Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Up early again (what else is new) and while looking out of the window, making coffee, it looked like a picture morning so I took my camera up top and was shooting pictures of the docks in the early morning light with fog when I heard a very loud snorting and thrashing of the trees and brush on the shore. It scared the bejabers out of me. I couldn't see anything but could definitely hear it storming through the underbrush - branches snappings and leaves being crunched. I scouted out all the pathways to the water but couldn't see anything. I must have scared whatever it was that came down to the water to drink when I came up and it must have stood still for a while before clamoring off into the woods and grassland. Originally I thought it might have been a large buck, but that wouldn't have made the noise and ruckus I heard. Next thought was bear - that would make a lot of noise running through the trees/grasslands. While meandering back to the ICW I saw some large wild boar moving along the water into the brush and a gray coyote. One boar was huge! Probably what I heard earlier this morning. Didn't know they could snort so loud or break branches!

We also saw more dolphins today - they seem to be more numerous the farther we go! Speaking of which - the swing bridge we're coming up to has been broken since before Thanksgiving (Lady Island Bridge). It only opens at 10:00 am and 2:00 pm. People had been saying it was closed, but it does open twice a day to let boat traffic through - they need to open and close it manually until the parts to fix it come in - so we'll be anchoring in the creek next to it since we missed the 2:00 opening by 20 minutes. We could hear boats giving the bridge tender their names and hailing ports an hour before hand and it sounded like their were a lot of boats waiting for the 2pm opening of the bridge. It was amazing as we pulled up - you could see cars backed up for miles waiting for the bridge to let them cross. I hailed the bridge to make sure they were still opening at 10 am the next morning then we set about looking for somewhere to anchor in the creek right next to the bridge.

We ended up anchoring across from some houses next to the grassland across the creek. It was strange to watch the grass get taller than the boat as the tide lowered us in the water. You could see the black mud the grass was growing in get taller and thicker. One minute you see us, the next - from down river - all you see is our mast LOL.