Beaufort, NC (StM204) 9/15-16/10

While in Hammock Bay at Camp LeJeune we shared the anchorage with fellow Marine Trawler Owners Assoc. members, John and Sue Winter aboard "Just Relax". In the morning as we were traveling they hailed us on the radio to say "hello" and see where we were headed. Beauford? We arranged to stay at the same marina and have dinner together that night.

Just short of the Beaufort Docks we came across the Coast Guard with their blue lights whirling. Mr. Mike calls out, "are you stopping us?"

All the young men shook their heads "yes" in unison. "When was the last time you were boarded by the Coast Guard?", they asked. "Never", we replied in unison. They boarded the boat and we continued the short distance to the dock. They took 45 minutes to do a safety check of all systems and safety equipment. They were very polite and pleasant.

We passed a very enjoyable evening dining with John and Sue. After dinner, John took the time to go over the charts with Mike pointing out characteristics of the terrain ahead.

I did the laundry and grocery shopped in a courtesy car provided by the marina while Mike attended "blue" engine room jobs. These water front towns do a grand job of maintaining water side parks and museums. And Beauford is no exception. I almost didn't go to the North Carolina Maritime Museum thinking I had seen more then a few museums in our journey.
That would have been a mistake. They had a building with exhibits and a building where local craftsmen were building gorgeous wooden boats. I learned about aspects of the marine industry I was totally unaware of and saw how safety equipment had developed over the years. The museum staff conducts hands on programs year round in seamanship for young and old a like. And, again, admission was free.

On the way back to the boat, we were stopped by a couple who said they had only been in town twenty minutes and did we know where the concert would be held? We replied, we'd only been in town twenty hours and had no idea. Well, how about in the small treed park directly in front of our boat? People started setting up chairs and a gentleman sat up his "music machine". He turned out to be a very talented professional musician who sang ballads from the 70's and 80's. A wonderful evening topped off by a fellow boater who came to the boat to tell Mike what a lovely well maintained and appointed vessel he had. Mike glowed.

Wilmington, SC (StM 298+12) 9/11-12/10

Captain Mike got the word that a bridge ahead of us was closed for repairs, so it was necessary to lay up for a few days. We looked at the charts, and decided Wilmington looked good. We headed twelve miles up the Cape Fear River for Wilmington's river front dock. Arriving, we found a thriving farmer's market in progress. And here, I thought fresh food might be problem! We met Shirley, the peanut brittle lady, the "pasta wench" with homemade mushroom ravioli, and, don't you know, a fisherman who raised goats on the side. He had a picture album of photos of his goats! We bought goat cheese and the goatherd/fisherman convinced Mike he HAD to try preparing soft shelled crab. A delicacy I fondly refer to as "roach on a plate". You fry the animal in its complete and natural state and eat the little buggers shell and all. Now, Mike had tried this once before in a restaurant, and not been thrilled. The experience did not improve the second time! Also that Saturday, Wilimington had a large arts and craft show for ten blocks along the main street. We viewed the booths and then found an outdoor establishment that had a bar directly on the street. We ordered beer and wine and followed the rules posted on the wall to a "T". We kept our drinks on our coasters so our elbows did not get wet, we kept our drinks on the inside side of the bar, and we did not say unkind or provocative things to passersby. We did have a delightful conversation with a gentleman in a Cincinnati Reds tee shirt who was a history teacher relocated to Wilmington from upstate New York who had been a dedicated Reds fan for forty years. Go figure!

We attended the light opera, "A Secret Garden", presented in the recently restored 1858 Thalian Hall. In the morning, I walked up town to church and the Captain of my Heart took the ferry across the river to tour the battleship, North Carolina. In the afternoon, we both visited the US Coast Guard Cutter, Diligence, which was soon to be deployed to the Caribbean to check out any suspicious activity. There were 17 symbols displayed on their vessel each one representing 500 pounds of confiscated drugs, so we assume suspicious activity abounds.

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Southport, SC. (StM 309) 9/10/10

We cruise on down the waterway and into Southport, South
Carolina where the Captain pulls into a free 0ver night dock at the restaurant, The Provision Co.

What a hoot!! Their service procedure is unique. They take your name and ask for a personal item to be left with the "hostess". In our case, my glasses' case. When they call your name, you look through the restaurant until you find the table with your personal item on it. Then you go the kitchen tell them your name and what you wish to eat making a selection from the chalkboard.


Then you go to the coolers and make a choice of beverage. Should you want another drink, you go back to the cooler whenever you want. When your dinner is ready they come out and shout your name. You hear your name and wave your arms vigorously in the air. When you're finished, you go to the cash register, tell them your name, what you drank and pay!

Georgetown, SC. (StM 403) 9/8-9/10

We pulled into Georgetown, South Carolina expecting to anchor out and dingy in, but the anchorage was full, of mostly of old abandon boats. We ended up staying with the nice folks at Boat Shed Marina. Piggly Wiggly to the rescue again!! They came and picked me up to shop for groceries and drove me back. In the morning we walked to town and enjoyed breakfast at Thomas' Cafe, (Captain Mike was enthralled with the yellow grits) I got my hair cut, and we went to the Kudzu Bakery where fresh bread and goodies were procured. Mike suggested we go the Rice Museum and I'm thinking...a rice museum??? How interesting can that be?? Very! The docent was an elderly lady (elderly means older then us!) and very committed to local history. The museum, a product of the Georgetown Historical Society, was extraordinarily well done and admission was free. In addition to explaining the labor intensive procedure for growing rice, they also had on display an American made sailing vessel from the 1720's. It had been recovered from a local river, and removed from the water in the summertime in the presence of alligators and snakes to keep local curiosity seekers from plundering the site. Winter would have been the preferred season when most of the wild things were hibernating. The the roof of the Historical Museum had been removed and the boat lowered in with a crane. We took the River Walk back to the boat where we were tempted, but did not feed the alligators! Just before the marina, we stopped at the shrimp docks and bought fresh shrimp from 10 gallon buckets for our dinner.

Charleston, SC. 9/5-6/10

And, we're off to Charleston, and the Charleston City Marina, home of the Mega Dock! The marina is huge and the Mega Dock lives up to the name!! The transient dock itself is a quarter mile long and you're not out of the marina yet. Due to it's deep harbor, many truly large private vessels come into port here. One of our neighbors was the yacht, Grand Finale and can be seen on the web by googling, Grand Finale yacht. The marina offers a shuttle service departing every hour to all the local sites. They even came to our boat with a golf cart to take us to the shuttle stop. On Labor Day, we took full advantage of this service and did it all. We took a carriage ride and our guide was a college history major, sampled the fare of a shop featuring local Carolina wines, browsed the extensive market house, took a ferry to Fort Sumter, the site of the first shots of the War of Northern Aggression, (Civil War to us from the north), ferried over to Patriots Point and toured the aircraft carrier, USS Yorktown. Earlier in the day, while on the carriage tour, we passed a restaurant called Jestine's Kitchen. The guide made the comment, "When there's a line outside Jestine's, the only thing it means is they're open". We thought we would end our Labor Day holiday with dinner at Jestine's and, because it was now after marina hours, called a cab. We pulled up to Jestine's only to view a sign saying, CLOSED. Not open on Monday's!! Now what?? We're sitting in a cab with the meter running. Cabbie says, there's a restaurant on the next corner I like a lot. Off we go to Sermet's. Now, it took a while, but we finally noticed that the colorful art on the walls were all signed "Sermet". Here, the owner was the artist and the chef!! The food was gourmet: seacakes with avocado ravioli in cream ginger sauce. All and all, a delightful experience. We stayed a little latter on Tuesday, and returned to Jestine's Kitchen for lunch for the best "soul food" ever. Now, of course, the local chamber instructs guides to refer to this style of cooking as "Carolina Cuisine"!

Beaufort, SC. 9/2-3/10

Onward to Beaufort, South Carolina. Now, that's Beaufort pronounced B-U-Fort and not to be confused with Beaufort, North Carolina, pronounced Bow-Fort. Got it? The guide books speak of the wonderful garden there. Now, I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer and I'm looking at the map to see how to get to the garden only to realize I'm sitting in it! And it is spectacular. It is not only a river side park, but a true garden with flowers of all varieties. We had docked at the free day dock and with the help of a young local man, obtained the phone number of the Piggly Wiggly. The store's manager drove down to the dock, drove me to his store, and returned me and the groceries to the boat.

Right there by the dock was the station for the carriage ride tour through the town and we decided to hop on. I can't remember the guide's name, but I can tell you the horse's name is Duke. Duke hails from Ohio Amish country and is a Belgium work horse. Belgium's are known for being large and Duke is one of the largest Belgium's alive. Larger than a Clydesdale. I'm 5'8" and look how much taller Duke is then me!! The tour was a treat telling about the daily life of the elite before, during and after the Civil War. We ended our day with dinner out at Luther's, a restaurant sitting in the garden with a water view of the river. We left the day dock and anchored out that night. In the morning, Captain Mike, discovered a problem. His fresh water pump was smoking! Never a good thing. He decided to spend an extra night in Beaufort, go into the city marina and take advantage of their courtesy car to get to the nearest West Marine Store. Fortunately, they had the required pump in stock and he was able to install it that afternoon. Me, I did my "pink" job. I did the laundry and sat in the park!

Savannah 8/31 & 9/1/10

After anchoring out for two nights, we headed into Savanah. Originally, the city was laid out in the early 1700's around a series of squares. Each of these squares provided a park on every block. We had always heard how lovely this city is, but we did not understand that it had fallen into virtual ruin by the 1950's. A restoration effort, mostly privately run, began. Old homes were bought up at prices in the $20,000 range and with slow, costly, and tedious effort, restored. Today homes in the "historic" district sell in the millions. We docked right downtown along the river on lower River Street. We boarded one of the many tour buses that showcase the city and using our "on and off" stickers, made the tour bus our "taxi" for the next two days.

We toured many of the old homes and churches, rode past Paula Dean's restaurant, visited museums, lunched on Market Square, spent a delightful evening listening to music in an Irish Pub on River Street and heard repeated historic interpretation from our many tour guides on the bus. Every guide begins describing the original charter granted James Oglethorpe by the English King. Oglethorpe had four rules when establishing his colony. There were to be no "hard" spirits to drink, only Protestants (no Catholics or Jews allowed), no slavery, and no lawyers. He thought lawyers to argumentative! Needless to say, neither these rules nor Mr. Oglethorpe stuck around very long.

We discovered that Savanah is a huge container port with 125 of these big babies arriving and leaving each week. Their size and the number of container they can hold are astounding. The city is our third largest port.