CODA BAHAMAS BOUND 2024-2025 (40)

CODA : Lost in the South Carolina ICW

Lady's Island Marina, Beaufort,  South Carolina    

The Great Egret welcome committee to Beaufort (pronounced Bew-fert).

Marc-  Well we did it again, travelled over 56 miles through rivers, creeks bays and cuts and traversed some skinny water too.  It all comes down to calculating where to be and when there will be high enough water at a given location.  No need for tide tables as in days of yore there is now an App. for that.  You pull up the app. tough your finger at a given location and then scroll to the time you hope to be there and it tell you how much water you have as well as if it rising or falling.  A falling tide is bad in the boating world.  

Passage calculations allowing for passage at half tide or better.

Beaufort has a famous swing bridge over the Beaufort River.  The running bridge interview scene in Forest Gump was filmed on the Woods Memorial Bridge, which connects Beaufort to Lady's Island. The locals here will never let the State replace it with one of those hi-rise 65 foot bridges that people can just by-pass the whole town without stopping.  This town is close to a the US Marine Corps Air Station and to the Parris Island Marine Training Center.  Several jet fighters flew by us every fifteen minutes when we passed the air station in the ICW.  Beaufort also has numerous old colonial homes and shops.

The inside command center very useful on a rainy day like today.  

That one windshield wiper does work.

I will end the day's entries with how it began. Sara took this photo at 06:30.

CODA BAHAMAS BOUND 2024-2025 (40)

 CODA : More travels in the South Carolina ICW

Church Creek anchorage (21 miles south of Charleston),  South Carolina   

Charleston architecture.

Marc-  We departed soon after sunrise this morning to continue our battle with the shallow ICW and the tides.  My calculations worked very well and we made it over some really shallow water (3-4 feet) with a four foot four inch high tide.  The photo below explains to what lengths people go to get through here.

We went straight through the red zone at high tide.  Next was Charleston.  I tried to find a spot in the municipal marina but unfortunately they have not repaired the docks from storm damage (you might ask what storm the place looks fantastic).  There are other options like the MEGA Dock and even anchoring.  Looking into the anchoring was easy to eliminate since the bottom is covered with ancient and more recent wreaks.  The MEGA Dock was actually full.

This is the MEGA Dock and the anchorage to the left. The crane is pulling a recent sunken boat out of the harbor.  This place really does not appeal to me.

Nice bridge coming into Charleston.

Nice old boat that was boarded by the Coast Guard when it came into Charleston.

We decided to just bypass Charleston after all and headed up Wappoo Creek.  The drawbridge over this creek only opens on the half hour such that since we missed the 11:30 opening by 10 minutes we had to wait 50 minutes for the next opening kind of hovering in place.  Hovering is not quite the word for it when you have a 15 knot wind behind you from the north and a 2 knot current coming at you from the south.  In a perfect world these two forces would cancel each other out and leave you be still. When it came time for the bridge to open the bridge-tender could not get the traffic gates to come down and then could not get the bridge sections to rise up.  The problems were all made very public as the bridge -tender kept speaking to the electrician on the VHF radio that all the boaters were listening to.  We did get through the bridge, saw more dolphins and pelicans and decided on an anchorage.

Nice sunset from a very quiet anchorage south of Charleston.

(Sara Lou photo)

Lou- Today was HOT! (I think I'm a bit brain-dead from it, so apologies for my lackluster blogging!)

No alligator sightings, but Dad did mention that they could definitely be lurking nearby so no swimming tonight.

Happily, to balance out the dreaded gators, we now have dolphin pals popping up every so often during the day.

Mainly today I was focused on a biography of Jack Kerouac, so I don't have too much from real life to report, but I could tell you all about Jack's friendship with Allen Ginsberg!

Tomorrow we're headed to somewhere 52 miles away that I forget the name of. Dad says it's great. I'm mainly excited that we'll be on land for the first time in 2 days and we can walk!! Also, a shower will be nice.

G'night fellow smelly sailors!

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 CODA : Traveling in the South Carolina ICW

Awendaw anchorage (25 miles east of Charleston),  South Carolina  

Our visitor who made the biggest splash today as he dove on a fish 

and swallowed it whole (about 10 feet from CODA).

Marc-  Travel day of 56 nautical miles from Wacca Wache to the Awendaw anchorage on the ICW.  We had an excellent start out on the Waccamaw River with a following 10 knot breeze.  We also had to use the tides to our advantage today since several passages on the ICW are very shallow (4 feet or less) at low tide.  The timing worked well getting us to the end of the Waccamaw River and into Minim Creek at the hide tide mark.  There is a four foot tide here and we used it all.  

The Waccamaw River flows southeast to the Atlantic Ocean but about one mile before its mouth is Minim Creek that the Army Corps of Engineers has reconfigured to be part of a series of tidal creeks connected by manmade ditches to make a navigable waterway inside of the barrier beaches and islands.  Great engineering that works well but needs constant maintenance (otherwise known as dredging in certain locations).  

The water source is both through Inlets from the Atlantic Ocean and fresh water creeks.  Because the waterway is open to the ocean it is subject to tides.  In this part of the coast you have tidal changes every six hours giving you two high tides and two low tides daily.  When we came down the Waccamaw River we were traveling at 6 knots fighting a 1.5 knot current (the tide was coming in or rising).  As we turned the corner into Minim Creek that current turned in our favor bringing up our boat speed to 8 plus knots.  CODA's actual boat speed through the water was 7.5 knots all day (except when we plowed through some very soft mud).  

Speaking of mud as we drew closer to our destination the tide had gone out bringing us closer to the red zone of the Army Corps of Engineer surveys found on one of our i-pads.  The red zone indicates depths of 4 feet or less (we need 5.3 feet to float CODA).  There are blue zones and green and yellow which are all fine for us.  CODA has a powerful diesel engine and a rather large three bladed propeller that allows us to plow, or push, through soft mud as we did today for the last mile or so of the trip with a reduction of speed to about 6 knots.  

The Awendaw anchorage is really an enlarged section of a creek that leads to an ocean inlet.  In fact some of the boats anchored here appear to be facing the open ocean.  If we look past the six sailboats anchored to our east we can see the Atlantic Ocean.  It is very calm in here for whatever reason.

It is not good to see red in a survey.

Steering through the shallow parts.

Waccamaw River pilot.

Prizes for a job well done.

Lou- We started the day at Cracker Barrel, where our kind friends Craig and Donna took us out for breakfast. Donna's got me hooked on biscuits! Much better than boring old toast.

It was my first day out on the water; it was exciting to get moving. Dad and I switched off at the wheel every hour. I spent my wheel time attempting to meditate, listening to a podcast about the reality TV show Love is Blind, and gawking at pelicans diving for fish. Dad got us through this one super shallow portion of the creek. He's cool under pressure, but I could tell he was tense. "Look," he said, pointing to one of his chart-screens. Our path forward was totally red. Yikes! "I think we're plowing through the mud," Dad said. I crossed my fingers that we wouldn't get stuck.

By the time it was my turn to drive, Dad had successfully navigated us out of there.

Then, we found this great place to anchor (with a few other boats) and had butternut squash ravioli and the last of our key lime pie (with peaches on the side) for dessert. Dad cooked; I did the dishes. 

0 miles walked today! Hopefully tomorrow we get to go on land!

Bonne nuit, brave wanderers!

P.S. Aren't anchor lights magical? (For friends who don't know, they're a light at the top of the mast that sailors turn on after dark so they don't get hit by other boats.) I see a couple out the window now and they feel so friendly in the vast gusty darkness tonight. 

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CODA : Day II Visiting Brookgreen Gardens and Huntington Beach State Park

2 November 2024

Wacca Wache Marina, Waccamaw River, Wachesaw Landing, South Carolina  

Start of the day at Brookgreen Gardens.

Search for the elusive Roseate Spoonbill at Huntington Beach State Park.

Marc-  Nice start of the day with breakfast with our Vermont friends Craig and Donna Lewis.  We returned to Brookgreen to see more sculptures and other art as well as incredible nature.  Next we crossed over to Huntington Beach to search for wildlife and we found plenty.  

Bust of a member of the Massachusetts 54th Infantry of freedmen (Civil War).

Bates College (Maine) memorial dog.

American Saint Francis.

Sancho Panza by Anna Huntington.

Tie dyed fabric to a new level.

Goldfish in three dimensional fabrics.

_____________________

Who is protecting whom?

An island full of alligators.

Sunbathing alligator (they are cold blooded).

Alligator out fishing.

Egrets fishing.

Ducks enjoying the duckweed.

Egret fishing.

Great blue heron just hanging out.

Roseate Spoonbill at a distance.

Roseate Spoonbill and a visitor ready to take his lunch.

Egret fishing hole.

Stork fishing.

Piping plovers hanging out at the beach (they are usually scurrying around for something to eat).

Sara Lou- More alligators today! Eek! Dad's totally chill about them, but I keep bugging him, "Stay on the path!!" when he goes off to take photos. 

I think it's good for me in a way to be so aware of my surroundings, though. Back in my regular life in Montreal, I can totally space out and practically sleepwalk through the city. Here, I'm watching the ground for poisonous snakes and the shrubbery/waterside for my reptilian nemeses, so I'm more alert. And then I end up noticing the beauty more too.

We visited a castle built on a beach today. Dad pointed out that it's not a great idea to build a castle on a beach because sand's not sturdy. He pointed out lots of cracks in the walls. 

There were signs in all the rooms telling us what they used to be-- the husband's study, the wife's art studio (she was Anna Hyatt Huntington, a world-famous sculptor; her specialty was animals), the servant's quarters... 

Then, of course, we had to go get ice cream. Dad got chocolate and I got raspberry sorbet. And then we walked along the beach, where Dad fell in love with the sweet little piping plovers that skitter along the shore, poking around for lunch. Dad claims that they stopped for a moment to pose for a picture.

7.5 miles today!

I'm off to dinner! Toodloo!

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CODA : Visiting Brookgreen Gardens and Huntington Beach State Park

2 November 2024

Wacca Wache Marina, Waccamaw River, Wachesaw Landing, South Carolina  

Pegasus with giant water lilypads at Brookgreen.

Huntington Beach walk.

Marc-  It was a fantastic day showing Sara around the local sights.  We started off visiting Brookgreen Gardens the worlds largest sculpture garden at over 9,000 acres.  We then returned to the boat for lunch with our friend Peggy Brewster.  I put out Sue's new quilt on our queen bunk for show.  We returned to Brookgreen for a special historical narrated cruise from Brookgreen to the Waccamaw River on Brookgreen Creek.   Finally we went over to Huntington Beach State Park on a barrier island across the street.

My favorite sculpture: Boy and his horse by Anna Hutchinson, 1938.

Sara's favorite bronze:  Girl with squirrel.

Explosion of colors at Brookgreen.

 

More.

Note that the Christmas lights are hung.

Christmas Lights being tested in the Kids garden.

Turtle caravan,

Pelicans shadow-work in flight.

Susan and bunny.

Two river otters at Brookgreen Creek.

This one was inquisitive.

Gators along Brookgreen Creek.

Anhinga drying out his wings.

Curious green-eyed fellow.

Owl winking at me.

Two tired tourists.

Sara Lou- Dad says to add, "We walked seven and a half miles!"

And to power us along, we got ice cream! I got chocolate chip coffee and he got something green and minty.

It was a wild and mind-expanding day. I've never really been to the South before. I've been to Florida and North Carolina, but South Carolina really feels Southern.

First off, there's the Spanish moss. It hangs from the live oaks (and maybe other trees?) all over the place. It's really lovely in a romantic/spooky way!

On a darker note, we visited a rice plantation where enslaved people worked. We had a tour guide who made the past feel unsettlingly real.

On that same tour (it was on a boat), I saw my first alligators! They were just out there on the banks sunbathing. They have this creepy way of not moving a muscle. One fellow tourist kept insisting, "They're plastic! They've got to be plastic!" 

But they also looked content as cats, so I was glad for them. And in their scary reptilian way, they're beautiful. 

Dad says to wrap this up and go to bed, so off I go. 

Sweet dreams, fellow sailors!