Kaimusailing

Getting underway for Fernandina Beach had a couple of hiccups. After a day of running around provisioning and getting the boat ready I was looking forward for early rest so that we could start first thing to catch the outgoing tide. At about 11:30 PM the anchor windlass suddenly began pulling in the anchor at full speed, all by itself. It woke me and I ran on deck in my NY Jets paraphernalia pajamas. I ran to the pilothouse to try the down switch to stop it and it stopped. Unbeknownst to me it had stopped because the anchor had come up to its stop and the stalled windlass tripped its breaker. Meanwhile, the force of pulling on the anchor rode so strongly and quickly pulled the boat forward, heading toward the nature park island and its muddy banks. I threw over the lunch hook, snubbed it, and we were again anchored, but I was not feeling very secure with the little lunch hook holding us with a changing tide at about 4 AM. The lunch hook is a Danforth and they often lose their grip when the tide current changes.
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The other anomaly was that the engine died after we did get underway, late due to oversleeping, but we had a light north breeze and main and staysail set to run down the bay. I wanted to run the engine to charge its battery after what the windlass had done, it uses the engine battery for its power. Normally the engine is running when doing anchor work, so the battery isn't drained.
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The sail down the bay was aided by the outflowing tide, which we were catching just the last couple of hours. When we got to the lighthouse which was where Kaimu anchored when we arrived after the mad dash from Frying Pan Shoals, we were fighting the new incoming tide and standing still, even though the boat was traveling through the water at a good clip. We would sit there for a while, then a gust of wind would come through and we would move ahead, then sit for a while again.
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After we passed that part of the channel, which seemed to have a stronger tide current than anywhere else, we now had to exit the bay between the breakwaters, which might force us too close to the wind. It was not so, we made it out and then bore off due South for a couple of hours to get some distance from the coast.
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The forecast of 15-20 was more like 5-10. Our plan was for a 36 hour or less voyage and in light winds it would take longer. It was pleasant sailing with some strange high speed craft off toward shore, I wonder what they were. Also the shrimp boats that had left Georgetown earlier were working the coast almost out of sight of Kaimu.
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As the sun went down we were approaching Charleston approaches and the wind was getting a bit stronger, more like the forecast. There was a lot of ship traffic and some terse words over the VHF between them. Little Kaimu had to divert to the west to avoid the ships coming out.
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The rest of this passage will be in several parts, much like those previous. The picture is of the SPOT track of the voyage. Positions were sent approximately every two hours.