What a splendid morning ! Other than the fact that neither one of us got much sleep during the night, nothing as drastic as dragging or anything of that sort, just the constant turbulent movement of the boat had both of us awake most of the night. It truly is a losing battle when currents and wind continually fight trying position the boat a certain way. Neither one wins and you kind of bounce quite uncomfortably, sideways. Yawn.
But oh, what a way to wake up !
We raised anchor and left Winyah Bay at twilight, and in the very icy cold. I lost count of how many layers I put on. The wind was just perfect though, and we had both our sails up before we even exited the channel. As Dave had planned, we rode the current out and we clocked in at over 8, woo-hoo !
When the sun was out in full force, it warmed up quite nicely and a few layers came off.
The ocean waters were warmer than the air, and the rising mist provided an eerie and glamorous backdrop, enveloping the shrimp boats and circling birds. What a beautiful, beautiful morning.
We even picked up a hitchhiker for awhile,
we think he was exhausted as he was pretty far from land, and he spend quite some time circling our boat trying to figure out if it was safe to land and rest. What beautiful orange-coloured wings he had !
We sailed along at 8 knots most of the morning, and the Capt'N was quite happy about that,
and if the Capt'N is happy, then so am I !!
We turned into the channel for Charleston with the incoming current, well ahead of our estimated ETA. And who did we see on our way in but Jerome and Sylvie (My Passion), heading out. We chatted briefly over the VHF and as with this type of lifestyle, sometimes you truly do wave "hello" and "goodbye" all at the same time.
We were lucky that there was no large container ship traffic coming in or out, but we did notice the Carnival Ship "Fantasy" was in town.
A quick stop at the diesel bar where we filled up our diesel tanks (in preparation of our departure) and got ourselves into our slip at the
Charleston Harbour Marina , on Patriot's Point, where there were way too many boat slips to count, and within sight of the USS Yorktown.
USS Yorktown is an aircraft carrier built during WW II for the United States Navy. She is named after the Battle of Yorktown of the American Revolutionary War.
Historically, Charleston was an entry point for slave traffic, an un-imaginable part of history, and history does have its stories, don't it ? Charleston almost didn't survive the economic depression that was triggered by the rice market, as it was too "poor to rebuild". Many of the old buildings were simply repaired instead of rebuilt, and today, some of the mansions sell for between $3 and $7 million dollars. million ! Can't wait to dig into some of the history here...
Best part of the whole thing was that our friends, David and Libby (Peregrine) were waiting for us with open arms, some peanut brittle and hugs all around. Brody was at the Spa getting groomed, and when he did come back, there were some serious puppy hugs and kisses coming our way, he must've remembered Dave and I were the "friends with bacon"!
In the evening we went for dinner at
The Wreck on Shem Creek, in the village of Mount Pleasant, and we had ourselves a wonderful evening laughing, sharing stories and adventures, and getting caught up, not to mention having ourselves The Best, and I mean THE BEST, shrimp and oysters we have ever had in our life. Would you believe, Dave and I shared !! He's come a long way (wink, wink !).
The meal started with some fried green tomatoes (remember the movie ?) and yes they were delicious, I need to find me a recipe for those!! We also tried some Hush Puppies as well, a sort of fried, relatively sweet, cornmeal dumpling. Many variations exist, and this one was scrumptious !
Way back when, the fishermen or hunters would fry up the batter and feed it to their dogs, saying "hush puppy, hush" and I guess one day someone tried them and said, hmm, these are pretty good ! And voila, another truly Southern experience.
Great sunset over the marina (and if you look hard, you can see the well lit "Fantasy".
Great food, great friends, great times : a true Banyan type of day !