After almost a month in Hilton Head, we were off. George Bolger joined us for our short trip to Beaufort, SC and then our longer run up to St. John’s Yacht Harbor outside of Charleston. Having George aboard was great and gave us an extra set of eyes watching for shoaling areas and keeping us centered in the ICW. As is always the case in this area, we had to time our departures based on the tide. We had to wait for a rising tide to leave Windmill Harbor in HH and we were able to stay with that higher tide all the way to Lady’s Island Marina just outside Beaufort. Heading north to Charleston we also had several shoal areas to navigate and seemed to always have the current working against us. When we did get to St. John’s, our home for the next week, the current was running strong and we had some wind to deal with as well. We were told we could go stern in and tie on the starboard side, but as we came down the thoroughfare, it didn’t seem like that was going to work. A combination of having the dock guy at the wrong slip, the current and wind, Tim made a quick decision to go bow in instead. With George aboard, we were able to get all the lines transferred to the port side and Tim made a beautiful docking in what could have been a difficult situation. Jacola was waiting at the dock to take George back home. It was great spending time with them while we were in HH.
Tim and I had a few days in Charleston before Mark and Beth Atherton join us. We chose to stay at St. John’s Yacht Harbor rather than at one of the marinas in Charleston. It’s less expensive here and either way we would have wanted to rent a car. The money we save by being a little further from town has made the car basically free. St John’s is a very quiet marina with many live aboard and excellent restroom facilities, but there’s not too much around it. Our first road trip was to Magnolia Cemetery, the oldest cemetery in Charleston. I love wandering among the old grave stones thinking about the people who once lived in the area. We saw many headstones of confederate soldiers. The men who died on the submarine, the Huntley are also buried in this cemetery.
From here, we drove to Sullivan’s Island and walked around Fort Moultrie. The remains aren’t much to look at now, but we did learn a very interesting tidbit. The original fort, begun in 1776 was built of Palmetto tree logs- you use what you have. When the British attached the fort, the cannon balls bounced off the rubbery logs and the fort and its inhabitants survived the invasion. That’s why the South Carolina state tree is the Palmetto tree.
Another day, Tim and I took a 2 hour walking tour of the historic areas of Charleston. This was a great way to get a better understanding of the history of Charleston and to appreciate the beauty. I’m going to dump a lot of photos of our walk.
You’ll have to wait for the rest. We’ve been waiting on wether to clear before moving on today to McClellanville. Just told it’s time to go. I’ll finish this segment when we get back to WIFI.