Our Great Loop Adventure

We easily pulled up our anchor on the Church Creek on Monday, April 14th. We had shared the anchorage with Quimby, two sailboats and what seemed like a hundred crab pots. We continued on the the AICW towards Charleston for a short two hour run. We ran into some rain and poor visibility as we got closer to Charleston. the rain continued until after tying up to the transient dock. We docked at the Charleston City Marina before Noon. The marina is huge and is home to several large vessels. One of the marina's amenities is a courtesy van that leaves every hour and will take you to downtown. After checking in we took the van to King Street. Guess what? There was a Starbucks on the corner. We walked down King Street, which has every type of store you can imagine. It is a lot like Michigan Ave. in Chicago except it is only a two lane street with narrow sidewalks. We then went to Market Street which is a several block long series of buildings housing lots of crafts and small businesses. It is the only place where you can find Charleston's famous hand made sea grass baskets. We discovered two looper boats, Limelight and CJ are also here. Tuesday brought rain, rain, and more rain. We did some grocery shopping and inside tasks on the boat. The evening brought wind and we rocked and rolled all night. The morning of Wednesday, April 16th, was very cold. We wore socks and lined jackets. We have developed a routine to get the boat ready to leave the dock. One of the steps is checking the engine. When we lifted the access panels, we were greeted by an unpleasant odor and a battery that was boiling over and appeared to be swelling. We have had concerns about the battery for a while.Tony has been adding water every week, and the last time he had added a full gallon. Now we knew that it needed to be checked before we should travel any farther. Luckily there is an on site repair service located next to the marina office. A mechanic came by before 10:00am and, sure enough, the battery was dead. We decided to have both batteries replaced. The batteries are 8D's. They weigh 150 lbs each and require two men to lift the old batteries out and lower the new ones in place. The job was completed before 3:00pm. Thursday was another chilly day, but we wanted to move on. We made our way through Charleston Harbor. We saw the aircraft carrier, Yorktown, in the distance and passed Ft. Sumpter. (You may be wondering why we did not do a lot more sight seeing in Charleston. We visited Charleston the year our daughter, Becky, graduated from high school. At that time we saw all the wonderful homes, Ft. Sumpter, the Yorktown, and shopped.) We had a very long trip to Georgetown. It was 63 miles of gusty winds and we were fighting current and tides. We finally docked just before 5:00pm. Again we met up with Limelight and CJ. Again we are sharing a dock with the Nina and Pinta. We also were visited by a couple from Rhode Island on a boat named Dolphin. They followed us for most of today's travels and finally passed us when we got to Winyah Bay. Georgetown is known for their shrimp fleet. So on Friday morning, I went to the seafood market and bought fresh shrimp. We started our trip on Friday on the meandering Wacamaw River which has trees and swamps on both sides with occasional glimpses of civilization. On top of many of the ICW channel markers we observed many nesting bald eagles. As we got closer to Myrtle beach the waterway narrows and it is very important you stay in the middle of the channel. There is a five mile stretch called the "Rock Pile." In this area you hope you do not meet any large oncoming vessels because there is little room to maneuver without causing great damage to your boat. One of the most unusual things we have seen on this trip were two gondolas suspended on cables crossing over the waterway. They are used by golfers to get to the course on the west side. The clubs are on the outside and the people are on the inside. We docked a Myrtle Beach Yacht Club right behind Limelight and CJ. The captain of Dolphin helped us with our dock lines. After checking in we went on a tour of Dolphin, a 55 foot Offshore. It sure was a beautiful vessel. Tony was just a little bit jealous, but he got over it when he thought about how much it would cost just for the diesel fuel. We spent Saturday in Myrtle Beach. Again another cold and rainy day. Tomorrow, Easter Sunday we will treat ourselves to breakfast and make our way north on the ICW to Southport, North Carolina.