leland oil company marina, mcclellanville, SC.

foggy morning

fog slowly burning off

28 degrees, icy dock (we were on the T-head so it was a long walk to shore) and a VERY STEEP ramp.  consuelo needed help going up the ramp.  she had no problems going down but i went down very slowly, backwards, with one arm completely wrapped around the railing - phew!   we left in the dark and were the first boat out.  the generator was fired up so that we could run heat in the cabin.  two little snags though - tom doesn't like to turn the lights on when it is dark like that because it blinds him and  he inadvertently pushed a button that turned the engine instruments off so he had to turn off the engine and restart it to reset.  while underway, when he handed the wheel off to me, apparently, the autopilot "wasn't working" and the boat turned to port all of a sudden - probably scared the heck out of david in l'attitude IX behind us.  it was just another case of the wrong button being pressed in the dark, i think.  the autopilot is working fine.  the doyles eventually passed us and tom made me run up to the bridge to take photos.  i did not run - the whole boat was icy!  but i took pics of them taking pics of me as they went by.  unfortunately, they passsed on our starboard side and i had forgotten to bring up the fenders.  tacky....  oh well.  there was fog on the water - it was very pretty.  the waccamaw river is very pretty.

mark doyle on SEMI-LOCAL

tom and i had a discussion about people who dream about doing this trip and romanticizing it.  yes, we are on a GREAT adventure but doing the ICW is WORK and people don't seem to realize that one must constantly be at attention.  there are bridges, currents, shoals, the weather, other boats, etc. to consider - many, many variables.  heading south, the days are short and the weather can be unpredictable.  you can make all the plans you want but it is still a guarantee that they will change almost on a daily basis.   i work full time and it is not always possible to get any work done during the day while underway.  there is constant interruption.  so i have to work at night.  tom does most of the steering and i will take over every now and then for short periods of time.  at the end of the day, it's not over - i have to make up at work to the wee hours while everything is quiet and tom sits down with charts and guides and tide/current tables and figures out the next move AND alternatives if the original plan does not work out.  there is cooking and cleaning to do and currently, in our case, because we are with the SAIL rally fleet, there are briefings and socials.  believe me, we are always the first ones to leave any social.  as the tech boat, tom is more or less "on call" when the other boats have problems or questions regarding their engines or other equipment.  so, yes, it is work.  i told tom that he works just as hard as i do except that he gets to sleep more.   me, i don't sleep anymore.  i keep saying this.  i sound like a broken record. 

more bad luck - not us though, thankfully.  two of the fleet boats had problems getting going.  one finally made it out and the other, unfortunately, had a transmission problem and managed to back up into something that punctured his dinghy.  one boat stayed a day over at osprey marina for completely different reasons - he  bumped into an old flame :)  the rest are scattered - some are anchored in minim creek, some are docked at georgetown, and some went south of mcclellanville and the doyles went all the way to charleston. 

we hit the one section of the estherville minim creek canal between minim creek and the north santee river at low tide and touched bottom a few times.  we were zig-zagging, looking for water because it was pretty skinny.  there is another trouble spot coming up in the ICW but we will tackle that tomorrow.  in the meantime, we made it to mcclellanville, SC, a quaint little town that boasts a ~1000 year old oak tree and a seafood market that is supplied by a local fleet of shrimp boats.  we docked at the leland oil company marina and were greeted by a couple of friendly dogs (and people). 

~1000-year-old deer head oak

close up

tree house

just a beautiful old town, so much atmosphere with the live oaks and the spanish moss

shrimp boats at rest

there were four of us SAIL rally boats that wound up in mcclellanville and a couple of us went out for a walk to see the old tree where we bumped into an old man with a cane who grew up in town but now spends only half his time there (he said he inherited the home) and half in england.  he said he used to climb that live oak when he was a boy.  we also went to the market and wiped them out of shrimp.  let me tell you - there IS a big difference when they are FRESH rather than frozen.  these were sweet and juicy and flapping around just a couple of hours before! 

we had cocktails on WIND DANCER.  of course, we had two of the loudest guys in the fleet in our group  and then someone broke out a bottle of firefly which is a sweet tea flavored vodka -  it was wild!  i gotta say though - between work and consuelo, i always have a good excuse when it's time for me to exit stage left.  face it, i am a party pooper :)  besides, i didn't want to stuff my face with other things when i know i have shrimp waiting - shrimp and and andouille sausage!

some places just resonate with one and mcclellanville is one of those places for me.