Brown Eyed Girl: Beaufort, Charleston and Georgetown

Beaufort, SC

Beaufort Downtown Marina

April 21-22, 2012

We left Savannah on Saturday morning at 6:30 A.M. because we had 54 miles to go and the weather was turning so we wanted to get in before it got bad. The trip was fine and the water depths were good. It was quite windy when we arrived and we needed a pump out so they put us on the fuel dock for the pump out and then moved us up on the dock for the next couple of days. It was a little rocky on the dock and the weather was rainy. The town of Beaufort is right on the water so we did get to see quite a lot of it between rain showers but I didn't get many pictures. We had a good dinner at Plums with John and Mary from "Passport".

All the houses seemed to have trees in front but you get the idea

A very nice corner lot

One of the original churches

A swing bridge in the open position

And now here it is closed

Charleston, SC

Charleston City Marina

April 23-25, 2012

On Monday morning we again left at 6:30 A.M. This is getting to be a habit but actually I kind of like it because I am up anyway and we get to our destination pretty early if we still want to do something. I am pretty sure that John on "Passport" likes it but not so sure about Mary but I can tell you that she is always up and ready so I would say we are pretty good travel partners. When we got to the marina it was very windy and the dock master said we should go inside of the Mega Dock and all the way to the end. There are boats and by boats I mean large yachts on each side of the fairway. Ginny not only had to negotiate a very long stretch of this but then had to dock between two boats in the strong current and wind. I told her she could do it and she did it perfectly. When I threw the bow line to the dock hand it landed in the water (my first time I swear) so I had to hurry up and do it again. I got it this time but it was over the bow railing so if he had tied it off the railing would have been ruined. I moved the line while the dock hand waited patiently and we got tied up. All was well except that unless we wanted to back up down that same fairway we were pointed in the wrong direction. On Wednesday morning while the current and wind were low we turned to boat around so we were pointed in the right direction. Once we were docked, we went to a local restaurant for lunch and then hung out on the boat the rest of the day. On Tuesday we went to town on the free marina shuttle at 9:00. The first thing we did was take a 90 minute tour of the town on a mini bus. This approach works well for us because we get to see the city while the driver narrates. We also get a chance to look a the the city map and decide what areas we want to explore further. We got off the bus in the market district and explored from there. We had lunch at a nice little Italian place and got back to the boat late in the day. We thought that this would be the last night with "Passport" because they were probably going to leave on Wednesday so we had dinner with them at the Hominy Grill. We had a great dinner and some good wine. Ginny and I were going to stay on Wednesday and it turned out that "Passport" stayed in port also which was nice. We liked Charleston and would like to go back by car someday.

Sunrise leaving Beaufort

I don't know why these gulls were following us - it was annoying.

Our dock in Charleston

One of the many large yachts in Charleston

The Mega Dock

A replica of the Hunley - a Confederate submarine

A view of the Fort Sumter from the Battery in Charleston

The Market District

Real cobblestone steets

The Father of our country

The aircraft carrier USS York

Georgetown, SC

Harborwalk Marina

April 26, 2012

We left Charleston on Thursday morning at about 6:45 A.M. It was windy but Ginny did a great job of getting down the fairway and into the harbor. We did not visit Fort Sumter but we were going to go within 1/2 mile by boat so I got to see it pretty well. We had intended to stop at Leeland Oil Marina in McClelanville which was only 40 miles but when we got there we decided to continue to Georgetown with "Passport" which was another 28 miles. We got to Georgetown and the Harborwalk Marina about 2:00 and docked behind "Passport" on a long wall. We walked around town, bought some clothes and yarn and then had an ice cold beer at a local bar. There are a lot of restaurants in the city but we decided to eat on the boat. We had a good happy hour with "Passport", a couple (Laura and Ross) from another Looper boat "The Zone" that we just met and the couple from the boat docked behind us. Tomorrow we are off to Myrtle Beach bright and early.