walked to the El Puerto Aztecka restaurant about 3/4 mile from the marina. When we got there, they were closed on Tuesdays. Dang!
She next decided on Indigo Coastal Shanty which had great reviews on-line. It was only a few block away. When we got there, the parking lot was full and people were waiting outside. I went in and put my name on a list for a table. The gal told me maybe about 1/2 hour.
When I went back outside, we could see this bar across the parking lot called Tipsy McSway's. How could we turn down a name like that? We walked over intending to have a cocktail while we waited for our table at Indigo. But, it was pretty nice so we stayed. A short time later I got the call from Indigo and told them we decided to go somewhere else. We will try them next time.
Tipsy's had a great atmosphere. The menu explained that Tipsy was born on a ship crossing the International Date Line. His mother went into labor on Wednesday and he was born on Tuesday. Tipsy....
I ordered the Zombie (4 shots of different Rum plus a floater - limit 2 per customer) and Laura had a Mai Tai. They came in these cool glasses. We had to get a picture.
Their drink of the day was called, "Trinidady Issues". Too funny...
We were probably a little wobbly as we walked back to the boat. I'm glad we had taken care of all our chores before dinner.
But wait! There's more chores... I topped off our water tank and put away our hose. Then just about ready for bed.
20nm today, 464.5 total miles for trip
Wednesday, April 28th - Day 14
We left the marina at 7:15am and motored back down the Brunswick River to the ICW. Maybe you have read about the 656 foot long car carrier "Golden Ray" that flounder in the St. Simons Sound September 2019. I've posted a few picture on our trips by the wreck but now they are cutting it into slices like a big Wahoo. Here is a good article on it.
Leaving the marina we motored passed the Brunswick waterfront where they had just brought one of the slices to the dock. Check out this picture I took. This "slice" is on it's side with the keel of the ship to the right. The vertical lines are the decks inside the ship where 4,200 vehicles were stored.
This part of the ICW through lower Georgia is one of the most twisty-turny of the whole trip. When I saw we had logged 20 miles from the marina, I checked my GPS and we were only 10 “crow” miles from where we started. Geez!
I used our jib to help whenever possible and we were able to keep our average speed close to 6 knots. The day was fairly uneventful as we were on a rising tide through the typical shallow spots around here. We did get lucky that later in the afternoon, when the tide was low, we were traveling through sections where there was plenty of water. Overall it was a long day as I tried to eat up the Georgia ICW miles.
Another full-moon high tide today brought the channel markers down to the water.
We had planned to stop around St. Catherine's Sound for the night and go out the sound in the morning for an off-shore run up the coast. But, the winds were not good for those anchorages. I try to find an anchorage where the currents push the boat perpendicular to the wind. That way the wind is not fighting the current with the boat and we don't go around in circles on the anchor.
I decided to go a bit farther and we anchored at Buck Head Creek at 6:30pm. We had a quiet night at the nice anchorage.
67.5nm today, 532 total miles for the trip.
Thursday, April 29th - Day 15
Anchor up at 7am as we motored down Ossabaw Sound passed Hell Gate into the ocean. I don't like going out the Georgia inlets against the tidal current because it takes us forever to get off-shore where we can turn to our course up the coast. But today, the winds were helping so we rolled out our main and jib to help push us out. We held 6 knots against the tide which was pretty good for us.
A few hours later we turned NE up the Georgia coast. The seas were about the predicted height - 2 to 3 feet, short swell - but it was somewhat uncomfortable. I finally realized that there were two swells. One was coming from the ESE wind direction and the other out of the east. This was making the boat roll around pretty good and the apparent winds were only 5-7 knots so not helping stabilize the boat. We had to keep the motor running or our speed dropped below 3 knots. I eventually sheeted the main in tight which really cut down on the roll and made things much more comfortable for us riding along.
The nice thing about sailing off-shore on this part of Georgia is the inlets are pretty close so there is a wide selection to choose from depending on how long you want to spend out there. If it was nice, we would have motor-sailed overnight to Winyah Bay or Cape Fear River. But we like to sleep at night and this boat motion would not have been good for sleeping.
Instead, we decided to come in at the South Edisto River and anchor a few miles up by the ICW. One reason I picked here was the tide was just starting to flood so it would help us in. It worked out well and we anchored at 7pm then Laura made us a nice pasta dinner.
We were rewarded with this nice sunset and calm anchorage.
74.5nm today, 606.5 total trip miles
Friday, April 30th - Day 16
Today was another day of choices. The forecast for off-shore looked pretty nice but it would take us a long time to go back down the South Edisto against the current. Instead we pulled the anchor up at 7:30am and motored up the ICW toward Charleston.
It was only about 30 miles to Charleston so we had a few options. We typically do not stop in Charleston as the marina is expensive and the anchorages not nice. Usually, we anchor before Elliott Cut on the Stono River. That sets us up for running all the way to Winyah Bay and maybe Georgetown the next day.
Today, we got to Elliott cut around 1pm. We could keep going through the harbor and onto the other side up the ICW. The anchorages within range there have lots of current and not much swing room.
We could also continue out Charleston Harbor and sail up to Winyah Bay off-shore. The winds and seas looked good for this but we would be entering Winyah Bar around 11pm and anchoring around midnight. We were not in that much of a hurry.
Instead we anchored on the Stono River just south of Elliott Cut at 1:30pm. Tomorrow the currents in Elliott Cut turn against us at 7am so we have to leave here early in order to make it through there. That will set us up nicely for the rest of the day past Charleston to Georgetown with a rising tide through some of the shallow areas.
Laura and I relaxed today and it took me over 3 hours to write this blog. We will leave here around 6am tomorrow or as soon as it's light enough to see the channel markers.
34.5nm today, 641 total trip miles
