Leaving Beaufort we saw the weather bring us brilliant sunshine, lots of dew on the deck and canvas, and cool temps. We decided to sleep in and get started an hour later than our usual 7-7:30AM start up. We caught the 9AM Ladys Island Bridge opening after weighing anchor at 8:15AM. Shortly, we managed to put up the jib sail and add to our motored speed. We heard IOLAR on the radio and called Walt to let him know we were in the area. Walt kept his ketch in front of us at Osprey Marina for the summer. We met Walt and Lynn in Vero Beach last May.
We always enjoy Hilton Head and seeing the excessive beach homes and scenery. For many of these beach-front dwellings no expense is spared! All are well done with unusually well thought out landscaping. The trip from Hilton Head to the Savannah River and Thunderbolt is made up of winding rivers and shallow water at low tide. Crossing the Savannah River both north and south channel can be dangerous at low tide. We were fortunate to run through the tricky sections at almost high tide.
As we travel on Fiu it's amazing how the kinds of boats, size of boats and the names of the boats are so diverse! I am sure when boaters hear our "Fiu" they wonder, "What the heck?" Well, Fiu may be unusual but when you hear the story of what it means it makes sense. There is one boat name that no matter what the story is it doesn"t make sense. As we moved from Beaufort, SC to Thunderbolt, GA we kept hearing the boat named "Breaking Wind" over the radio. I'm sorry, but don't be that guy! All I could think about were other more ridiculous names associated with Breaking Wind. Here are a few: Stinky Feet, Bad Breath, and, well,you get the idea. The long time tradition of naming your ship with a woman's name is somewhat limited these days. The large luxury power cruisers and the sport fishing boats have been difficult to deal with on this trip. Both of these boats are designed in such a way that a huge wake is delivered outward ready to swamp any small craft and roll the "ba jeepers" out of even larger sailboats! Often you will hear some say that the faster they go the less wake they deliver! Not true! For many designs this is true. However, there seem to be just as many designs where this is also not true. The hard part of all of this is we all have a right to be on the water in the size of the boat, the design of the boat and of course, even the name of the boat we choose. Getting sailboats to understand they need to slow down and move to the right when possible and more importantly, to get power boaters to pass on our port side at a reasonable speed that produces the smallest wake for that design is what really needs to happen.
Captain Sid
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