East Coast of America (Episode 2, Jekyll Island to Wilmington/Wrightsville Beach)
We loved Jekyll Island as it was interestingly different to what we had expected and seen thus far. But then I’m not sure what we had expected. Certainly, the initial impression of the unpretentious, rustic, small island marina, belied the rest of the island which was an understated but incredibly well-run local tourist destination. The island is run by the Jekyll Island Authority who are responsible for the most immaculately manicured and neat road sides, cycle track system, private landing strip, several exclusive golf courses and many up market hotels and resorts. Miles of flat, sandy beach on the Atlantic ocean side form the spine of these barrier islands. The old part of the island had this magnificent colonial hotel with people playing bowls on the lawns in front. There were also several old historic mansions donning plaques telling stories of, inter alia, late 1800s railway barons and Morgan Stanley founders. The Atlantic side of the island was also home to a small village comprising shops, restaurants and a few modern hotels. Well-run but neat beach bars completed the picture and rounded off the local, almost perfect holiday destination. Sometimes perfect is a welcome break!
Our marina was on the ICW (west) side of the island. It was just before a bridge that we just could not fit under. We enjoyed the restaurant, complementary bicycles and golf carts and pool with jacuzzi which we planned to enjoy but the shaded location of these and desire to explore the island somehow kept us away. We spent 2 nights there waiting for the northerlies to stop blowing which was hardly a hardship, as we explored the island by bikes and on foot. The First Mate could not get on with the bike. They had a single back pedal brake which she hated. Needing to completely stop the bike before you put your foot down did Veronica’s head in although she says she is pretty sure she had a bike like that when she was a kid!
I have to say we have found the marinas in the States expensive by worldwide standards. This one was $135/night for our boat. That said they have been clean, well maintained and often with all of the aforementioned facilities, as well as complementary shuttles to the shops, etc.
One the first day as we walked out of the marina past a fish pond we spotted a sign: “Do not feed the Alligators’ $500 fine and dial 999 to report any offenders”. This had a similar affect on Veronica to the sign at the Duck Pond on Cumberland Island, except on closer inspection looking straight into the sun, there WAS an alligator in the pond, with just its eyes and snout above the water. Poor Veronica, in the Bahamas it was sharks and now it is alligators. She says that she has no doubt that Martyn would swim or run a mile if he saw similar. But we felt safe with the relatively small alligator in his still, lazy position.
We have been using a FaceBook group called Inlets on the East Coast of America, it has been very useful. We had come up one of the few sections of the ICW which we could traverse with our mast height but now we needed to leave via St Andrews inlet to get out to sea and get up to Charleston. This was one inlet that was not marked on their map and had no information about it. We had the Navionics and the Aqua-map charts and we made some enquiries at the marina, but frankly they were mostly non-committal other than to say it was possible. We knew it was unbuoyed, so we left at slack high tide. Luckily the weather was completely benign and the swell less than a metre. The scary thing was that at one point, despite high tide, we saw the same depth on the echosounder as was on the chart (which would be the lowest astronomical tide depth). Anyway, we “got away with it”. I say that because Veronica retrospectively asked the administrator of the Facebook group mentioned above to add a pin for that inlet. There are now about 6 comments next to that pin entry that, in summary, say, don’t use this inlet. Phew!
It was overnight to Charleston and for once we had some pretty good wind and calm seas. As we left St Andrews inlet we had had to dodge about 5 shrimp boats that were in a line with their booms out. No AIS on and no response on the radio. Much later, on my night watch a line of lights started to appear …. also all in a row, seemingly going away from us. It was really difficult to determine how far they were away as they were also not on AIS. I was convinced this was also a row of shrimp boat going away from us and because we were doing 6 knots and they trawl at 2.5 knots we would have to overtake them at some stage. There were two other sailing boats with us and talking on the radio. Hadhammer and Foghorn Lullaby were their names. You have to love the oxymoron of the latter name. The odd thing was that we did not seem to be catching these shrimpers with their glaring bright lights on their head gear. At one stage I called up Foghorn Lullaby on the VHF and asked them what they made of these lights. Hadhammer chipped in putting us right. He said he had sailed past here several times and these were monster boats at anchor in the roads to go into Savannah, which is a major East Coast container port. No sooner had he said that, we got within 5 Nm of the lights and they started to pop up on AIS showing that they were indeed anchored. Anyway, it is an interesting story of how your situational awareness, can be influenced by preconceived ideas (seeing the shrimp boats earlier) and play tricks on you. Also, how a massive brightly lit ship 10Nm away can be mistaken for a small boat nearby. We sailed through the anchored behemoths and went on our merry way. At 08h40 I turned into the Charleston channel and had to slow down to let a tug towing a massive dredging barge, cut in front of me. It was a long way into the estuary and it took us until 11h00 before we were tied up at the municipal marina.
We ended up spending 3 nights in Charleston and Aidan left us there. Michelle had driven down and they were staying at Jon and Gene’s place which is a beautiful downtown town house. We were invited to stay but we decided to just stay on the boat. We did however accept Aidan and Michelle’s hospitality in showing us around town. We did a lot of eating out and that combined with the marina fees made for a bit of an extravagant stay. Charleston is another lovely town with wonderful old houses and a buzzing downtown district. Aidan drove us around in the car and we managed to get shopping and laundry sorted. I had the bike out and took a ride along the waterfront (called the battery) where there is a row of opulent mansions and a raised sea wall. Veronica chose to walk and run instead. On the 4th day Aidan and Michelle headed home for Wilmington and we thought we saw a weather window to go all the way to Wilmington with a 10 am departure and an overnight. It took 8 NM to get out to sea and the wind just did not show up, so we ended up motoring for the whole day. We made a call to stop in the Georgetown estuary but it was going to be tight. We just made it into the estuary in fading light but luckily we had timed the incoming tide right and it was a windless evening. We snuck 5 NM up into Winyah Bay, went into a side branch that we had identified as an anchorage from the No Foreign Land App. We dropped the anchor in the very last of the light. It was beautiful place aside from the bugs and there was nothing around. We had a very still and peaceful night and tranquil morning watching dolphins, fish and nature. The next morning we were studying the weather and tossing up traversing up to Georgetown, another 8NM into the estuary or whether the weather window was good for Wilmington. We decided on the latter and left at about noon on the slack tide and. We had a fantastic sail in 10 to 12 knot winds to the outside of Frying Pan shoals, which we rounded at about 01h30 in the morning.
Just before the Shoals there is a traffic separation zone for the entrance to the Cape Fear River and Wilmington. There was a big cargo boat coming across our path, drifting along at 1.2 knots, obviously killing time. I called the guy up as I was trying to decide whether to go around his stern or not and I was unsure if he was suddenly going to speed up in some direction. His English was poor but he announced that they were going to the pilot-waiting area. I said great, thank you but ‘I don’t know where that is?’. There was no reply and then the boat turned and sped up, doing 9 knots in a surprisingly short time, running directly down our proposed track but away from us. As they got to the edge of the Traffic Separation Zone they turned to the port off our track to what I assume is the pilot waiting area. Nothing like a bit of action like this to keep you awake and on your toes on your early hours watch.
From Frying Pan Shoals the sailing was slow as we made about 4 knots in 8 knots of abaft following wind. The last 15 NM we motored into Wrightsville beach dropping anchor in Banks channel at about 10h00. The rest of the day was dedicated to catching up on sleep .
When we dropped the main sail coming into Wrightsville it jammed. I guess we were lucky to get it down after some up and down persuasion. On closer inspection the top headboard car that the halyard is attached to had derailed. I won’t go into the detail but the Torlon ball bearings had come out of it. We are currently trying to source a new car and replacement bearings and it is a really complicated and laborious process to fix it as we will need to remove all the cars from the track and reload all the cars with bearings. This is a bit of a frustrating delay in Wrightsville Beach but on the positive side Aidan and Michelle live a few kilometres down the road, so that is helpful if we need help getting places as well as providing some company as we while away a few days. We need the sail fixed before we tackle going around Hatteras.
So, in Wrightsville Beach we were treated to the very generous hospitality of Michele and Aidan as we had left the boat moored at Dockside Restaurant’s pontoon and had the luxury of staying with them in their house for 2 nights, inter alia, eating out at their club and catching up on haircuts, shopping, laundry and the like. We also got the grand tour of the surrounding area. On Friday night we went back out to the anchorage to save money while we waited to sort out our mainsail slider issues. On Saturday afternoon, we again joined Aidan and Michelle in their pontoon boat and we went on a tour of the waterways, stopping at a beach on a nature reserve island near the inlet we had come into.
So, hopefully in the next blog I will be able to tell you about the fix for our woes and about our trip up to Beaufort or Cape Lookout to stage ourselves for the rounding of Hatteras and onward to Chesapeake. Adios Amigos.
Our marina was on the ICW (west) side of the island. It was just before a bridge that we just could not fit under. We enjoyed the restaurant, complementary bicycles and golf carts and pool with jacuzzi which we planned to enjoy but the shaded location of these and desire to explore the island somehow kept us away. We spent 2 nights there waiting for the northerlies to stop blowing which was hardly a hardship, as we explored the island by bikes and on foot. The First Mate could not get on with the bike. They had a single back pedal brake which she hated. Needing to completely stop the bike before you put your foot down did Veronica’s head in although she says she is pretty sure she had a bike like that when she was a kid!
I have to say we have found the marinas in the States expensive by worldwide standards. This one was $135/night for our boat. That said they have been clean, well maintained and often with all of the aforementioned facilities, as well as complementary shuttles to the shops, etc.
One the first day as we walked out of the marina past a fish pond we spotted a sign: “Do not feed the Alligators’ $500 fine and dial 999 to report any offenders”. This had a similar affect on Veronica to the sign at the Duck Pond on Cumberland Island, except on closer inspection looking straight into the sun, there WAS an alligator in the pond, with just its eyes and snout above the water. Poor Veronica, in the Bahamas it was sharks and now it is alligators. She says that she has no doubt that Martyn would swim or run a mile if he saw similar. But we felt safe with the relatively small alligator in his still, lazy position.
We have been using a FaceBook group called Inlets on the East Coast of America, it has been very useful. We had come up one of the few sections of the ICW which we could traverse with our mast height but now we needed to leave via St Andrews inlet to get out to sea and get up to Charleston. This was one inlet that was not marked on their map and had no information about it. We had the Navionics and the Aqua-map charts and we made some enquiries at the marina, but frankly they were mostly non-committal other than to say it was possible. We knew it was unbuoyed, so we left at slack high tide. Luckily the weather was completely benign and the swell less than a metre. The scary thing was that at one point, despite high tide, we saw the same depth on the echosounder as was on the chart (which would be the lowest astronomical tide depth). Anyway, we “got away with it”. I say that because Veronica retrospectively asked the administrator of the Facebook group mentioned above to add a pin for that inlet. There are now about 6 comments next to that pin entry that, in summary, say, don’t use this inlet. Phew!
It was overnight to Charleston and for once we had some pretty good wind and calm seas. As we left St Andrews inlet we had had to dodge about 5 shrimp boats that were in a line with their booms out. No AIS on and no response on the radio. Much later, on my night watch a line of lights started to appear …. also all in a row, seemingly going away from us. It was really difficult to determine how far they were away as they were also not on AIS. I was convinced this was also a row of shrimp boat going away from us and because we were doing 6 knots and they trawl at 2.5 knots we would have to overtake them at some stage. There were two other sailing boats with us and talking on the radio. Hadhammer and Foghorn Lullaby were their names. You have to love the oxymoron of the latter name. The odd thing was that we did not seem to be catching these shrimpers with their glaring bright lights on their head gear. At one stage I called up Foghorn Lullaby on the VHF and asked them what they made of these lights. Hadhammer chipped in putting us right. He said he had sailed past here several times and these were monster boats at anchor in the roads to go into Savannah, which is a major East Coast container port. No sooner had he said that, we got within 5 Nm of the lights and they started to pop up on AIS showing that they were indeed anchored. Anyway, it is an interesting story of how your situational awareness, can be influenced by preconceived ideas (seeing the shrimp boats earlier) and play tricks on you. Also, how a massive brightly lit ship 10Nm away can be mistaken for a small boat nearby. We sailed through the anchored behemoths and went on our merry way. At 08h40 I turned into the Charleston channel and had to slow down to let a tug towing a massive dredging barge, cut in front of me. It was a long way into the estuary and it took us until 11h00 before we were tied up at the municipal marina.
We ended up spending 3 nights in Charleston and Aidan left us there. Michelle had driven down and they were staying at Jon and Gene’s place which is a beautiful downtown town house. We were invited to stay but we decided to just stay on the boat. We did however accept Aidan and Michelle’s hospitality in showing us around town. We did a lot of eating out and that combined with the marina fees made for a bit of an extravagant stay. Charleston is another lovely town with wonderful old houses and a buzzing downtown district. Aidan drove us around in the car and we managed to get shopping and laundry sorted. I had the bike out and took a ride along the waterfront (called the battery) where there is a row of opulent mansions and a raised sea wall. Veronica chose to walk and run instead. On the 4th day Aidan and Michelle headed home for Wilmington and we thought we saw a weather window to go all the way to Wilmington with a 10 am departure and an overnight. It took 8 NM to get out to sea and the wind just did not show up, so we ended up motoring for the whole day. We made a call to stop in the Georgetown estuary but it was going to be tight. We just made it into the estuary in fading light but luckily we had timed the incoming tide right and it was a windless evening. We snuck 5 NM up into Winyah Bay, went into a side branch that we had identified as an anchorage from the No Foreign Land App. We dropped the anchor in the very last of the light. It was beautiful place aside from the bugs and there was nothing around. We had a very still and peaceful night and tranquil morning watching dolphins, fish and nature. The next morning we were studying the weather and tossing up traversing up to Georgetown, another 8NM into the estuary or whether the weather window was good for Wilmington. We decided on the latter and left at about noon on the slack tide and. We had a fantastic sail in 10 to 12 knot winds to the outside of Frying Pan shoals, which we rounded at about 01h30 in the morning.
Just before the Shoals there is a traffic separation zone for the entrance to the Cape Fear River and Wilmington. There was a big cargo boat coming across our path, drifting along at 1.2 knots, obviously killing time. I called the guy up as I was trying to decide whether to go around his stern or not and I was unsure if he was suddenly going to speed up in some direction. His English was poor but he announced that they were going to the pilot-waiting area. I said great, thank you but ‘I don’t know where that is?’. There was no reply and then the boat turned and sped up, doing 9 knots in a surprisingly short time, running directly down our proposed track but away from us. As they got to the edge of the Traffic Separation Zone they turned to the port off our track to what I assume is the pilot waiting area. Nothing like a bit of action like this to keep you awake and on your toes on your early hours watch.
From Frying Pan Shoals the sailing was slow as we made about 4 knots in 8 knots of abaft following wind. The last 15 NM we motored into Wrightsville beach dropping anchor in Banks channel at about 10h00. The rest of the day was dedicated to catching up on sleep .
When we dropped the main sail coming into Wrightsville it jammed. I guess we were lucky to get it down after some up and down persuasion. On closer inspection the top headboard car that the halyard is attached to had derailed. I won’t go into the detail but the Torlon ball bearings had come out of it. We are currently trying to source a new car and replacement bearings and it is a really complicated and laborious process to fix it as we will need to remove all the cars from the track and reload all the cars with bearings. This is a bit of a frustrating delay in Wrightsville Beach but on the positive side Aidan and Michelle live a few kilometres down the road, so that is helpful if we need help getting places as well as providing some company as we while away a few days. We need the sail fixed before we tackle going around Hatteras.
So, in Wrightsville Beach we were treated to the very generous hospitality of Michele and Aidan as we had left the boat moored at Dockside Restaurant’s pontoon and had the luxury of staying with them in their house for 2 nights, inter alia, eating out at their club and catching up on haircuts, shopping, laundry and the like. We also got the grand tour of the surrounding area. On Friday night we went back out to the anchorage to save money while we waited to sort out our mainsail slider issues. On Saturday afternoon, we again joined Aidan and Michelle in their pontoon boat and we went on a tour of the waterways, stopping at a beach on a nature reserve island near the inlet we had come into.
So, hopefully in the next blog I will be able to tell you about the fix for our woes and about our trip up to Beaufort or Cape Lookout to stage ourselves for the rounding of Hatteras and onward to Chesapeake. Adios Amigos.
ALLURES 45 TIMELESS ODYSSEY
Who: The Crew; Martyn & Veronica (mostly), Dylan and Tayo (occasionally) and other good friends.
Port: Portsmouth
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