A successful sail down the ICW to Beaufort, SC.

Our trip from Charleston to Beaufort could not have gone better. Well, aside from the one moment when we almost ran aground at high tide while waiting for the Wappoo bridge to open. But no harm, no foul.

We used the engine to raise the anchor from the spot where we were anchored in Charleston and then sailed across the harbor. Trying to time it so that we didn’t have to wait too long for the bridge, we made it with ten minutes to spare.

As we waited we had the sails down and tried to stay in place with the dinghy side-tied to Pegu Club. We noticed a tad too late that the current was pushing us to the side, so we had to turn on Big Red to save us from being stuck in the mud (which at high tide would have been far from ideal), but all was well and we had learned another lesson.

Jeff in position, waiting on the Wappoo Bridge.

Our friends on SV Rosa del Viento had passed us with a hearty wave on their way to the bridge, so we hailed them on the VHF for a report on Elliott Cut. They said there was still some current pushing them along, so we breathed a big sigh of relief and made it through that short stretch with no issues.

The sails went up as we popped out onto the Stono River, and the rest of the day was uneventful. We had anywhere from 5 to 20+ knots of wind, and Pegu easily sailed along. At one point we were doing 9+ knots speed over ground with the current! If we hadn’t been towing the dinghy, we figured we would have hit 10 knots. It was a blast, and we were saying that for future trips we really should try to sail more.

Trying to take full advantage of the current, we anchored at a new-to-us spot that evening, about an hour past Church Creek which is our usual anchorage. It turned out the charts for the new-to-us anchorage were incorrect, and we had much less depth than we anticipated.

When we dropped the anchor the depth was fine, but by the time the chain was out and the boat had settled in position, we knew we were going to end up in the mud at low tide – a difference of 6 feet from what was charted. Normally we would have reanchored, but again, we were trying to use the engine as little as possible. But no worries. It was only mud, and we knew the tide would be rising when we left the next morning.

Sure enough, we settled into the mud overnight, but we had a whopping 1 foot under the keel when we raised the anchor in the morning (with the tide continuing to rise), so all was well. What followed was another uneventful day, sailing until the wind dropped off that afternoon, and motoring with the dinghy the rest of the way to our happy place – Beaufort, SC. Even though we were in the mud the previous night, we were glad we had stopped there because we arrived in Beaufort just after sunset. If we had stopped in Church Creek, it would definitely have been dark.

In hindsight, we are SO glad that we bought the new Yamaha outboard when we were in the Bahamas last winter. As a 4 hp two-stroke, it has much more oomph than our old Honda 2.3 four-stroke. Honestly, we don’t think we would have been able to push Pegu Club against the current with the Honda. Not to mention the Honda’s internal fuel tank is less than 1/2 gallon and there’s no way to accommodate an external tank. We definitely would have had to refill the tank underway which would not have been easy. The Yamaha has a 3 gallon external tank and an almost 1-gallon internal tank, so we had plenty to get us through the afternoon.

So now what? We are spending the week in our regular anchorage in Factory Creek and enjoying our stop in Beaufort. Tomato pie is on the agenda, and we’ll be making a full Thanksgiving dinner courtesy of Publix. Coincidentally, this is where we spent Thanksgiving last year.

On Saturday we’re going to head towards Savannah, and with a bit of luck we’ll be able to sail a chunk of it. Sunday we’ll arrive at Isle of Hope Marina near Thunderbolt, and Monday the engine work begins. So far we have been nothing but extremely impressed with the communication and assistance we’ve received from WW Williams. A very good sign indeed. With a bit of luck, we’ll be heading towards Vero in a few more weeks.

I’ll be sure to post updates as the process continues!

It was stressful, but we made it out of the marina!

Today we moved out of the marina and into an anchorage so we could stop hemorrhaging money for a dock slip. Initially we had been told that we might be able to haul out on Wednesday (today), but the strong winds have put the kibosh on that so the earliest haul out would be next week. At $138.80/night, we had no intention of staying in the marina past this morning. Ten days was bad enough.

Jeff and I were both really stressed about moving the boat out of the slip. The engine can truly seize at any moment. It could last a month, a week, a day, an hour, a minute. The last thing we wanted was to have it seize while we were maneuvering through the marina and collide with another boat.

It’s windy today, but the wind was blowing on our bow and we were the first slip in from the t-head with the fuel dock behind us. All we had to do was wait for slack, wait for an empty space at the fuel dock, and back her out. From there it was a few hundred yards to the breakwater and we’d be home free.

We filled up our external dinghy fuel tank with three gallons, waited for slack, took a deep breath, and went for it. I can’t begin to describe how relieved we both were once we were clear of the marina, and we heavily praised Big Red for hanging in there!

Now we’re at anchor for free. It’s far from the best anchorage we’ve ever been in as far as protection is concerned, but when the dockmaster heard we were planning to anchor by the USS Yorktown, he strongly advised against it. With these winds, he said a few people always drag when the current changes, and that’s the last thing we need. So we sacrificed some physical comfort for mental comfort instead.

So what’s next? Now that we’ve left the slip, it feels like everything is falling into place and we are in a REALLY good headspace. We’ve decided not to get the work done by Zimmerman here in Charleston. The lack of communication has been unimpressive, and we haven’t been able to find any reviews on the quality of their engine work with a job like this.

We have received several recommendations for WW Williams out of Thunderbolt/Savannah. All they do is diesel work – 18 wheelers, pleasure boats, commercial boats (they take care of the pilot boats that bring the cargo ships into Savannah), etc. They are FAR from cheap. Far. From. Cheap. In fact, the estimate made us both blanch when we saw the hourly rate (which includes travel time to the marina).

However, they clearly know what they are doing and their communication has been outstanding. We called them on Monday morning and had an estimate at 6:00 a.m. this morning (Wednesday). Zimmerman knew by noon on Friday that we needed this work done, and we still haven’t received any information from them besides a call saying we can’t haul out until next week at the earliest.

A few other things in WW Williams favor: they will do the job from start to finish, so the amount of time we’re waiting will be minimized. The only exception to that is if a pilot boat has a problem in which case it’s all hands on deck because it affects a container ship, but we’ve been told that’s rare. They will also do it in the water, so we don’t have to pay for a haul out and land storage. And they can get started within a few days of our arrival.

Besides WW Williams, we called Hinkley in Thunderbolt to cover our bases. Their hourly labor rate was 1/3 less than WW Williams, but we had to haul out of the water and it would take 4-5 weeks to get the job done (they don’t do the work start to finish). We had also read mixed reviews about their work which made us pretty nervous. After lightly investigating a few other mechanics and places, WW Williams it is!

Now what? We were going to wait for a weather window to go outside, but the wind is howling for days with MAYBE a small window this weekend, and then more howling. The wind is bad (for us) for going outside, but absolutely perfect for continuing to sail inside – both in strength and wind direction. The only tricky part will be Elliott Cut – a .2 mile stretch where the current can rip and the wind is blocked by houses on a high bank.

After getting some advice from our friends on Lone Star, we have decided to put the dinghy together tomorrow morning and side-tie it to Pegu Club. We’re going to hit Elliott Cut at slack tide and simply use the dinghy engine to motor us through the Wappoo Bridge and Elliot Cut. Then it’s back to sailing on the inside. The first daylight opening at the Wappoo Bridge is at 9:30 tomorrow, which is right around slack. It’s perfect timing.

Next week is Thanksgiving, so we aren’t planning to get to Thunderbolt until after that. We have plenty of time, and honestly, we enjoyed our fancy sailing from Georgetown. Might as well keep it going! Looks like we’ll be getting our tomato pie in Beaufort after all!

We’re (mostly) adjusted to the new reality.

I’ll admit, morale was very low on the Pegu Club on Friday and Saturday. We went through all the stages – denial, anger, bargaining, depression. And now we’ve reached the stage of acceptance. No surprise that Jeff reached it first, but I went for a five mile walk yesterday and came back with a clear head and a good perspective.

The main thing that helped was knowing that we are in a position to do this. Yes, it’s a big hit to our savings, and we will take next winter off to work and fatten up the cruising kitty again, but this definitely won’t force us to swallow the anchor. There are shoe-string cruisers where an engine replacement would mean game over plus now they have a boat they can’t sell. Fortunately, that isn’t the case for us.

Now it’s basically a waiting game, with the time spent making many decision. Decision 1: repair the engine or get a new one. On the surface, it would seem that repair would be the way to go. But dig a little deeper, and it’s not as simple.

The engine has to be removed and then reinstalled either way: repair or replace. If we go the repair route, then the mechanic has to dig in and see if it’s a bearing or the wrist-pin, and see what kind of damage it may have done. We already know that there are flecks of metal on the oil dipstick. At the hourly labor rate, a mechanic could easily spend half the cost of a new engine (or more) diagnosing and repairing – assuming it can be repaired at all. The damage could be too great. So do we roll the dice, knowing at the end we have an engine that’s out of warranty with five+ year old parts?

If we go the replace route, we could strip the current engine of a variety of parts that will need to be replaced in the future: starter, alternator, water pump, heat exchanger, basically brand new injectors, etc. and keep them for when those parts break down in the future. No, they aren’t new parts (well, the alternator basically is and the injectors certainly are), but buying all of the potential replacement parts would easily exceed $2,000. Replace it, and we’ll have a new engine with a five year warranty and a bunch of spares.

Decision 2: buy a complete engine or a long-block. We didn’t know it before this happened, but apparently you can buy an engine that is basically just the core. Then you transfer the other parts (listed above) from your old engine onto the new one. The long-block is $2,300 cheaper, but then you’re paying labor to transfer everything and you don’t have the older spare parts, so we’d need to buy new spare parts.

They key factor for us when it came to decisions 1 and 2 was the fact that the long-block would be shipped from England so it would take “approximately” four weeks to arrive. The new engine is in stock. Given all of that, we decided to go with the new one and strip the consumables from the old engine ourselves, giving us a chance to learn how to remove those items and save on labor costs.

So we’ve put a hold on the new engine and saved some money on the cost of it by purchasing it without the transmission, the exhaust elbow, the mounts, and the alternator. Our alternator was replaced in May in Saint Augustine, so it’s virtually new. All of those items can be moved from our current engine. We also don’t need a control panel since our current one is fine.

Beta has given us a multi-engine discount of 20%, and the total cost is around $1,000 more than the engine we purchased in late 2017. Given inflation since then, that’s not bad. But it doesn’t feel like a “we’re sorry this happened” price. At this point though, we’re arguing over speculation. We haven’t given up on getting a larger discount once we have a better idea as to what exactly went wrong.

The next decision (decision 3) was whether or not to try to remove the old engine and install the new one ourselves. Ultimately we decided that for the good of our psyches and our relationship, we should leave this one to the mechanics and take the diesel courses in Annapolis later this year. Jeff might try observe while the mechanic works and pick up some knowledge that way.

Decision four is where to get the work done. We posted on some Facebook pages for some referrals, and we’ve narrowed it down to here in Charleston or a bit farther south in Thunderbolt, near Savannah. If we were going to tackle this ourselves, we’d probably go even farther south towards St. Marys or Brunswick. But we’re not, so that helped. We’re waiting on quotes from a few places and will base our decision on cost and how quickly it can get done, but right now we’re leaning strongly towards Thunderbolt.

We already know that we can’t get hauled out in Charleston until late next week. If we choose Thunderbolt, we’ll have to sail outside to get there and we don’t have a weather window for that until Friday at the earliest. So either way, for now we wait.

Ugh.

The injectors arrived late yesterday (Thursday), and the mechanic was here by 8:30 today (Friday) to install them. We started the engine, waiting anxiously, hoping that the snapping sound would be gone and we’d be on our way. Sadly, it was not to be. This is very bad news.

It’s likely a bearing or something just as bad. Regardless, fixing it requires hauling the boat out, removing the engine, and looking to see what damage is done. At some point the labor costs are such that a decision needs to be made you as to whether a new engine should just be installed. At least it would have a five year warranty (hah!). We don’t know where the tipping point is, but we should have more numbers on Monday.

I called Beta Marine U.S., explaining the situation, and he said he had never heard of such a thing happening on one of their engines. I asked if he would be willing to cut a break on the cost of a new one given that it’s only 6 months and 500 hours out of warranty. It’s not out of the question, but he would need to see the engine first which is understandable. So that’s not necessarily off the table yet.

In the meantime, the quote for a new engine without a transmission (since we already have one) is $8,964, and he has one in stock. He’ll get a quote for a long block engine (which is an engine without all of the parts that we don’t need – mounts, bell housing, etc. because they could be transferred onto our existing engine) on Monday. Beta is based out of the U.K., so the long block engine would take a couple of weeks to arrive.

We can’t get hauled until maybe Wednesday, so we are in a holding pattern, racking up marina fees at $138.80 a night (Wednesday morning will be 10 nights), not to mention what the injectors, the mechanic, and the tow has cost to date. Needless to say, morale is low on the Pegu Club at the moment.

Encouraging news while we hurry up and wait.

I’ve been holding off on posting because each day I thought we’d have something definitive, but I’m throwing in the towel and posting an update anyway.

On Saturday we had a relaxing day hanging out with Infinity in Dewees Creek. We were waiting until Sunday for our tow because we didn’t want to have to pay for an extra day at the marina when we knew the mechanics didn’t work on the weekend. The afternoon was spent grilling sliders and playing a marathon session of Rummikub. A fun day was capped off when Infinity took this excellent picture of Pegu Club in a beautiful sunset:

Sunday TowBoat showed up early and easily brought us to the marina. He hip-towed us into the slip without any issues, and we anxiously awaited our appointment with the mechanic on Monday morning. Interestingly, the TowBoat guy was from Glastonbury, CT (he moved here ten years ago after he was using a roof rake to get snow off his roof and a bunch fell down his coat), and the mechanic is from Long Island (he moved here when he got sick of the snow). I’m sensing a pattern here. LOL!

The marina is attached to a hotel/resort (with the attendant cost), so Sunday night we began a nightly tradition of hanging out with Jeff W. from Infinity, shooting the breeze by the fire pit.

Monday there was a bit of a mix-up with the scheduling so we actually didn’t see the mechanic until early in the afternoon, but we were trying (and failing) to roll with it. We were really stressed, not knowing if we needed a new engine. I said to Jeff that it was like waiting for a doctor’s appointment where you were going to get test results.

John the mechanic immediately proved himself to be substantially better than the guy in Georgetown. While the Georgetown mechanic spent literally ten seconds listening to the engine before declaring it dead, John actually got in there and spent some time listening and testing.

When he crawled out, he said he believed it was the injector and he’d call Beta to get their take on it. At this point we were feeling much better, but still not 100% relieved because he wasn’t 100% sure. We discussed overnighting parts, and made it clear we really needed to get going (and out of this expensive marina).

On Tuesday John showed up first thing in the morning. He had spoken to Beta and they wanted to him to check a few more things. About an hour later he was even more confident that it was the injector, so we gave approval to overnighting the parts. If they arrived early enough on Wednesday, we could be on our way that afternoon or Thursday.

Knowing we didn’t need to wait around for the mechanic for the rest of the day, we took the free resort shuttle into Charleston, a place we have never stopped. We had a delicious lunch and wandered around, taking in the sights. First impressions were that we prefer Savannah, but Savannah didn’t charm us until our second visit, and we really didn’t even scratch the surface here so we would definitely come again. There’s no doubt Charleston is a beautiful city:

I love the round part of the Circular Congregational Church and the contrasting materials of the bell tower.

The Church had informational signs discussing rising sea levels, culminating with this wall that shows how high the storm surge would be if a Hurricane Hugo-equivalent storm hit Charleston in 2020, 2050, and 2100;

I loved the color of the French Huguenot Church. It reminded me of Bermuda.

The Pineapple Fountain at the waterfront park.

Rainbow row in Charleston. I suspect it costs all of it to buy one of these properties when they come up for sale.

Wednesday morning we woke up hoping that we could maybe be on our way that afternoon. That was before FedEx put the package on the truck for delivery and kept pushing the delivery time back. By the end of the afternoon we still didn’t have the package. But the mechanics begin work by 7:00 a.m. so we agreed with the office that we would be up and ready to go for installation, all of us assuming the package would get delivered by the end of the day since it was on the truck.

Today (Thursday morning) we were up and ready, but the package wasn’t delivered late yesterday. Instead, it’s out on the truck again with an estimated delivery of between 9:30 and 1:30. It’s 11:15 and I’m not exactly holding my breath, so we’ve extended our marina stay for one more (expensive) night. More to come later – hopefully.

Making lemonade out of lemons.

Yesterday (Friday) was another highly successful day of sailing down the ICW, from Graham Creek to Dewees Creek. In fact, we didn’t need a tow from Infinity at all!

It was warmer than the day before, and although the wind started out light, it picked up enough to give us a steady downwind push to allow us to sail for a quick 15 nautical miles. Once again, almost every boater was very kind by giving us a slow pass, and a few people complimented us on going for it and wished us luck.

We weren’t the only boat having mechanical problems! The trawler was getting a hip-tow, passing us in the early afternoon.

We are very fortunate in several ways, only a few of which are: the geographic location where the engine problem occurred; our familiarity with the ICW along with what we’ve learned over the past five years of cruising on it; and the forecast.

If this had happened on the Waccamaw River, for example, there would have been too many trees to give us enough wind, regardless of how hard it was blowing. Or it could have happened on the Alligator River where we were VERY far from any repair facilities.

Had this been our first year, we wouldn’t have known what areas had the potential for sailing, and what didn’t. Instead, we knew exactly what the next 40 miles or so would bring. A mostly straight waterway with a few areas with trees (but occasional gaps in those trees to allow for puffs of wind to come through), and then a very long stretch with nothing but marsh where the wind could blow uninterrupted. We also knew to leave at almost high tide to give us more wiggle room to use the entire width of the river without worrying about running aground. Perhaps most importantly, we had the confidence to know we could do this.

Finally, the weather. The location and what we’ve learned wouldn’t have helped us at all if the wind had been on the nose, or calm like it had been the few days before it happened. Instead a timely front pushed through with accompanying northerly wind that blew strong enough to move us downwind. That was 100% luck.

So put all of the above together, and the result is that we didn’t have to rely on Infinity to tow us the whole way, although he repeatedly said he’d be happy to. But it was great knowing he was behind us as our “support boat” if needed!

We also didn’t have to pay for an obscenely expensive tow from Georgetown. We were able to take advantage of our knowledge and the weather to get close enough to Charleston where it’s a slightly-less-than obscenely expensive tow. Wait! Don’t we have unlimited towing? Why yes. Yes, we do. But we have learned that unlimited is not defined the way it used to be. But that’s a subject for another post.

Instead, we enjoyed a truly unique experience of peacefully sailing between Georgetown and almost Charleston over the past few days. We heard birds singing, pelicans splashing, and dolphins puffing through their blowholes. All things that are usually drowned out by the engine. And we really felt like we accomplished something too.

So my goal is to hang onto those good feelings as we anxiously await the mechanic’s diagnosis. He’ll be at the marina on Monday. Hopefully we’ll know what’s going on shortly after his arrival. Fingers crossed.

“Fancy sailing.”

It was a chilly, but sunny, sail down the ICW yesterday, covering just over 20 nautical miles. The wind was basically cooperative with a downwind sail, although the shifts through the trees kept Jeff busy moving the sails back and forth.

We were able to spend a substantial amount of time sailing wing and wing, and the motor vessels that passed us were VERY considerate, giving us slow passes as Infinity explained the situation on the VHF (which is not always the case.)

Jeff and I call sailing in rivers and creeks, “fancy sailing.” It’s not something we can do often, but it’s a lot of fun when it works out.

We had to call it a day about 20 minutes away from our anchorage when the wind died and the current was against us. Infinity had been patiently staying behind us for the duration so he motored up, we threw him a line, and he towed us the rest of the way.

Honestly, we were a little bummed because we were hoping to make it the whole way, but all in all it was a successful sail and a fun day. Dropping the anchor in one of our favorite anchorages (Graham Creek) was a nice reward for the day.

We had Infinity over for a dinner that was appropriate for the chill: warm tomato soup and Mexican grilled cheese sandwiches (otherwise known as quesadillas – we only have tortillas on board, not bread.). A good night sleep followed, and now we’re ready to keep sailing to our next anchorage. The adventure continues!

A weather lay day.

Yesterday (Wednesday) was a lay day due to the strong winds. We stayed well-protected in the anchorage, I made brownies, and we had a marathon session of Mexican Train Dominoes with Infinity going from double twelves down to double blanks. Infinity won.

It was our coldest day and night of the trip with a high only in the mid-50’s and a low of 39, so we took advantage of our Honda generator and our portable heater to warm up the boat.

We were hoping to run the heater all evening (it’s only us and Infinity in the anchorage), but the exhaust from the generator was getting trapped somewhat by the weather cloths surrounding our cockpit. The wind was on our beam (the current overpowers the wind around here so your bow points into it instead of the wind), but the exhaust wasn’t getting carried away as much as we had thought it would. Next time we’ll open up the dodger window to aid in circulation and shut the generator off right before we go to bed.

Regardless, when we went to bed the boat was warmer than it would have been, and it was a snug night tucked in amongst all of our blankets and sleeping bags.

Today we’ll shove off around 11:00 to continue sailing down the ICW. We’ll have the current with us for most of the afternoon, so if Infinity has to tow us we should barely make a difference. Hopefully we’ll end up in Graham Creek tonight, which is one of our favorites.

Next time, we’ll leave the dock by ourselves.

Yesterday (Tuesday) we left Georgetown to anchor in Minnis Creek to wait out a passing front. The marina we were at in Georgetown is right on the river, parallel to a wicked current. After consulting with SV Infinity, we decided to leave a few hours after the max flood current, figuring we wouldn’t have to fight the current too much when we were in the Canal when he would need to tow us.

Based on the current, SV Infinity (who is single-handing at the moment) decided to get help with his lines from the dockhands when he left, so we asked him to send them over to us when they were finished. Normally we would do this ourselves, but we decided since we were babying the engine, it would be better for Jeff to be on the boat when we cast off the lines.

We should have done it ourselves.

The dockhands came over and we explained that we were having engine trouble, so we wanted some help with our lines so Jeff could stay on the boat. We had one sailboat docked several boat lengths in front of us, and the current was running towards the sailboat – the opposite direction from where we were heading.

Jeff was literally opening his mouth to tell the dockhands what order he wanted the lines released when all of a sudden they were letting lines go (we had four lines – a bow, a stern, and two springs.) Some lines were in the water – if they had tangled in the prop we would have stalled, which is not good. The boat had immediately turned sideways with the current and was swiftly moving towards the sailboat docked ahead of us, our bow pointed into the dock.

We are always VERY nice to dockhands, but this was beyond the pale. Nice was not happening, nor deserved, amidst this chaos which was quickly spinning out of control. Not with our engine situation that they knew about. Let’s just say there was a lot of yelling and swearing on our part. It was basically a clusterfuck.

We were sideways to the dock and rapidly approaching the sailboat so I had no choice but to drastically increase the throttle, listening to the engine hammering away, hoping it wouldn’t stall, to get the hell away from the sailboat in front of us. I will give credit to the younger dockhand who gave our bow a mighty push upon Jeff’s instruction, which allowed us to move away from the dock.

Disaster was averted, and we motored away with four people VERY unhappy, judging by the sourpuss on the dockhand – easily 15 years older than me – that I had been yelling at. I’m sure they were muttering “Damn Yankees!” as we left, still swearing and thoroughly pissed off.

In talking to SV Infinity on the VHF after we left, his experience wasn’t that much better. They dropped his line with the idea that he would pivot and motor away, but he found himself moving VERY quickly towards the bridge that was not too far in front of him.

Trying to give the dockhands the infinitesimally small benefit of the doubt, it does seem to be a marina that caters to large motorboats with very huge engines. Those engines laugh at the current, whereas sailboats with engines the size of Infinity and Pegu Club need to “make friends with the current” (to quote the dockmaster at Delaware City Marina our first year south, when they were warping us around.)

Once the adrenaline dropped off though, we had a very nice sail for most of the trip. We had wind from behind us to start, but it was strong enough to push us along despite the adverse current. As we made our way towards the canal, the current continually eased and the wind angle changed as we rounded the bend in the river, so we trimmed the sails until we were close hauled going over 6 knots.

Based on the wind direction, we radioed Infinity and told him we were going to try sailing down the Estherville-Minim Canal. The wind would be behind us and the trees were definitely going to interfere with the direction and strength, but we wanted to go as long as we could before he needed to tow us.

We hung a right into the canal and began doing everything from wing and wing to switching the main and jib back and forth as the wind direction changed. As predicted, the trees were making the wind squirrely. We went 4+ knots, we went 2.5 knots, and we were having a lot of fun. Jeff and I jokingly call it “fancy sailing.” SV Infinity joked that we might be the first people to sail wing and wing through the bridge area. Just goes to show you can sail more of the ICW than one would think, as long as you aren’t in a hurry to beat feet south.

The whole time, Infinity was patiently coasting along behind us, and although I had fantasies of sailing to the anchorage and anchoring under sail, I figured he had to be going nuts just drifting along (I would have been if the situation was reversed.) Infinity graciously said we could do whatever we wanted, but we knew that a big stand of trees was coming, so rather than make him suffer we decided to call it a day and he towed us for the last 20 minutes.

We thought about what we would have done if we had been alone, deciding we would have dropped anchor on the side of the canal, lighting up the boat so other boats could see us, and then moved to the anchorage today when the wind is gusting 25 knots. Always good to go through the mental exercise!

Now both boats are anchored in a good spot for today (Wednesday’s) blow, and we are going to enjoy a marathon session of Mexican Train Dominoes before we take off tomorrow. We should have pretty good wind to sail the next two days, so we’ll get as close to Charleston as we can before we call TowBoat.

It’s always an adventure!

We interrupt this broadcast…

My last post was covering our trip north. It was part two of three, and my intention was to spend several posts getting caught up to real time. I’m still going to cover the rest of the trip north and the trip south to date, but we’ve had an unexpected interruption so I’m going to “live blog” for the next week or so before going back to playing catch up.

Several days ago I heard a new knocking sound in our engine. It wasn’t very noticeable and I thought I was imagining things, so I didn’t mention it to Jeff. He has since reminded me that he’s getting hard of hearing, so always say something.

On Sunday we were anchored just south of the ICW on Winyah Bay in South Carolina. The plan was to head down the ICW and be in Beaufort, SC eating tomato pie today (Tuesday).

About 15 minutes after we began, we increased the throttle to pass a smaller, slower boat in front of us. As we were passing, I could hear the revs on the engine starting to search. It took a minute or two before Jeff could hear it. We passed the other boat, brought the throttle down, and now the knocking from a few days ago became louder so that Jeff started to hear it too.

We radioed SV Infinity to let them know we were having issues and decided to turn around (he told us later that he could hear our engine through the VHF which wasn’t typical.) Within a minute of turning around, the revs really started hunting, the knocking was really loud (we think – there was a lot going on), and the engine stopped. Uh-oh.

We told SV Infinity what was up and started drifting with the current (there wasn’t any wind) while we talked about our options. Of course the current eventually started to turn us towards the center of the channel, so Infinity came up and within 30 seconds we had a line tied between the boats and he was slowly towing us.

It took awhile to reach TowBoat (they weren’t answering the radio and we didn’t have cell service), but eventually they arrived and towed us to the only marina in Georgetown, SC that had space. SV Infinity arrived about an hour after us.

To make a long story short, we had a mechanic come in yesterday (Monday). He listened to the engine for ten seconds and promptly declared it was a broken wrist pin and we would need a new engine, because the labor to rebuild would approach the cost of a new engine. Keep in mind, in 2018 we had a new Beta 16 HP installed (at great expense) to avoid this very situation. It has almost 2,800 hours on it, and you should easily get 10,000 hours out of one. This was NOT what we expected to hear.

After the shock wore off we decided to get a second opinion. We really didn’t get a good hit off the guy and had the distinct feeling he just didn’t want to do the job, whatever that job might turn out to be. A few people from Facebook had recommended him, but he deals primarily in large, expensive sport fishing boats with standing headroom engine rooms that are larger than the main living area of Pegu Club. Our boat most definitely does not have that kind of an engine room. Boat yoga is involved to work on it. Besides, we would never take just one mechanic’s opinion when we’re talking about something that massive. That would be like having a random car mechanic say your car needs a new engine. You’d go to another mechanic.

There is a Beta dealer in Mt. Pleasant SC, right by Charleston – Zimmerman’s. We figured we’d get a tow there and have them take a look. That’s when we found out that BoatUS’s Gold unlimited towing package isn’t really unlimited away from your home port. It used to be, but now Geico owns it. We can only get a free tow for up to 25 miles, after that they’ll pay 50% up to $3,000. To give you an idea of towing fees, the TowBoat in Georgetown, SC charges $180/hour. We have about 58 miles to go, at approximately 7 miles an hour. Do the math (and don’t forget he needs to go 58 miles back).

Infinity has offered to tow us the entire way, but we don’t want him to do that. Fortunately, it’s a sailboat and today we have a bit of wind. We’re going to ghost to an anchorage not too far away (we’ll need Infinity to tow for about 5 miles where the trees will be blocking the wind.) We’ll wait out the blow tomorrow at the anchorage, then on Thursday and Friday there will be enough wind to sail down the ICW, thereby getting us within 25 miles of the Charleston TowBoat where we can get a free tow.

We’ll have a mechanic look at the boat on Monday morning and see where we go from there. At this point, having received input from various cruising friends, we figure it’s either going to be something simple and we should be quickly on our way, or it will be catastrophic. Keep your fingers crossed! I’ll post daily dispatches to keep readers up to date.