Kilkenny to Savannah, GA
There are a lot of songs written about these areas where we were privileged to travel. Our last blog borrowed from Georgia on My Mind by Ray Charles. This blog refers to a line from James Taylor’s Carolina in My Mind. In Georgia, our boat wound through the salt grass marshes and that continued into South Carolina. The marshes combined with the oak trees draped in moss, and the occasional wildlife
sighting, like deer or eagles, made for a very peaceful and calming landscape. I’m sure there will be more musical references in upcoming blogs.
We waited until right after high tide to leave Kilkenny which was our peaceful refuge from the wind. Somehow we lucked out that it was slack tide so the other boaters on the dock pushed us out sideways for a smooth departure. Slack tide is the moment when the current is still and the water is not stressed. It marks when the tide is changing direction. Our timing was lucky as we still haven't learned how to know when slack tide is or how long it lasts, just that it’s sometime after high tide.
That morning, Cam managed the bridge and most of the driving for a stretch while attending a Zoom meeting on his iPad - the one we usually use for Navionics. It was a twisty run through the salt marsh, but not difficult. Today the challenge was Hell Gate, which is supposedly the shallowest part of the AICW. We left at high tide to avoid any depth issues and the shallowest we saw on our depth sounder was 8.2 feet. We need 3.5 feet, so we were fine. Hell Gate is right at the exposed Ossabaw Sound, but we also made sure to travel in low winds so the water conditions were pretty flat. We got to Isle of Hope Marina around 11:00 AM and immediately got the courtesy car for a quick trip to West Marine and Walmart.
After lunch, we took an Uber to Savannah’s historic district. We decided to do a hop-on hop-off tour. We only had a couple of hours in Savannah so it made the most of our time and it was a pretty good tour. We particularly enjoyed the old historic homes. Admittedly, we were quite distracted with calls and texts from home due to a family emergency. After the tour, we strolled through the Colonial Park Cemetery where many notable people were buried, including Button Gwinnet, who signed the Declaration of Independence, and Archibald Bulloch, Governor of Georgia and also the great-great-great-grandfather of Theodore Roosevelt. Over 700 victims of Savannah's yellow fever epidemic in 1820 were also buried there. During the Civil War, the Union soldiers occupied the cemetery for a while, and they had some fun changing dates on stones, removing headstones, and switching some bodies. We found a gravestone that said the person was born in 1711 and died at the age of 75 in 1811! You do the math. Apparently others died before they were born!
We then walked to the Broughton Common Restaurant for a nice birthday dinner for Cam; no cake though. They told us that they don't want to compete with the dessert places in the Market nearby. So, we found the Market, which was mostly closed except for a very few restaurants and shops. We didn't really need dessert. We went into a huge candy shop that made and sold their own candy and also
carried many varieties of retro candy. The next day was May 4th, so what else should be playing at the local theatre besides Star Wars. Notice that it is the "Lucas" theatre. Finally, we Ubered back to our boat for a birthday card and gift opening with a cocktail. It was the first birthday not celebrated with our son Andrew, who shares the same birthday. Zoom doesn't really cut it.
Savannah, GA to Hilton Head, SC
We had a relaxed morning before leaving Isle of Hope Marina, with no tides, winds, or waves of concern. The scenery on the first stretch was all views of Savannah. At one point, as we wound our way through the salt marsh, we checked the weather and suddenly realized we had crossed into South Carolina. You can't see the state lines out on the water and there aren't any signs so it's easy to miss these landmark moments. That day’s destination was Hilton Head. There is a small inlet on the approach to Hilton Head so it was a bit windy and rougher on our final approach but it smoothed out for a good docking. We loved the very welcoming lighthouse at the entrance. The Harbor Town Yacht Basin is part of the Sea Pines Resort where Cam’s family had a time share so they had been going there for years. Heather had never been so Cam was looking forward to showing her around but he hadn’t been in over 40 years.
We had a walk around the grounds, trying to get the lay of the lands, and then had a short beach walk. On Saturday, we placed a grocery order on Instacart. When it was 15 minutes out, we got on our bikes to meet our shopper at the gate, only to discover just how huge the Sea Pines resort is. She called and told us where she was and we had to bike almost all the way back to connect with her. She was only about 90 meters from our boat and we had been biking for at least 20 minutes! We should have asked the marina first.
We recharged the bike batteries, did a little cleanup on the boat, and Cam installed some new cleats on our dinghy. We waited out a brief rain shower and then we got the bikes down again. This time we went to find Monarch which is where Cam’s parents timeshare unit was. It was a fun ride and we even saw two alligators in a pond. We had a quick turn around to get back to the boat before our friends, Cathy
and Paul were to show up. Cathy and Heather had known each other since elementary school and our time in Hilton Head coincidentally overlapped with their vacation there. We had them a board for a tour and docktails and then we went out to dinner at the Truffles Café. It was an enjoyable evening catching up and sharing our adventures with them. It's always nice to see familiar faces, especially from home! We spent the next morning and a chunk of
the afternoon doing laundry and working. When the laundry was finally done, we biked to the beach for a walk. The beach is incredible and goes on forever! From there we biked to the Salty Dog Café, not to eat, but just because Cam’s parents always had Salty Dog Café clothing and we had to check it out. We found the shops and bought some Guy Harvey cards with dice, a Salty Dog Café nightshirt for Heather, and three shirts for the dogs.
On Sunday, we realized too late that it would have been a good day to cross Port Royal Sound! Unfortunately, we couldn’t pull it together fast enough to get away and we had already paid the marina for another day. In the afternoon, we went for a bike ride and biked all through the Forest Preserve. It’s incredible how high some of the trees are! We biked about 12 km today! This ended up being one of the best places for us to enjoy our bikes. For dinner we went to the Cranky Crab with our friends Mark and Lori from Ottyssey. They came back to our boat afterwards for a drink and a chart briefing. We planned to head out together in the morning at 7 AM to cross the sound.
Hilton Head, SC to Charleston, SC
Our journey to Charleston would be staged over two travel days with an overnight stop at an anchorage called Church Creek. We got away on schedule with Ottyssey right behind us. They would only be travelling part way with us but it was nice to have a buddy boat to cross the Sound. The forecast for Port Royal Sound was calling for two foot waves with about a four second period. That's a nice 1:2 ratio and we rode very comfortably over the swells. We finally pulled into our anchorage at Church Creek around 3:30, about 8.5 hours after we left. It was a long and tiring run. We were anchored with two other boats, for a secure and quiet evening amidst a couple of light rain showers.
The next morning, we took our time leaving our anchorage for Charleston because the marina had advised us to arrive at slack tide which they told us was 11:48 AM. High tide was 11:15 AM so we still had no idea how to predict slack tide but at least the marina did. Once we were underway, we realized that we had to go very slowly so we wouldn't arrive too early. We were getting a 0.5-1.6 knot push from the current, which meant extra speed that we didn’t anticipate. When we arrived at the marina, Cam was really feeling the push of the current as well as some wind so it was a challenging docking, but he’s good at it and the dock hands were experienced. Cam had to work in the afternoon, so Heather researched tours and transportation for Charleston, and then went for a walk to explore the grounds. The resort was beautiful with three pools, one hot tub, one beach area without ocean access, and two wedding areas. There were also fire pits near the hot tub. It was fantastic!
We had hoped to try a Michelin Star restaurant in town but we couldn't get a reservation. They are probably booked weeks in advance. The only availability was 10:15 PM at one restaurant and that was past our bedtime! We chose the Charleston Fish House instead. It was pretty good and it turned out to be on the resort property. We got back to the boat and we were considering going for a hot tub when a black sky moved in out of nowhere. We could see lightning in the clouds and the gust front was blowing the boat hard. We ran out to attach a couple of extra lines and secure the bridge but it was upon us before we could finish! It would be the worst storm that we went through on our whole Loop. The boat rocked, bounced, and heaved in the slip. The sailboat beside us rocked violently and their jib was banging with the 50 knot winds. Eventually, the jib started to unfurl and flap, and then it tore. When the storm settled we went out to investigate. We saw a couple of powerboats with torn canvas and a boat in the mooring area with a jib that was completely shredded. Fortunately, our boat was okay and we finished securing the lines. Another storm came through so we took shelter again. At some point the power went off and it was off for about an hour. Our neighbour was listening to the VHF radio and we could hear that a boat was adrift in the mooring field. What a storm! A third system came through around 11:20 PM, announced by the loud flapping of the jib on the boat beside us. Our neighbour said that it was his home port and he's never seen a storm so bad.
On Wednesday we took an Uber to Whole Foods and Harris Teeter for groceries. Cam even squeezed in a haircut. Then after lunch we toured the USS Yorktown which is an 888 foot long WWII aircraft carrier. The Apollo 8 landing capsule was on display on the ship as it was retrieved by the Yorktown. There were four self-guided tours to choose from inside with lots of museum like displays along the way. They
also used mannequins to set up realistic displays of the galley, dentistry, and many other areas, as well as life sized videos. We were able to go all the way down to the engine room, up to the flight deck to see the planes, and further up to the bridge. Very cool! There was a recipe in the galley for baking 10,000 chocolate chip cookies! We haven’t tried it yet but if you do, please let us know and we'll come help eat them!
We wrapped up our stay in Charleston with a nice dinner back at the boat, followed by a hot tub at the resort.
Click on the photos below to view the images in slideshow mode. You can also watch our videos on Hilton Head and Charleston. Coming up next, we enter North Carolina and have engine trouble.
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