A couple weeks in North Myrtle Beach
We had a several quiet weeks at the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club (MBYC) along with a Thanksgiving visit to my cousins Tim and Karen in Emerald Isle, NC. I really enjoyed spending 3 1/2 days with Tim and Karen. Laura also got a bunch of baking in - in a real kitchen! Once again (this seems to be a theme for this trip), we had great food, good wine and awesome company. Unfortunately, the only picture we took the whole week was a "selfie" I took on a walk to the ocean which is only an 8 minute walk from their house.
Thanksgiving was the "full Monty feast" with 9 of us enjoying the best snacks and dinner that Karen, Tim and Laura could have possibly made - I supervised from the sidelines. We were joined by their good friends Mike and Jen, their Son and his wife, and neighbor Bob who fit right in.
We had rented a car for the Thanksgiving trip and, before returning it, again stocked up the boat with groceries and a few boat items from West Marine.
I think it was the next day after we returned from Tim and Karen's that Laura took down all the Fall decorations, did a thorough cleaning, then re-decorated for Christmas. Here was just one side of the salon when she was done.
We were not sure how long we were staying so I made tentative reservations for December in case we needed to extend. The marina had originally told us there wasn't an open slip after our month was up on December 9th but I think Laura's contribution of bake-goods to the marina staff helped our cause. We would have to move the boat but we had another dock reserved.
Temps for the past week had fallen into the 30s a couple nights and the boat was collecting a lot of moisture on the walls. Laura was doing her excellent job of trying to keep up with it but the cold fiberglass hull against the warm air inside made it hard to control. We were running our central heat full-time to keep the boat comfy.
A few days after arriving at the marina, we were woken up in the middle of the night by our Air Conditioner / Heater making a loud screeching noise. It was not a very nice way to wake up... I got up and found that the screeching sound was coming from the seawater pump on the heater. Our Webasto AC / Heat system is like a heat-pump that uses seawater instead of outside air like your home. Because water absorbs much more heat (or cold) than air, boat systems can be much smaller. But, they require a pump to keep the seawater flowing through them. I turned off the heater and went back to bed with a second blanket.
Over the next few days, I found that the condenser in the heat-pump was probably leaking into the seawater system. As the heater cycled off (when the cabin got up to the set temperature), a small refrigerant leak in the condenser was pushing the water out of the lines and un-priming the pump. I called a local refrigeration technician (recommended by the marina) who charged me $100 to say it was a sealed system that he couldn't repair or add refrigerant. Bummer.
By the way, the system was not putting out heat or A/C now. Fan would blow but it was kaput.
Good news was the exact same Webasto system is still made and they were available from Defender.com. I ordered a new one ($1,550) and it arrived two days later. In the meantime, we dug out 2 space heaters to keep the boat warm.
It took Laura and I a couple hours to lug the box down to the boat (even with a dock cart), take the box apart and move the new system down into the salon. Here is the new system on the right with the old one on the left. The old one is still connected to all the electronics but I've taken off the two water hoses to get it out from under the stairs.
Over the next several hours I meticulously removed each wire from the old electronic box and hooked it into the new box. This was made a little more difficult because of the "Easy Start" I put in a couple years ago to let our small Honda generator start the AC compressor. For the Easy-Start installation, I had to re-wire part of the AC electronics. Now I had to do that again for the new system.
The only major problem I had was the new system had 3/4" water line hookups and the old system was 5/8". They did include 5/8 to 3/4 adapters which made me use about all the correct size hose clamps I had in stock. After thinking about it a bit, I decided to change the boat hoses to 3/4". It only required a different hose fitting on the pump which I found in my stash. Then I was able to remove the stupid adapters and all the hose clamps. Much better!
A few hours later (I think it took me all day) I turned on the new AC / Heat at it worked! I cycled between heat and AC a few times and everything seemed great. I even tried running it off the Honda generator and that worked too.
Laura and I cleaned everything up and took a giant cart-load to the dumpster. Done!
(Note that less than two weeks later Defender.com had a sale on these exact Air-Conditioners / Heaters. I sent them an email asking for a refund. A few days later my credit card showed $192 credit. That was pretty awesome of Defender. Don't think most places would have done that.)
During one of our daily walks, I took this picture of Second Wind in the packed marina. She is about middle picture with the burgundy trim and sails covers.
Russ and Pam returned on Friday, December 1st which was Russ' first day of retirement. Congratulations!! We had dinner together that night at the Officer's Club. They were leaving for "the warm" on Sunday and we still were not sure when we were leaving. (I know I haven't explained our reasons for staying here this long but they were personal and I'd rather not share.) At one point during dinner, Pam said something like, "You should just stop thinking about it and go." Maybe it was the tequila or wine's fault but about 10 minutes later we decided to go with them. Woo Hoo. We're out of here!
I know this is a short synopsis of our 3+ weeks in Myrtle Beach but the days seemed to blend together. We were able to spend a few valuable days with our friend Sandy who lives nearby including a fun night at the North Myrtle Beach Christmas tree lighting then dinner at Flynn's Irish Tavern. I highly recommend Flynn's for the best Fish 'n Chips I've ever had (Grouper!) and awesome live music.
On Saturday, Pam and Laura took an Uber for groceries and booze. By Saturday evening, both boats were stocked and ready to go. We had a short cocktail hour with Pam, Russ and a few friends on Apre' Ski' then we retired early so I could finish a few last minute boat projects. Sandy even stopped by to share a glass of wine with us. We will miss you!
I want to say how great the facilities and staff were at the Yacht Club. Everything was very nice for our stay including laundry and excellent on-site restaurant. Uber to anyplace in North Myrtle Beach was only around $10 each way. Our marina bill was $644 for the monthly slip and metered electric which came in at $43.
Sunday, December 3rd (Day 57) - Myrtle Beach to WinYah Bay
Cold, misty and fog in the morning. Sunny and warming in the afternoon. 52 degrees, water temp 58. No wind.
58 nautical miles today (879.5 total trip miles)
After researching the tides for the next few days, I knew we had to
leave early to make it through the shallow area near McClellanville and
the Ben Sawyer Bridge (on Monday) with enough water for our 5.5 foot keel not rub. The tides were actually very favorable for the next several days with low tide in the early morning moving about 1/2 hour later each day. This was excellent for traveling through the ICW in South Carolina and Georgia because we'd have high water for the whole afternoon.
Laura and I were up before first light to leave as soon as it was light enough to see clearly. I had filled our water tank the night before. After engine checks and starting, I turned on all our instruments and setup the iPad with AquaMaps in the cockpit. We folded up our step-ladder, brought in the power cord and released the dock lines. I slowly backed out of the slip which was made much easier because the boat next to us had left over a week ago. We had a clear shot out of the marina.
15 minutes later we motored out of the marina and turned south on the ICW. Holy Cow. It was CSS (Can't See Shit). The fog was so thick I could see only 200-300 feet. Both side of the channel were in the fog. We slowly motored to the Little River swing bridge and only waited about 10 minutes for them to open. After passing through with another sailboat, we took the lead through the Myrtle Beach "Rock Pile". This is a VERY narrow channel with rocks extending from the shore on both sides. There is barely room for two boats to pass each other (if you are careful). I used my radar, drilled all the way in, to keep us in the center of the shore on each side as I slowly motored through Myrtle Beach. About an hour later the fog started to clear and I was pretty happy.
Today was "Fuel Day" and Osprey Marina has been our fuel stop for many years. Hmmm. Something happened there. I think the owner had a construction business so used lots of diesel (real low prices). I wonder if the marina changed hands recently because now the price was pretty high. On the way north last Spring we had found the Wacca Wache Marina on the Waccamaw River had good prices. Laura checked on-line and found Wacca Wache was almost 60 cents cheaper than Osprey. Good bye Osprey.
A couple hours later we entered the Waccamaw River and were soon passed by Russ and Pam who had slept in a bit (they run about 2 knots faster then us).
About an hour later we pulled into the Wacca Wache marina and took on 70 gallons of diesel. That was our usage since Norfolk about 400 miles ago. Diesel price was $3.84. We did have a problem during the fill with lots of bubbling up. The marina tech stuck a piece of pen in the boat's fuel vent and cleaned out what looked like a mud-dauber nest. The fill-up went much better after that. I added cleaning the vent to my list of boat jobs.
I had hoped to make the Minim Creek anchorage tonight which would set us up nicely for high water tomorrow through the shallow areas. Unfortunately, the tidal currents were not helpful today. At 5:45pm we anchored about 7 miles before that in WinYah Bay near the ICW entrance. It was a pretty anchorage and we spent a quiet night on the hook for the first time in several weeks.
Russ and Pam stayed at a marina in Georgetown, SC a few miles back. They'll pass us again tomorrow morning. This is the typical "ICW Dance" we see all the time. Powerboats go faster than us but usually do shorter days. So we get passed by the same folks every day.
Monday, December 4th (Day 58) - WinYah Bay to Stono River
51 degrees, water temp 56. Cloudy most of the day with light winds.
58.5 nautical miles today (938 total trip miles)
Our goal for today was to make it through Charleston and the Wappoo Creek Bridge before 3:30pm. The bridge will not open between 3:30pm and 6pm because of rush-hour car traffic. If we were late for the 3:30 opening, we'd have to anchor in Charleston Harbor and get waked by power boats all evening and early morning. Plus, we would have to wait until 9:30am tomorrow morning to pass through because of morning rush-hour. If we could make that bridge before 3:30, we'd have a much nicer anchorage on the Stono River and be about 20 miles closer to Beaufort - our planned stop tomorrow.
I had the alarm set for 6:10am and we were pulling the anchor at 6:45am just as the sky started getting light. By time we motored 1/2 mile back to the ICW, it was plenty light enough to see where we were going. It was a cool but peaceful morning on the ICW.
Tidal currents helped much of the day and we hit a rising tide through McClellanville where it turns out we would have hit bottom if it was low tide.
Russ and Pam did pass us a few hours later but the boat traffic was pretty thin. I think we only saw 2 other boats - both large power-catamarans that passed us in the morning (and would pass us again tomorrow morning).
We passed through the Ben Sawyer Bridge (opens on demand during the week) at 2:10pm. Now we had an hour and 20 minutes to make only about 7 miles to Wappo Creek Bridge. No problem, right?
Crossing Charleston Harbor I love the waterfront homes.
As we crossed the harbor, we were slowed by the ebb tidal current. I watched the ETA on my GPS go from 3:15 to 3:25. Yikes! More RPMs! (really wouldn't help now...)
We entered the last section before the bridge and I took this picture of the Charleston City Marina. Check out the mast height on the red sailboat. It's gotta be 100 feet.
Somehow I missed Apre' Ski in this picture. They were docked about 3 more boats to the left. Bummer.
We did make the Wappo Creek Bridge 3:30 opening with 5 minutes to spare. 1/2 mile later was Elliott Cut - a narrow channel with high currents between the Stono and Ashley rivers. The boat slowed to 2 knots for the 1/4 mile passage but never stopped. A short while later WE WERE FREE!
Another hour working our way up the Stono and we anchored on the southern shore at 4:45pm. Now we were setup nicely to make Beaufort tomorrow afternoon.
An interesting sky and sunset from our anchorage.
It was another quiet night on Second Wind.
Tuesday, December 5th (Day 59) - Stono River to Beaufort, SC
58 degrees. Water temp 62. Partly cloudy with light winds again.
57 nautical miles today (989 total trip miles)
Anchor up at 7:30am. We slept in a little as our reward for making the Wappoo Creek bridge yesterday.
Today was another nice day for traveling through several ICW problem area because of the rising tide late morning and afternoon. I had no worries about shallow passages because we had several feet of tidal water under us through all the bad spots.
My plan was to make it through the Lady's Island Bridge in Beaufort and pick up a mooring at the City Marina tonight. After we were underway for a couple hours, I check the rush-hour lockout on the Lady's Island Bridge and it had changed for the worse (for the boaters). We had to be there by 3:30pm which I didn't think was possible. Time for a change of plans.
We decided to book a night at Lady's Island Marina where we've stayed several times in the past. Laura called and had no problem booking a slip for us. Whoa! Some land-time? Hehe. It's only been 3 days folks.
It was a nice ride on the ICW and we turned south down Brickyard Creek around 3pm. We were at high tide and you could really tell by how close the channel markers were to the water. Geez. If the water was much higher, the marker would be underwater.
45 minutes later we tied up at the marina. The dockmaster was awesome. After tying up, we asked to use the loaner car for some shopping. He said it was out and would be back around 5pm. He'd give us the spare key and we could just leave the key under the floor mat when we got back. Nice!
Our engine was about 10 hours from needing an oil change so I started the oil draining into the container I had for the job. I figured I'd finish the oil change when we returned from shopping. When Laura came back from checking in and told me about having to wait for the loaner-car, I decided to do the whole oil change now. Maybe not the best idea....
The engine was still really hot as I removed the oil filter and installed the new one. Now sweat was dripping off my face onto the engine as I sucked out the transmission fluid (with a vacuum pump) and refilled it with fresh fluid. I removed the old oil container from the bilge and closed off the drain hose. After refilling the engine with 2 1/2 gallons of Rotella T5 oil, I started the engine to make sure no leaks. Everything was fine so I spent the next 15 minutes cleaning up. The whole thing took about 1 hour and 20 minutes. Maybe a new record!
But now I was hot and exhausted. I took a quick shower and put on clean clothes for public viewing. We walked up to the office with the used oil and trash before finding the loaner pickup truck.
We had a short list of a few things that were not critical - bank, liquor store and groceries. Bill's Liquor was our first stop. They are the cheapest liquor store we've ever found. We didn't need much but just added a few things to our stock (like my 1800 tequila). The bank was just a kiosk so wasn't helpful but the grocery store was in the same mall. 1/2 hour (and $90) later we were headed back to the boat. Oh. We did pickup a roaster chicken and some sides at the grocery store for dinner.
During the night a front came through (why I wanted a mooring or marina for tonight) and the wind switched from the west to north. I woke up a few times thinking the north wind was going to make leaving harder since it would be blowing the boat onto the dock. Oh well.... I have tricks to get around this.
Georgia tomorrow!
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