The Marshes & Towns of South Carolina
I forgot to share one of the best things about being at Louis and Dianne’s beach house. They always give us the downstairs guest room with bath and the four towels Dianne has hanging in the bath kind of sum up the whole beach house mentality. They are as follows: “If you are lucky enough to be at the beach, you are lucky enough”. “You will always be my best friend, you know too much”. “You never know how many friends you have until you buy a beach house”. And my all time favorite “Guests of guests may not bring guests”
On Monday, November 7, Robert Creech cast off our lines at 0800 and we departed on a cool, sunny morning from Southport. Thanks, again, Robert & Kay for a great time in your town. The Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) wanders through the low country (marshes) and passes little beachside towns. It is peaceful when there isn’t much traffic. We arrived at Coquina Harbor in North Myrtle Beach in the early afternoon. Frank Erwin, a Past President of MTOA, lets us use his vacant slip there and we always enjoy the stop. This is a large marina and home to the Myrtle Beach yacht Club, with a pool, restaurant and all the amenities. We soon found “Licker” had come for a visit and was wandering around the boat. He is a nice orange cat that lives on the dock since his owner passed away and is cared for by the liveaboards there. We are into OPPs (other people’s pets) as we no longer have one and it is always fun to have an animal to pet for a time. Licker is very affectionate and will take all the petting you want to give, and then some. It was another nice cruising day past the many beach towns surrounding Myrtle Beach. There are golf courses galore here and a dozen or so that front the ICW. One even has a gondola ski lift to take golfers from the parking lot over the ICW to the clubhouse and course on the other side (while our clubs are onboard, they get very little use). We stopped for fuel at Osprey Marina which had the lowest prices in the state and topped off with 150 gallons of diesel. Finding marina rates and fuel prices was a real chore when we started cruising. I’d get on the cell phone and make 10 or 20 calls and perhaps still miss the best price. Now with web sites by Waterway Guide, Active Captain and others, it is a five minute point and click job on the computer. The technology is amazing and saves a lot of time. We cruised down the Waccamaw River, which Ann and I think is one of the prettiest we’ve encountered. Unspoiled, it winds through the abandoned rice patty fields of the old South. This area once supplied rice to the world and the area had many rice plantations. One or two remain as tourist sites. We docked at Georgetown, SC which is a quaint little town of good shops and eateries. It is a stop we always look forward to and the friendly folks at Hazard Marina always remember and warmly welcome us. Underway at 0830 it was a warm and partly sunny day. We were both in shorts and T-shirts by 0900 with temps at 80. Love it There isn’t much between Georgetown and Charlestown except marsh lands, but they are pretty with lots of birds and the occasional dolphin by the inlets to the sea. We anchored at Dumerees Creek about 20 miles north of Charleston. The shores are covered with oysters and Ann immediately wanted the dingy launched to retrieve some. However, a sign on the bank of the creek indicates the number to call if you wish to lease this oyster bed from the state and unless you do you are “strictly prohibited from harvesting shellfish”. Damn ! Our new oyster shucking knife will remain in the drawer. Fog thick enough to cut with a knife delayed our departure from anchorage until 0930. Even then we crawled down the ICW with the RADAR, GPS and AIS all helping to keep us in the channel and out of harm’s way. Much like flying the plane on instruments, you trust your gauges and stay safe. We made the Charleston Maritime Center at 1130 following the “Northern Highway” , a 617’ car carrier full of Japanese 4 wheelers, into port. We took a pedicab to the old French Quarter for lunch at the Fleet Landing Restaurant. During WWI & WWII the Navy anchored many of its large warships in the harbor and took sailors by launch to Fleet Landing for liberty ashore. It is now a nice waterfront restaurant which maintains many of the old photos and Navy memorabilia from the past. It is a favorite stop of ours for lunch. My second to last tour of duty in the Navy before retiring was as Commanding Officer of USS Semmes DDG-18 based out of Charleston. She was a guided missile destroyer of the Adams Class measuring almost 500’ with a crew of 350 men and 14 officers. The last time I put to sea and returned in her was from the Cooper River in Charleston, which we sailed up today. More than a touch of nostalgia for this old, retired Destroyer Skipper. Charleston was, for over 100 years, a major Navy Base and Naval Shipyard. It was surpassed on the East coast only by Norfolk, the largest Naval base in the world. Sadly the Navy has departed, the base and yard are gone and the Naval history in this bastion of the Old South is but a faded memory. It is especially poignant for me to see the Navy gone, as this is where my Naval career culminated with command of one of our country’s warships. Sad, but still good to be back on the Cooper River. The current in this river hasn’t changed. It challenged my ship handling skills 25 years ago and did so today, albeit I am driving something a bit smaller these days We had a long motor the next day to B&B Seafood dock. There is no town here, just the commercial shrimping pier, the seafood seller and room for two visiting boats. We bought a pound of shrimp and cooked them up for dinner. In the past we have been fortunate enough to catch local oystermen bringing in their catch and been able to buy some dirt cheap. Unfortunately, no oystermen this evening and B&B only sells them by the bushel for $25. That is about six dozen and we couldn’t possibly eat that many. Aw shucks, nothing to shuck! We did meet a very nice retired Navy couple Roger and Jackie on the Great Harbor 37 “Pelican”. Both are retired Navy Captains ( O-6) and both had been stationed at one time at NAS Boca Chica (Key West) where we are headed and have a permanent slip. Nice folks who we hope we see again. We departed at 0800 for a great day of cruising to Hilton Head, SC. There are four yacht clubs listed there in the American Yacht Club Directory. Two were out of the way and one had no guest dockage. I called the fourth and was told we would be welcomed with a “letter of introduction” from our home club. I e-mail our home club, YYC, and they faxed a letter introducing Past Commodore Evans. That worked and we tied in front of the absolutely lovely South Carolina Yacht Club. The office manager and club manager were there to handle our lines and welcome us.
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