Since leaving Charleston City Marina on the 12^th we have been to

Harborwalk Marina in Georgetown SC,

Ocean Isles Marina in Ocean Isles Beach NC,

Swan Point Marina in Sneads Ferry NC,

Whittaker Pointe Marina in Oriental, NC,

Swan Point was really funky but fun, Whittaker Pointe where we are now is small but so nice we can’t figure out how they make money with all their amenities, which includes a swimming pool and a car any of us can borrow for 2 hours at a time. We used it for a trip to the very small town for groceries and a restaurant. In Harborwalk we also had a grocery run in a borrowed car. We were too busy seeing important things in Charleston for that kind of thing.

 

Sue & Sharon leaving Charleston. Whittaker Marina from our slip

Our goal is Washington City Marina in Washington, NC. Our inverter needs fixing, and the regional service center is there. We may be delayed reaching Washington but I will discuss that next time.

We are setting a fast pace, averaging 74 miles per day. Our kind of boat rarely travels more than 80 miles per day. To do that we would have to use our fast cruise of 10 knots from 7 AM to 3 PM. We get slowed by currents of up to 3 knots which can go against us. Of course current can go with us as well, but if you do the math for a current against half of the distance (not half the time!) and one with the other half, you always lose time overall. In addition we might wait nearly an hour for some draw or swing bridge openings if we just miss the previous one. We’ve been lucky on that issue so far. Fortunately about half these bridges have clearance of more than 20 feet and we just run under them. It may take time to overtake a slower boat in a narrow channel. If the channel passes close to boats in the water we slow for them so our wake doesn’t bash them around. There are also people standing up fishing in small low freeboard boats just off the channel and some with a beached boat close by. Our 9.2 knot wake could make real trouble in these situations, so we have to drop to 1000 rpm, which averages 5.5 knots. We slowed down a lot Sunday on the way to Whittaker Pointe. A lot of people fish on Sunday.

Trees and water along the way. Click on any pic to enlarge.

Not the recommended way to travel by boat, but we got such a late start this year due to stops to get everything working as well as straightening out things we discovered as we started using the boat. Two more things we want to get done. One is in Washington NC, the other is one or two more days of travel up in Virginia Beach VA. We’ll go through the Great Dismal Swamp canal to get there. We’ll slow down for that.