December 1, 2010
Our summer was fantastic! Not only did we get to spend some time in Kauai, but we also did a great driving trip. Spending time with our friends is always a special treat, and we did a lot of that too.
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| Kauai, HI |
Well, after a great summer we always look forward to our trip of 1,000 miles down the ICW. Every year we seem to enjoy the trip more than the previous year. This year we spent a little more time in marinas than we did anchoring which is not how we usually do it, but we are working for the Waterway Guide again. This time we are updating the entire ICW and part of our responsibilities involves verifying the facilities at the marinas. We don’t critique per se, but we like to make sure that they are properly representing their facilities. So we tend to stop for the night and peruse what they have. It’s great…we meet a lot of new people and explore new areas. We still anchor out a lot, just not quite as much.
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| Marina being rebuilt |
We left Norfolk, VA on the 9th of October and started our migration south. The weather was supposed to be good for us for the next few days. We stopped our first night in Coinjock, North Carolina. The marina only has one dock, but it is 1700 feet long. It’s a face dock so everyone is tied up on the same side (not uncommon on the East Coast). Their claim to fame is a 32-oz. prime rib dinner. We ordered half and still took some of it home. It’s fantastic! The next day we were off heading toward Belhaven, NC. It was going to be a long day so we got an early start. The hardest thing on this leg is the crossing of the Albemarle Sound. If the wind is blowing 15 knots or more and opposing the current, it can be HELL!!! We hit it on a really great day, very smooth, which was fine by us. We’ve had it the other way around and it’s not pleasant. We stopped at the Dowry Creek Marina. We are especially fond of this marina because of the people. They’re exceptionally friendly. We were only going to spend one night there, but they talked us into staying the next day because they had a group of Canadian cruisers there and were going to have a special dinner to celebrate Canada’s Thanksgiving. So we had an early turkey dinner with all of the fix’ns.
With full tummies and blown diets, we headed out the next morning to Beaufort, NC. While talking on the radio, we were told that some people we knew were going to stop for a night in a marina that we had heard about but had never been to before. So we changed our plans and spent a night in the River Dunes Marina in Oriental, NC. This is definitely one of the nicest marinas we have ever been to, and the facilities ashore are incredible. In the restrooms the showers are steam showers, there is a beautiful pool, two spas, cabañas, and outside bars. It is very upscale yet surprisingly inexpensive!
Beaufort, NC was our next destination. It’s not very far from where we were so we had a short day on the water. We hadn’t been to Beaufort for 3 or 4 years so we needed to make sure what was and wasn’t still there. We spent a couple of days walking around town and watching the local high school’s “homecoming” parade, and then we continued to travel down the waterway. Stops in Carolina Beach, NC, Myrtle Beach, SC and then onto
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| Homecoming Parade Beaufort, NC |
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| Not quite Macy's Parade |
Georgetown, SC were on the agenda. We have friends in Georgetown so we spent a couple of days there to visit with them.
Georgetown is really a pretty little town that has gone through a lot of restoration over the last few years. There are some very stately homes that have been restored and a lot of really old buildings in the town. It’s a nice walking town with friendly folks. Georgetown, at one time, had a small steel mill and also a paper mill, but those have mostly gone away.
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| One of the restored homes in Charleston, SC |
Charleston, SC was next, but we decided that we have been there several times fairly recently so we would catch it on the way north in the spring. We anchored in Charleston, though, and continued on the next day to Beaufort, SC. Yes, there are two Beauforts. One is in NC and the other is in SC, both are small but charming little towns. Our favorite is Beaufort, SC., it’s incredibly friendly and very pretty. We also like to stay at the Port Royal Landing Marina. It is family owned and operated, has great hospitality, a loaner car, fun little bar and grill, plus nice facilities. We like to stop for a couple of days, especially when we have been traveling for several consecutive days.
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| South Carolina marina |
When we got moving again, we traveled through Savannah, GA this time instead of stopping. We’ve been there several times and decided that we would stop next time going north. We think that when we do stop, we will go into the downtown area and dock. We usually stay on the outskirts of town and take a bus into the downtown area. Anyway, we anchored out for a night and continued on the next day. We decided to anchor in the Duplin River. There is nothing there, but it’s protected and secure for a night’s stay. Over the years, we have gotten used to anchoring in remote areas all by ourselves. The only problem with it is that if anything really happens, you’d better be prepared to take care of the situation yourself because it could be awhile before help arrives. In most of the really remote areas, your cell phone won’t work so you have to hope that the VHF radio aboard will be heard.
This year we decided that instead of stopping at either Jekyll Island or Cumberland Island, we would stop at St. Simons Island and also the town of St. Marys, GA for a change. Both places were really great. St. Simons is a resort destination with a lot of upscale shopping and some amazing homes. It was larger than we had visualized and much more developed. It was a good stop and one that we would probably do again. The town of St. Marys is quite small. The main part of town has one street with all of the businesses along it, and is only about 3 or 4 blocks long. When we arrived, they were filming a movie called “Eye of the Hurricane.” They had made the town look as though a hurricane had just blown through it….debris everywhere…it looked horrible. After they cleaned it up, it looked normal again. There is almost no automobile traffic, but it’s probably one of the friendliest towns we’ve been to in our travels. We met a couple, Jim and Paula, who we hung out with for a couple of days. It’s always fun to meet new cruising friends.
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| It's supposed to look like a hurricane just went through |
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| A small house in St. Marys, GA |
At this point in time, our trip south was almost complete. Florida is only about 4 miles from St. Marys, and our friends Dave and Elaine MacDonald’s home and dock are only a little over 100 miles away. They invite us to dock and leave Diamond Girl there while we travel home for the holidays. It is really great knowing that the boat is being looked after and secure plus we get to spend some time with them and have a ball.
Now we are at our youngest daughter’s (Traci and her family) home in Tualatin, OR. We got here for Thanksgiving and will stay for a time. Then we’ll fly to CA to visit our older daughter (Michelle and her family) for Christmas. The first few days that we’ve spent in OR the highs have been in the high 20’s and low 30’s, a far cry from the 70’s that we are used to in FL. Oh well! However, it has warmed up to the mid-40s during the day.
When we return to Florida after the first of the year, we will take a few days for projects on Diamond Girl and then get back to what we love to do……”moseying” down the waterway.
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HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL
