11/03/2009, Cumberland Island, GA
We left Charleston early Fri morning and sailed along the coast until Sat morning when we came in the St Simon Sound Inlet. We continued down the ICW to Cumberland Island, GA, where we anchored in the afternoon just off the dock to the National Seashore Park. It was a sunny, warm, afternoon in the mid 80's. We took the dingy to the dock and headed over to the beach on the ocean side. What a beautiful beach. We then continued walking the beach to the Dungeness Trail taking it back to the ICW side, viewing the sites and historical ruins. We even saw the wild horses that inhabit the island.
We left Cumberland Island Sunday morning and got as far as downtown Jacksonville where we tied up to a free dock for the afternoon and night. Our friends, George and Karen, from Sunseeker live in the Jacksonville Beach area. We met George and Karen in Marathon last winter and sailed and snorkeled with them in the Bahamas last spring. You will probably remember them best from the lobster tail dinner we had on their boat . We are keeping our boat in the same marina that they keep their boat in and they have been very helpful to us already. George came down to our boat and got aboard to help us get into the marina, as it is a little tricky, with some shallow areas to go through. We had a wonderful salmon dinner at their lovely home, did laundry and spent the night.
We are back on the boat today, getting the boat ready to be left for two months and packing for the trip home. Tomorrow we will spend the day doing some fun things with George and Karen and stay the night with them. Then we will do the final cleanup on Thurs., again spending the night at George and Karen's home and they will take us to the airport early Fri morning. We will fly to Baltimore and get our car that is parked in Havre de Grace, MD and start home with a couple of stops on the way. George and Karen will keep an eye on our boat while we are gone.
We will return to the boat mid Jan, do a few projects and head to the Bahamas when weather lets us go. George and Karen will join us in the Bahamas. What great hospitable people they are. We look forward to having them visit us in Suttons Bay next summer.
|
Comments [0]
10/29/2009, Charleston, SC
Charleston, SC is great. We missed it on our trip down the ICW two years ago, so made sure we would see it this time. We got into the marina early yesterday and spent the day sightseeing. We spent the day in the downtown area again today, taking a carriage ride through the historic district.
It is a very pretty and interesting town, lots of history and beautiful homes. The downtown area has a big covered market with fun things for sale. Especially interesting are the sweet grass baskets. They are all hand made and beautiful. I have pictures in the gallery of some of the basket makers.
Tomorrow morning we are heading out the inlet to sail on the ocean for about 24-30 hrs. We will go in at St Simon Sound by St Simon Island and Jekyll Island, GA. We think we will be in Jacksonville by Monday (Nov 2).
|
10/27/2009, Oriental Marina, Oriental, NC
We had a great time with Cheryl and Paul in Oriental, NC. We had a seafood dinner, North Carolina style. We had shrimp and sausage with grits. It was great. I guess grits are not just for breakfast, especially if you think of polenta. It is similar. We did a lot of catching up and reminiscing, and Oriental is one of our favorite stops.
We stayed in the marina on Sat night as well and left on Sunday to go to Beaufort and out the inlet to the ocean. We planned to try to go all the way to Charleston, SC, but with the timing we thought we might go back into the ICW at Winyah, near Georgetown, SC. We would have to either speed up a couple of hours, or slow down 12 hrs to get in the Charleston inlet in the daylight. We had an auto helm problem at about 2am, and had to hand steer the rest of the way, so that cinched it. With the high winds and big seas it was a lot of work. We got into the inlet about 1pm and anchored about 3pm. Larry was able to fix the problem and the next morning (Oct 27) we headed down the ICW and anchored about 8 miles north of Charleston.
|
