Saturday, April 19, 2008

South of the Border


Sorry for the infrequent blog posts. I've been on the move. I did an offshore overnighter from Charleston to Georgetown, SC. And today I motored on the ICW from Georgetown to the Little River Inlet. I motored about 60 miles in 11 hours, and only used about twelve gallons of gas. A new ICW record for me. I timed the tides well and with fair winds was able to put up the jib about half the time.

I did this stretch of the ICW in two days on the way down. It helps that the days are longer, and that I'm familiar with the territory. I went up the Waccamaw River, which is very pretty and undeveloped. Then down the Little River, which is very developed and basically a ditch (Myrtle Beach area).

There was lots of traffic on both rivers. Blame it on a beautiful Spring Saturday. My whole body aches from the long day of motoring. But the most tired part of my body is my right hand. Everyone waves as they pass. I also achieved a personal record of amount of waving in a day.

Pic is a boat I passed on the way out of Charleston harbor. Also passed Fort Sumter.

I'm monitoring the weather. It would be a nice, easy day sail to the Cape Fear Inlet tomorrow, if the weather cooperates. Soon I'm going to take a day off and maybe even a night at a marina. I think the last time I was at a marina was when Fred and I went to Bike Week in Daytona.

Oh, and the title of the post. I'm on the NC/SC border. If you've traveled I-95 down here, you know what "South of the Border" is.

4 comments:

Ross said...

Scott -
I'm back from a good time in the Bahamas.
You've made tremendous progress north and watching your track today I can see why - you're really driving hard!

Your endurance at the helm is truly amazing.

You mentioned that you'd be looking for a marina soon and because you're now cruising through my old home sailing grounds I may be able to offer some insight into the options, albeit somewhat dated.

NautiG said...

Ross,

I'm exhausted.

I have an easy day to Wrightsville beach tomorrow. I'll take a day there to rest. A bunch of things are broken on the boat. I've been pushing myself and Split Decision pretty hard. I'll gather the things the boat needs there.

I really want to hear about you're week on a catamaran in the Bahamas. My past week on a catamaran on the icw has been pretty grueling. Hopefully the Bahamas were a lot more restful.

Grampa said...

According to Google Earth, you have about a 21 mile sail to Wrightsville Beach. With Google Earth and the coordinates supplied with your GPS, you can really get a good view of where you are and what lies ahead.

It's a good thing you are handy at repairing things with the rate you are breaking them! Good luck tomorrow.

NautiG said...

Yah, it's when things start breaking quicker than you can fix them, that you're in deep trouble. That usually happens in bad weather, far from help.

I'll be at ICW mile 285 in Wrightsville (Mile 0 in Norfolk, VA). I'm pretty excited about taking a day off. A week of so ago, I wasn't all that confident about making Baltimore in May. But after banging out a bunch of miles, I'm feeling a lot more secure about it.