Georgia

We are underway southbound in the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of southeast Georgia, after a two-night stop in the Golden Isles. We will end the day somewhere in Florida, most likely anchored on the St. Johns. My last post was from South Carolina and my next will be from Florida, so I guess this is my Georgia post.

Harbour Town at night.

We had a nice dinner Saturday evening at the Quarterdeck with Dorsey and Bruce. It was very nice of them to gift us the half dozen bagels from Rain-n-Bagels in Beaufort, and they even provided the cream cheese. Later they also gave us a two-pound bag of ground coffee, so our joke in the morning was that it was nice to stay at a place that provides free breakfast. By the end of dinner they were still ruminating about heading offshore in the morning.

Sunset over Daufuskie Island from The Quarterdeck.

They were out of the marina before we could even pry ourselves from under the electric blanket in the morning, and while they reported it was lumpy crossing the Savannah River entrance, conditions were good enough that they continued on to St. Simons Sound. We, on the other hand, lingered in our slip until the noon checkout, basking in the warmth of electric heat and topping up our water tanks.

As we were making preparations to get underway we heard the marina directing an incoming boat to our slip, and I had to call them to say we were still there. Evidently check-in and check-out are both noon. I was going to linger to the last minute and take one more stroll, but with another boat hovering outside the marina we expedited singling up and were off the dock ten minutes early. We proceeded directly to the fuel dock to pump out, which necessitated spinning the boat around both before and after.

This sculpture in the plaza, "Out to Lunch," was very familiar to us from in front of the Sunnyvale, CA Public Library. I'm not sure how many were cast. Louise had a dog who would walk up to it and lick the hamburger.

We had an easy cruise down the ICW, with enough tide to easily get us over the nasty shallow spot at Ramshorn Cut. At the Savannah River we faced the choice of going upriver for a stop in Savannah, or continuing south on the ICW, and we chose the latter after learning we'd have just one day and two nights of nice weather in town. That's a long detour for a short stop.

We instead set our sights on the Thunderbolt area as a stop for the evening. While we normally anchor in the Herb River, this time we would arrive at a high tide of +7', and we decided to try our luck with the anchorage up Turner Creek just before the bridge. That would let us get ashore for dinner and a walk, with plenty of daylight to backtrack to the Herb if the anchorage did not work out.

This was the festive view from our deck. The flip side is that we were the view for the tourists.

There is a 4'-deep shoal at the entrance to this creek, which means it's really unusable for us unless we have at least half tide both coming and going. Long-time readers may know that we basically started our boating life here, as Turner Creek is where Hogan's Marina is located, where we moved the boat for a month right after we took possession. We did not know enough back then to know this was a terrible choice for newbies in a big boat, but it was a friendly marina that let us park and live in our bus while we moved aboard.

After a dozen years, 56,000 nautical miles, and a Merchant Mariner Credential, Turner Creek is no big deal anymore, and at a full high tide it was an easy cruise upriver past Hogan's to the anchorage. We squeezed in to what amounted to the only legal spot to anchor in a line of five other anchored boats and dropped the hook (map). Setbacks from marinas, docks, and the bridge have shrunk the anchorage since our early time here.

This weird mural adorns the unisex restroom at Basil's.

I tendered over to Hogan's, which is now actually called the Sun Life Wilmington Island Marina, before they closed to get some gas and pay the daily ten buck dinghy fee. Dockmaster Bubba (really) still runs the place and it was nice to catch up with him after a dozen years. We returned together at dinner time and walked across the highway to Basil's for pizza and draft beer, followed by provisions at the Publix right next to the marina. It was all very familiar, and I'm happy to now have a track into the anchorage that follows the channel thalweg. It was very quiet overnight.

With access to so many things right there, we contemplated staying a second night. Maybe it was nostalgia for the early days. But in the morning we decided there was nothing further we needed on Wilmington Island, and we decked the tender and weighed anchor at 7:45, while we still had a good 4' of tide to get out of the creek.

One of my current projects: replacing these instrument lamps with LED.

Leaving the creek on 4' and falling put us at the notorious Hell Gate at dead low tide. We need at least 2' to get through, and so we dropped a lunch hook off-channel to wait. A previously scheduled conference call at 1:30 meant we'd actually have to wait until the call was over, maybe close to 3, and that suited us, because it would give us a bit more tidal help, and more of a push on the other side of the Gate.

We were far enough off-channel that everyone could get by us, and a whole conga line did. One boat pulled off channel and anchored a couple hundred feet from us, waiting for the same reason. All was well until Louise noticed the northbound American Liberty, a cruise ship with a 6' draft that is also 56' wide, on AIS well ahead of us on the other side of the Gate. Shortly, I heard them making meeting arrangements with another boat. While I knew he had plenty of room to get past us, I did not want even the appearance of being in the way, and so I called and talked with him. They figured to come through at 2:54, when they had enough tide to be comfortable, and that might well have been while we were on our call. We moved another 200' from the channel before our call, just to be safe.

At one point on Tuesday we had our own personal flock of gulls, feeding on what we were stirring up.

As it turned out our call lasted just a half hour or so and we were back underway a little after 2. I called American Liberty back to let him know we'd shoot through ahead of him, and after we cleared Hell Gate I called and gave him our soundings. We pass these big American Cruise Line ships pretty regularly, and when people tell me they think their boat is too big to take down the ICW I will sometimes point out that these guys do it every day.

With the stop at Hell Gate I figured to make the "top of the hill" (where incoming tide from both directions meets) on a fair tide, and stop at a familiar anchorage there for the night. But it was barely 3pm when we arrived, and still cold, and we decided it was better put push on another hour, even against the tide, to have the heat and power. We instead dropped the hook in Big Tom Creek (map), a new spot for us. We had the place to ourselves, a lovely, if windy, night among the spartina of the low country. We would have gone another hour, but this was the last decent anchorage before St. Catherines Sound.

Our view in every direction from Big Tom Creek. Spartina grass and not much else.

We got a fairly early start Tuesday, another cold day where we wanted the heat afforded by moving. That put us at the Darien River by 1:30, where we seriously considered turning upriver for a visit to Darien. This side trip has been on "my list" for a while, and in all our transits this is only the fourth time we've passed by. But after learning that what was a free overnight dock is now day-use only, and the formerly $1/foot city dock is now double that, we decided it was not worth trying to anchor when the weather was not even good enough to call us to Savannah. We'll save Darien for a warmer time.

Unless we wanted another cold night trapped on the boat, continuing on meant making it all the way to St. Simons, with a bail-out option to the Two Way Fish Camp if it started to look like we would be too late arriving. We lucked out and arrived at the shallow Little Mud River just as the tide came up to 2', the minimum we need to get through. We had just a few inches under keel in spots. The 8' draft tug boat behind us, whom we had overtaken just an hour earlier, plowed right through it.

One of a pair of historic tabby slave cabins at Gascoigne Bluff Park.

When it became clear we would make St. Simons in the daylight or soon after, I reached out to our local friends there, John and Laura Lee, on the chance they might be available to get together. They were busy Tuesday but said they were available Wednesday, and we just decided to make it a two-night stay so we could connect with them. We dropped the hook in a familiar spot between Lanier and St. Simons islands (map) and tendered in to the newly reopened Coastal Kitchen for dinner. It was decent but they are still having teething pains. We got a much-needed walk in before dinner.

With a full day at anchor ahead of me, in the morning I jumped right in to a problem that has been nagging at me: we seem to be losing an ounce or two of engine coolant on every run. I went over the engine and hot water heater very carefully for leaks, checked in all the bilges, double-checked the oil and coolant for signs of cross-contamination, and then hit the Internet for research.

Park rules say no docking after dark. I suspect no one cares but we did not want to test the waters.

Quite a number of sources implicated the hot water heater, which, while not cheap at about a thousand bucks, would still be much preferable to anything wrong with the engine itself. This theory is consistent with the heating loop through the water heater constantly losing prime of late, and my fingers are crossed that this is the issue. I have valved off that loop, and it will take a few days' running to learn whether or not that is the problem. I am having cognitive dissonance over actually hoping for a busted $1k water heater.

After learning that my next step requires more sea time, I took the afternoon off, and I went ashore at Gascoigne Bluff Park and walked the 1¾ miles to the nearest shopping center. I found a Dollar Tree there with some items I needed and then hit the Winn Dixie for some provisions before hoofing it back. It felt good to finally get a long walk in after days on the boat.

This brand new sign is the only new thing in the park. I suspect the result of the horrific incident in nearby Fernandina Beach in July. 

At 6:30 we tendered to the St. Simons Island Marina, after learning that Gascoigne park technically closes at dusk and is also pitch dark. This county marina has allowed us to tie up the tender in the past, but on this visit I found no one to ask. Laura Lee and John picked us up and whisked us to Nest, one of their island favorites, for a nice dinner. It was great to spend a couple hours catching up with them; they are dear friends.

We had a cold dinghy ride home, and with the tide unfavorable this morning until 8:30 we decided to deck the tender in the morning. It was cold this morning, too, at just 49°, but at least it was daylight, which somehow makes it feel warmer. We had the anchor up just ahead of the turn of the tide, and had a nice push out the inlet this morning.

Golden Isles Sunset from our anchorage.

As I wrap up typing we have already passed the St. Marys and are on track to arrive at the St. Johns just as the flood starts. We should be anchored by sunset just off the ICW, and in the morning we will decided whether to continue upriver to Jacksonville for a brief stop, or continue down the ICW toward St. Augustine. In this cold weather we are leaning heavily toward the latter.