November 3, 2012 Wally's Leg, Georgia

This was by far the longest day of our trip to the Keys.  The 83 miles however, allowed us to finally meet up with one of our "Buddy Boats!"  Ken and Marie on Tempest greeted us with smiles and we renewed our friendship with some wine and stories of our children.

The Skidaway Bridge opened for us with only a slight delay.  We waited only a couple of minutes for the sailboat behind us to catch up to us so we could all pass through with a single opening and thereby reducing the inconvenience on local traffic, you know, those late for day care, on their way to work and to school.

Moon River, Burnside, Vernon and Little Ogeechee Rivers took us round to the left then round to the right!  The Ogeechee River had many dolphins feeding.  Again, I have no pics of dolphins since the little creatures hold their breathe for what seems forever!

Up the Florida Passage to Kilkenney Creek and the Bear River led us to St Catherine's Sound.  Walburg Creek and Johnson Creek brought us to the South Newport River and the Sapelo Sound and Island.  Once across the Sound we entered the Altamara Sound and Little Mud River with low tide in progress and very little water under our keel.  Sometimes as little as (5) feet.  We draft 4' 9" but anything less than (7) feet is a problem.  We arrived in Wally's Leg just as the sun set and it started to get cool and buggy with "no see ums" that you could see!!

Captain Sid

Friday, November 2, 2012 Thunderbolt, Georgia

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.

Bon and I prepared the boat for the night and headed over to Tubby's for a draft beer and a fish dinner.  We usually stop there and see our niece, Dawn, who was out of town this trip.  I purchased diesel and filled the water tanks for the trip south.  The 47 mile day was tiring but fun.

Captain Sid

Thursday, November 1, 2012 Beaufort, SC

The 63 miles and (10 hours) we motor-sailed today was in mostly sunny weather with a cool breeze in the afternoon.  Actually it was downright cold at times, like when the sun went behind the clouds!  Early on in the AM we spotted (6) deer along the shore a few miles from St John's Marina. Most of the wildlife we see are birds, rarely deer.  As we passed Church Creek and the immediate area we were treated to a well-kept golf course with a tee box built out into the water.  I'm sure there a a hundred golf balls in the river.  Too bad they sink and not float!  Passing a tricky part of the Wadmalaw River we passed a navy ship being refitted with work being done on the bow. 

I always get interested in names of creeks, rivers and sounds in this region.  The Toogoodoo Creek is an actual place with its very own location on the charts!  That is its name.  As to origin, you got me!  As we approached the East Edisto River many dolphins appeared (not long enough for my camera to snap a "quick" foto)!  These mammals can hold their breathe longer than I have patience to wait for their eventual surfacing, again for a split second, just long enough to blow out and suck in some air! The next interesting body of water was Watts Cut.  This canal-like cut joins two rivers and is very shallow at low tide. It is just past the Dawho River.  All of this leads to the South Edisto River.  Following along we get to the Ashpoo River and the Ashpoo-Coosaw Cut-Off!  Yes, they are spelled correctly!  This is the fifth time I have traveled the Coosaw River and again it is wide open and very rough. We were saved by the fact that heading directly into the wind we get a little bit of pitch but no rolling!  Since the tide was going out we struggled with speed and only averaged 4.5 knots with while facing a 12 knot wind. So much for good fuel mileage today!  The next cut took us to the Combahee River past Bull River and Parrot Creek.

We finished our day by bearing a sharp left immediately before the Ladys Island Bridge ( no apostrophe) in Beaufort, SC and anchored on Factory Creek.  We used the heater in the evening while running our generator!

Captain Sid