Friday 7 November
We are in Georgetown SC. Very quaint little town that is a good place to provision on the way down the ICW. A fish market where you can get those great Carolina shrimp which are very different from the Gulf shrimp we get at home. These are incredible tasty, sweet with a nutty taste. Both Terri and I find them better than gulf shrimp which are somewhat bland. We are learning one hundred and one ways to cook shrimp. Not much else going on. Soon we will be entering the marshes of SC.

Saturday 8 November
An incredible long day today, all of it through salt water marshes. We went from Georgetown to Charleston. We arrived in Charleston after dark, crossing Charleston Harbor as the sun set. We were expecting to get there before dark, but we missed the opening of the Ben Sawyer bridge by five minutes so we had to wait for one hour for the next opening. We thought of anchoring there for the night but the only anchorage close by allegedly had wrecked dredging gear on the bottom and a steel beam one foot under the water. It did not sound inviting.

Sunday 9 November
We are anchored in an isolated creek in the Marshes called Parrot Creek. We are the only boat around and it is peaceful and quiet. Once again we made good time. This boat has much longer legs that our previous one. That is to say it moves faster and covers more ground. It’s on to Beaufort SC tomorrow for real showers and mail pick-up.

Monday 10 November-Wednesday 12 November
Well here we are in Beaufort, SC. Terri like this place the best of all places we stopped last year. Rich in history, beautiful architecture. Our original plan was to stay for 2 nights in the marina, pick up our mail, provision and get out of dodge. Well firstly we did not remember it was Veterans day on Tuesday, no mail and secondly our other boat, the Tartan 34 was sold and we had to deal with the paper work involve. So, we decided on another day, but we dropped out of the expensive marine and went to the anchorage.
They say that the two happiest days of a boater are the day he buys a new boat and the day he sells a boat. We have has two such days this season. Praise the lord and pass the biscuits. I hope the new owner will be as happy with her as we were, I will miss her.
I took advantage of the lay days to do some needed service and projects on the boat. Also we came to realize that the reason we were rushing was totally off base. We thought Thanksgiving was next week and we were rushing to get to St. Marys. No it is it two weeks, time to slow down.

Thursday 13 November 2008
We slept in this AM, we’re not is a hurry. Our first business of the day was to go ashore and replace a vital store, olive oil. How can you cook a decent meal or dress a salad without it??? Terri and I are after all of Italian heritage. Then we left Beaufort at a leisurely pace, slowly motoring by Paris Island as the Marine recruits learned the skill of war, crossed the Port Royal Sound through the fog and on to Wrights Creek just before the Savannah River. We are a stones throw from Georgia. We sit here at anchor as the thunder storms pass us by and we breath a sigh of relieve for WE are the tallest thing around here.

Friday 14 November 2008
We continue on at our leisurely pace enjoying the beauty of the marshes, which in some places go to the horizon. The tidal range here is large but we are in the lunar perigee or apogee, I can’t remember which, so the tides are immense. The place we stopped for fuel, right out of deliverance for sure, had a floating dock and a gangway from the land to the floater. We got in at low tide and a swear you needed climbing gear to get up. The tide had dropped 10 feet so the land based pier was over 10 feet above the floated.
We are still having problems fueling up. Tartan in there infinite wisdom placed the fuel fill about in the middle of the boat on the port (left) side. The tank vent is all the way aft, over 15 feet away so you have to have one person filling the fuel and the other listening at the vent to hear when it is full (the sound from the vent changes when near full). Even so you need to be careful that you don’t spew fuel out of the vent because there is a big fine for getting petroleum, (right Brian).
We settle in Kilkenny creek because the issue of Skipper Bob’s Guide that we have says you can buy shrimp at the shrimp docks up there. We are informed by the marina guy that they closed that down three years ago, so no shrimp for us, but leftovers instead.

Saturday 15 November 2008
Up late off late, we’re not in a hurry. More Georgia marshes unfold before us. About mid-day NOAA weather starts talking about a strong cold front coming through with strong wind, heavy rain and t-storms. Of course that is what they said about last night and all we got was the rain, but today it looks threatening in the west. Being prudent mariners we look around for cover. Now friends let me tell you, in the middle of the marshes there is not much cover and YOU are the tallest thing around for miles. After scouring the charts I do find a creek with trees on both banks, so we run for cover. We are settled in with at least 4 other like minded souls to wait out tonight frontal passage, secure in the knowledge that we’ve picked a good spot. Time will tell, so we’ll see in the morning if Duplin Creek has filled the bill.

Sunday 16 November 2008
Well the frontal passage was anticlimactic, just a little wind, rain and no lightning. Now it is cooooold. Brrrrrrr. Here we are in southern Georgia and we’re expecting a frost, jeez. Today our destination was Fort Frederica, which we missed last year. The problem was that the dinghy dock at the fort could only be used begining 2 hours before and two after high tide, because any other time the dock was high and dry. We were there last year at the end of the day when the dock was dry because high tide was a noon. Even the next morning we could not get to the dock so we left. I grumbled about this complaining on the stupidity of the people at this National Monument. Well someone must have been listening, because when we got there this year, at high tide this time, there was no dock because they were rebuilding it, hopefully so one can get to it at any tide. We’ll try again on the way back. Hopefully the dock will be finished by then and allow access regardless of the tide.
So no fort again therefore we decided to push on to Brunswick a day earlier. But the marina is full until tomorrow so we wait on the hook a couple of miles away.
We need marina time to shower with lots of hot water, laundry and groceries. We also need some internet time to post this blog.

Monday 17 November 2008
Well we got it all, shower, laundry and groceries but most important propane for the heater and cook stove. We were minutes from running out. There is internet access as well. The trip from Beaufort, SC through Georgia was a vast internet wasteland, but stunningly beautiful.
We were pleased to find a couple from Canada who we met in the Keys last year. They keep there boat in the Brunswick Marina for the summer months while they return to Canada. They got down here a month ago and are commissioning the boat for another winter’s cruise. It was good to reconnect with old friends and hear what transpired with them after we left. And of course we had to show off our new/old boat, we are very proud. This old girl is beginning to grow on us. I finally solved a vexing problem we were having, the autopilot. While not essential an autopilot can be a valued third hand, steering the boat while you accomplish other tasks. The problem was it was schizophrenic for it would go along steering the boat then for no reason it would start turning left and right in ever increasing arcs, so you could never trust it. It ran us aground once when it turned hard over on to the side of the channel. It was not to be trusted. Reading the manual I played around with something called rudder gain without success. Then buried in the text after reading the manual several time I found something called autotrim. I decreased this by one setting a voila the autopilot now works like a charm. I wonder if the previous owner suffered with this for as long as he had the boat because this setting was buried deep in the setup. Now all is right with the world and we have our "extra hand".