We are in the lovely city of Charleston, SC. It is sunny and warm here. This stop on our journey was highly promoted and touted as a highlight by multiple sources, as such it had a lot to live up to. It is day 3 now of our planned 8 day stay, and although we have hardly scratched the surface, the city has delivered. The architecture, history, historic houses, restaurants and down home southern hospitality are out of this world. We have been mostly getting the chores done (oil changed, fuel gauge replaced, laundry, groceries, made banana bread, and planning our next legs) to have them over with so we can take in the city, and we are delighted to be doing so with, a work friend of Guillaume’s, Kim and her husband Sean who are vacationing in nearby Hilton Head, and Glenn and Dalia who arrive tomorrow to spend 4 nites aboard Slow Waltz with us to explore Charleston.

The anchoring possibilities in Charleston leave a little to be desired with a strong current, poor holding and a bottom littered with debris on which to foul your anchor. Some of the guidebooks suggest that you count on dragging and have the number of professional diver handy to aid in the retrieval of your anchor. As such we decided to spring for a marina, so we are tied up to the Charleston City Marina Dock, on, of all things, the “Mega Dock”. We are on an oversized floating cement pier in the shadows of some hulking 100+ footers with fenders the size of our dinghy that are being scrubbed and spit polished by their professional crew (apparently there was a 480 foot powerboat here a couple of weeks ago). The marina staff arrived on a golf cart when we got in to assist in docking in the 2 knot current. Slow Waltz can hold her own, but she sure looks small. We are all the way at the end of the dock, and it’s probably ¾ of a kilometer walk to the showers/laundry. That said, that puts us near the mouth of the entrance to the Ashley River, which is where the dolphins like to hang out. So we get a show at times, right in the cockpit (I even saw a baby dolphin).

We have been travelling for a couple of weeks with two “Buddy Boats”, Lee Loo (a calibre 40) and Romana (a Corbin 39) who are also here, but in a different marina. It’s good to have buddies. A couple days ago the three boats were leaving Southport, NC and headed for some trouble spots on the ICW. Before we left, we had called US Boat Tow to gather “local knowledge” on how to get through without running aground. We were advised to follow the markers (not the chart plotter) and we should be ok (famous last words). We were transiting Lockwood Folly which is an inlet to the Ocean. The currents are swirly and strong by the inlets and that’s where you find the moving shoals that cause the problems. We were in the channel and found a sand/mud shoal with about 4 feet of depth (we need 5 to float), so at 7:49 we hit, and road up and listed 20 degrees, caught. We were on a falling tide, so the situation was only going to get worse. (we were taking a calculated risk transiting on a falling tide, but the alternative was to leave at 3 am-in the dark, or 3 pm-with only 2-ish hours of daylight left, with short days and distances we need to make, planning our days is a real art.) We immediately called US Tow Boat (we bought tow insurance, so they will come to our aid), who advised that he would be 30 to 45 minutes, which would make us “higher and dryer” given that the tide was falling.

Our two buddy boats dispatched on their dinghies quickly. First we tried turning Slow Waltz towards the deeper water by pushing on the bow with the two dinghies and Guillaume at the helm. We managed to pivot her on the shoal about 20 degrees, then she wouldn’t go anymore. Dave and Mario, deployed our spare anchor, a Fortress 16, and rode from the dinghy and we led it through the bow chock and hand cranked it on the topsail winch. The anchor set really well and we were able to winch the rode and pull Slow Waltz into the deeper water and we were free. It was 8:35 and US Tow Boat still hadn’t arrived, so we called them off and carried on. Thank you buddy boats! We brushed the bottom one other time at another inlet.

When we were approaching Georgetown, SC a couple of days later, there was a chance to go out on the big pond. The weather was decent (for motorsailing, anyways) so we did an “outside run” to Charleston (as opposed to on the inside on the ICW). It was glorious to be out on the big water with a good 40 feet under our keel. We heard the radio chirping about 5 and 6 feet depths and keels dragging through mud.

In our next couple days in Charleston, we are planning to take in the Aquarium and take a historical carriage ride tour. Looking forward to it! (pics to follow on Facebook).