W(o)W Williams

Marine mechanics get a bad rap – oftentimes deservedly so. Calls go unreturned, people don’t show up when they say they will, the estimate skyrockets, the job isn’t done right. But one shop that deserves every accolade that can be given is W.W. Williams.

We had never even heard of W.W. Williams until our engine died. I reached out onto various Facebook pages and received nothing but good reports. So we contacted them, and TJ (their marine engine representative) immediately responded. He followed that by sending us an estimate when he said he would (within two days).

Contrast that with Zimmerman in Charleston who told us it would be at least 10 days before we could get hauled out, but they would give us an estimate in a few days. That’s literally the last time we heard from them until we got the bill for the work that the mechanic had done trying to solve our issue. Of course by the time we got the bill, we had already moved on to Isle of Hope Marina where W.W. Williams would take care of the engine – and with no need for a haul out!

When the engine arrived at W.W. Williams, TJ texted us with pictures to let us know along with the condition it was in (new). He asked us to text us when we arrived at the marina on Sunday, and when we did he immediately responded and said the mechanic would be at our boat at 9:00 the next day.

TJ texted us on Monday at 8:30 when the mechanic was on his way, and Thomas showed up right on time. At $200/hour, we had already removed the kitchen cabinet ourselves so we could save a bit of money, so he immediately got to work. Within 3 1/2 hours the engine was out and on its way back to W.W. Williams where Thomas was going to swap some parts to put on the new engine, and remove a few others that we had requested to keep as spares.

Thomas said he would be back on Wednesday, so we took advantage of the empty engine bay to do some cleaning and painting. We weren’t able to do that when we had the first Beta installed because the temperature was in the teens, and Jeff was still recovering from being in the hospital. After an afternoon of work, we had a shiny, white engine bay!

The engine is out and the cleaning has begun!

It’s a good thing I can fit into small spaces!

On Wednesday morning Thomas came back with the new engine and our spares. Not only had he removed the spares we requested, but he also removed, as he put it, “the parts I would want to have on board as spares.” Everything was neatly labeled in separate large Ziplock bags and stored in a box for us. We were VERY impressed.

We made ourselves scarce so we could stay out of his way and spent our time exploring Savannah. Our plan was to visit my Uncle and Aunt near Atlanta that weekend, so we had already rented a car. We took full advantage of it.

We explored the Plant Riverside District for the first time which was very cool. The lobby of the district’s JW Marriott hotel was unlike any hotel lobby we had seen. Converted from an old power plant, there was a rare gemstones and fossils exhibit, along with a life-size chrome dinosaur of the largest dinosaur ever discovered at 135 feet long. Cranes and pulleys from the old plant were still attached to the ceiling, and there were multiple interactive exhibits that talked about subjects ranging from the old power plant and district to the various minerals on exhibit. We were quite surprised to see all of this, and spent several hours there.

It’s not every day you see a chrome dinosaur. One of the gemstones is at the bottom of the frame.

Since it was the Christmas season, there was a large, very impressive gingerbread house on exhibit

There was also a holiday market display along the riverwalk.

I love the old steps that take you down to the river, but you definitely have to walk VERY carefully.

We also went to the Wormsloe State Historic Site where the tabby ruin is the oldest standing structure in Savannah. There were walking paths and a very good visitor’s center, but the highlight of the site is undoubtedly the one-mile long live oak-lined avenue that leads to the visitor’s center. My picture doesn’t do it justice. It’s stunning:

The live oaks are side-by-side for the entire mile of the road.

You can’t go to Savannah without eating good food, and we checked out Sweet Potatoes Kitchen which is known for its amazing fried chicken and banana pudding. They only serve fried chicken twice a week, and it was to-die for. I grabbed this picture from the internet:

SO good! The banana pudding was also very good, but a tad sweeter than I prefer.

Of course after eating fried chicken and banana pudding, regular walks were in order to make up for it. Fortunately, Isle of Hope is a beautiful area with lovely scenery for afternoon walks:

By Thursday at noon – 3 1/2 days after TJ had begun – the engine was installed and we were back in business. To say that we were impressed in an understatement. The total cost came in well under the estimate which was fantastic. To be fair, when Thomas gave us the estimate it was VERY generous because they hadn’t been able to lay eyes on the engine, and unexpected things always pop up. But since we had just gone through this 5 years ago (sigh), and we were swapping like for like, there wasn’t anything unexpected TO pop up. It was probably the easiest engine replacement TJ had all year.

Son of Big Red, installed and ready to go. Let’s hope it lasts a lot longer than Big Red.

After a great visit with my Uncle and Aunt, it was time to cut the dock lines again. But we weren’t heading south this time. BIG changes were ahead for us. Stay tuned!

Big Red gave us all he had.

We spent a relaxing, wonderful eight nights in Beaufort before setting sail again for Isle of Hope. We hit all of our favorite spots, took care of a few small boat projects, and soaked up the energy of being in our favorite place.

Our classic charcuterie board to celebrate arriving in Beaufort. SV Infinity has named it a “Peguterie board.”

It’s not a stop in Beaufort without getting tomato pie from Low Country Produce. We were trying to remember how we learned about it and decided it must have been somewhere on the internet. All I know is that we’ve had one every time we’ve stopped here since we started cruising back in 2018.

It just doesn’t get any better than this.

It seems like whenever we’re in Beaufort, we always see a few classic cars parked downtown:

This was our second Thanksgiving in a row in Beaufort. There’s a Publix only a 15 minute walk away from the dinghy dock where we once again were able to buy the fixings for a traditional Thanksgiving dinner:

And proof that Beaufort just keeps getting better and better, there’s a Waffle House just down the street from the Publix! Yes! One chocolate chip waffle and hash browns scattered, smothered, diced, and capped please!

Finally it was time to reluctantly leave and head towards Isle of Hope to get the engine replaced. Once again, the weather gods were smiling on us. All week in Beaufort there either hadn’t been wind or it was in the wrong direction. But on departure day we had good wind for an easy sail to our anchorage at Bull Creek.

I think people must feed this pelican at the Bull Creek anchorage. He flew down, landed right by us, and hung around for awhile. We’ve never had that happen before. The different color gradations in his feathers was very cool to see up close.

All good things must come to an end, however, which it did on our last travel day. It was cold, rainy, and raw, and there was no wind. With the dinghy side-tied, the two-stroke Yamaha did a great job of pushing us along. Of course with only 4 hp, we were occasionally making 2 knots against the current, but at least we were moving. I don’t think the 2.3 Honda four-stroke could have pulled it off.

Ever since Georgetown we have been using the engine for only a few minutes a day. We’ve primarily used it to raise and lower the anchor, and then once to get in and out of the marina at Charleston. As we approached Isle of Hope Marina, where we were thankfully going to be on a face dock, we discussed our strategy.

The dinghy was side-tied on the wrong side of the boat for the face dock, so we were going to start the engine a few minutes away and move the dinghy so we could tow it behind us. We had very light wind and a current against us.

We started the engine and within a minute it started sounding even worse than it had been. Then there was a squeaking sound and it stopped running. We quickly scrambled to move the dinghy from the stern to the port side while I tried to eek out any forward movement with the jib. It was a hectic minute or two, but Jeff leaped into the dinghy, started the outboard, and we limped into the face dock without any trouble.

Big Red had clearly given us all he had. He lasted long enough to get us out of the marina in Charleston without colliding with any boats. He lasted long enough so that Jeff didn’t have to raise the chain and anchor by hand. And once Big Red saw that we were within spitting distance of our final destination, he gave up the ghost. RIP Big Red.

Next up: Son of Big Red gets welcomed into his new home, Pegu Club.

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.