TRIP 2 LOGS
Ft Lauderdale, FL TO Wilmington, NC
March 8-21, 2000

Preparations in Ft Lauderdale, Wednesday and Thursday, March 8-9, 2000

     Angela and I flew to Ft Lauderdale March 8, hoping to begin the boat trip the next day, but some maintenance parts had not yet arrived.  We were having some new spreads and drapes, etc. made for us, and it was the next day before those additions were complete.  Our mechanic, Richard, rebuilt the water pump and changed the belts on the generator.  Our cleaning service washed and waxed the boat, washed and waterproofed the canvas top, and polished the interior teak.

     We rented a car and bought groceries plus a few boat things for the trip.  While waiting for the other repairs to be completed, I changed the oil and filters on all three engines.  While we had been gone, Richard and Jim had taken the boat to the yard, quick hauled it and inspected the running gear and zincs, and removed the props and replaced them with the spares.  After reconditioning, the spares were put back on the boat.  The rest of the inspection showed no further repairs were needed.

     Danny had installed some teak rails along the edges of the pantry shelves, so if the pantry door opened again the contents of the shelves would not slide out on the floor.  Richard had welded the bracket that held the dinghy davit (crane) to the radar arch.  Both of these items reflected on the rough crossing of the Gulf Stream we had in January.

     We had lunch with our friend, Dennis, on Thursday, said goodbye to our dock landlord, and prepared to shove off.

Ft Lauderdale to Ft Pierce, FL, Friday, March 10, 2000

     We got off at the crack of 9am, waving goodbye to Brad and his family.  The weather continued      
to be pleasant-75-80 degrees, winds 10-15 knots from the SE, no rain, mostly sunny.  We went offshore to avoid the bridges, manatee zones, and no wake zones along the ICW (Intracoastal Waterway).  We turned back in to the ICW at the Ft Pierce inlet, 100 miles from Port Everglades (Ft Lauderdale).

     Along the way we had some rolling motion due to the winds and waves coming from the SE while we were going basically north.  The autopilot could not keep a course that did not include wide swings of 40-50 degrees, so we steered manually most of the time. The seas were 2-4 feet, no problem, really; but some things fell over inside.  We need to expect that when we go offshore; it always happens.

     The generator only ran 6.7 hours, compared to the engine hours of 7.9, call it 8 for the day.  I spoke to Richard on the phone, and we decided it must be a fuel problem; perhaps the fuel tank had some debris in it?  The water pump was not a problem, and the shutdown was slow, not fast as with a Murphy switch shutoff.

      We had a slip in the municipal marina at Ft Pierce, which was very nice.  The attendant there was the nicest, most polite, and most precise attendant I had ever met.  We showered and dressed and met my uncle, Jim Magill, and his wife, Mable, for dinner.  We had a good meal in a restaurant alongside the inlet, with an open wall along one side of the restaurant.  The weather cooled off in the evening: it was very enjoyable.

Ft Pierce to Daytona Beach, FL, Saturday, March 11, 2000

     I got up early and changed the Racor filter on the generator.  Sure enough, the generator started and ran, which seemed to prove the need for the filter change.  We left the marina at 7:30, and by 8:30 the generator had quit.  So, since we were using the Intracoastal Waterway, we pulled off the channel and anchored.  I changed the fuel filer on the engine, and the generator ran fine again.

     Just north of Melbourne, we stopped to see the Dragon, at the tip of Merritt Island.  It was an interesting side trip, with an interesting story in the cruise guidebook.  The statue was in a residential back yard, built for the children to play on.  The Banana River runs into the Indian River there (the Indian River is the ICW).

     It was a pretty nice day, but windy with some clouds and occasional light rain.  The temperature was warm, middle 70’s.  We had been wearing shorts and no socks.  Winds were from the west at 15-20 knots at times.  I don’t like the speed zones and manatee zones in Florida because they have so many different regulations.  All signs look the same, so you have to read each one; and you have to get close to each one to read it.  The speed zones go up and down, up and down. 

     Of course, I got a ticket - for excessive speed through a manatee zone, just north of New Smyrna Beach.  I missed a sign while we were photographing a lighthouse and thought it was okay to go ahead and plane off.  The Florida Marine Patrol seemed to hide and try and catch you, too.  I didn’t see them until they were up beside us.  It cost $50: I’ll consider it a contribution to the Florida manatee fund, even though I’ve never seen a manatee.  I know natives on the water in Florida who say they have never seen one.

     The generator ran 4 more hours and quit again.  The municipal marina at Daytona Beach (Halifax Harbor Marina) closed at 6pm, and we arrived at 5:30pm.  We filled up with fuel before going to our slip, which I recommend.  It prevents condensation in the fuel tanks, and it allows you to leave at your own time the next morning.  The marina was very nice, with some really large yachts in the harbor.  It was the last day of the 59^th Bike Week, with an estimated 600,000 motorcyclists in town.  We ate on board and stayed in the marina and listened to them run up and down the city streets.

Daytona Beach to St Augustine, FL, Sunday, March 12, 2000

     I got up early and changed the Racor filter and the fuel filter on the generator.  I had to bleed the air out of the system, too, which was something I had just learned to do.  Also, I was getting more efficient at the whole procedure; it still was a chore to do.  That time the generator ran for almost 4 hours before it shut down again.  Changing these filters allowed us to use the generator for a while, but then it would quit again.

     The ride was uneventful except for catching a crab trap on our port propeller.  After we figured out what it was, we stopped and reversed the engines and it came off.  I don’t know why the spurs on the shaft didn’t cut it off; that’s what they’re on there to do.  Temperatures had dropped, and we were in long pants and socks on our feet.  The heaters had come on in the night.

     We got into St Augustine about 1pm, with time enough to see some of the city.  The generator ran until  about 12:30pm.  We fueled up (diesel was $1.30 per gallon), plugged in, and turned on the water and electricity.  Then we got a ride into town, to the City information building.  It was very nice.  A sweet little old lady behind the counter there answered our questions and recommended a horse-drawn carriage ride, which we bought.  We walked two or three blocks to where the carriages picked up. 
      

     What we found was the sweet little old lady’s daughter running the horse and carriage business.  She told us her mother sold us the tickets, her mother only sells tickets for her rides, and most of the people behind the counters there work for some tour or ride business.  We thought they worked for the City!  We remember the lady didn’t offer us a choice; she just said she recommended this, and we took it.  It was a con game, in a way.

     St Augustine was smaller than I had expected.  It also was more of a memorial to Henry Flagler than I realized.  The former Ponce de Leon Hotel (now Flagler College) was fabulous.  And the churches were beautiful, too.  The weather was warm, and many people were wearing shorts.  We walked around after the carriage ride.  Angela bought an outfit at one store, and she realized later that night she must have lost an earring there.
         

     We walked to a French restaurant that had been recommended to us and had dinner.  Afterwards, the taxi took so long coming the owner’s daughter drove us back to the marina.  We had a new problem: the hot water would only come out slowly and erratically.  Angela and I removed some plumbing to see if we could see an obstruction in the lines to and from the hot water heater, and it seemed to work better after that.

St Augustine to Jacksonville Beach, FL, Monday, March 13, 2000

     The next morning the hot water wouldn’t come out at all.  I got up early and changed the two filters on the generator, bled the air out of the fuel lines, and restarted the generator.  Then I went to the yard office for some help.  Comachee Cove Marina, on Comachee Island, was nice, even if they do pronounce the name “Comanche”.  They had a lounge for transient boaters with coffee, television and books, phones (no charge for local calls), connections for Internet service, and lists of frequently used telephone numbers.  They also had a repair yard with some good mechanics who reacted quickly to our needs.

     The hot water problem was solved by replacing the check valve that prevents hot water from coming back into the cold water line.  The mechanic said he had never seen one go bad before.

     The generator problem was solved by replacing the fuel pump.  After several diagnostic tests, we decided the problem was air getting into the system, not dirty fuel and clogged fuel filters.  I had been throwing away good filters, but I didn’t know enough to know they weren’t dirty.  We removed the fuel line from the tank and took a sample from the bottom of the tank.  It was perfectly clean and clear-no debris in the tank at all.  The fuel pump must have been letting some air into the system after running for a few hours.

     While I was working with the mechanics, Angela phoned the dress shop in St Augustine.  They had found her earring.  The marina provided a young man to drive her in their vehicle.  He dropped her off, rode around the block, and picked her up again after she retrieved her earring.  Not a bad experience considering what it could have been.

     We finished with the mechanics about 1:40pm.  By 2:40pm we were on our way north.  We went to the marina in Jacksonville Beach where our friends, Ed and Marion, from Clear Lake, TX, were staying for the month (Beach Marine).  We enjoyed a nice visit with them and got to see their new boat, REMEDY.

     Weather that day was windy after passage of a cold front during the night, low in the 40’s, high in the mid-60’s.  The tides in that area are at least six feet.  Slip rental in St Augustine was high, $1.40 per foot plus $8 for electricity.  I would stop there again; it was an exceptional marina.  In Jacksonville Beach slip rental was a little over $1 per foot including electricity.

Jacksonville Beach, FL to St Simons Island, GA, Tuesday, March 14, 2000

     We traveled 72 miles to St Simons Island and filled up with fuel.  The generator gave us no more problems for the whole trip.  As we passed Jekyll Island we could see the Millionaire’s Club building by the Jekyll Wharf.  It would have been interesting to visit the homes of some of those millionaires who built elaborate homes in the 1920’s without kitchens, because all homeowners were expected to dine at the “club”.

       We borrowed the marina’s courtesy car and drove onto St Simons Island and on to Sea Island.  We parked and toured the Cloister Hotel, which was very elegant and attractive.  The live oaks, the flowering plants, the landscaping, and the décor of the hotel were all especially well done and beautiful.  There were, naturally, some beautiful homes, cars, and people there, too.

     We ate at the restaurant at the marina, and we washed some clothes before and during our meal.  The weather had been windy, N to NE winds, 15-20 knots, high about 60 degrees, and mostly cloudy.  Slip rental was $1.10 per foot per night plus $4 for electricity at Golden Isles Marina.  Fuel was $1.38 per gallon.


St Simons Island, GA to Thunderbolt, GA, Tuesday, March 15, 2000

     Thunderbolt, GA is a small town immediately adjacent to Savannah, where we wanted to see the sights.  We left St Simons Island at 8:40am, and we were tied up at Savannah Bend Marina in Thunderbolt (95 miles) at 2:40pm.  We fueled up and were attacked by some small gnats, which had quite a bite.  I was still putting anti-itch cream on my arms a week later. 

    We taxied into Savannah, where preparations were in full swing for the St Patrick’s Day weekend.  Savannah’s celebration of that holiday is second only to Boston’s in the USA.  We began our tour down on the river, near the statue of the “Waving Girl”.  Legend has it she waved to all the ships coming and going in case her sailor-lover was on one of them.  As we rounded the corner to a point where the river was visible, a huge container ship blocked a lot of the view as it moved quickly down the river.

            

On the opposite bank (in GA) was a large, new Westin Hotel and a new, city convention center.  The south bank was much higher than the north bank, and it appeared the north bank was just now being developed.  On the south bank, however, Savannah has a large number of fine old homes, city parks, and live oaks and flowers.  We walked the waterfront and asked about places to eat.  We walked up the hill to an area with about eight restaurants in two blocks, near Market Square.

     The one we chose was called The Lady and Sons.  It featured low-country cuisine, which I was in the mood for.  They even had a buffet, which I like because you can sample many foods and not just eat one entrée.  Angela ordered from the menu, but I did the buffet for $12.95.  I had three kinds of meat, four kinds of beans, collard greens, salad, and desert.  It was all good.  We bought the Lady’s cookbook.  She came out and walked through the crowd, and we got her to autograph the cookbook for us.

     We taxied back to the boat, and our driver gave us a special tour.  He took us by the Williams house, featured in the book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which Angela and I had read.  And he told us some more about the city, its residences and residents, and real estate.  Apparently there were many people bidding up the prices on those old homes, and rehabilitation was in process on many of them.  Prices were in the millions, we were told.

     We saw palm trees as well as live oaks, sometimes side by side.  The weather had improved, with highs in the 70-degree range, winds NE at 10, and sunny skies.  Slip rental was $1 per foot per night plus $6 for electricity, and fuel was $1.20 per gallon.  We were using 19 gallons per hour and making 13.8 mph.

Thunderbolt, GA to Charleston, SC, Thursday, March 16, 2000

     We were off at 7:10am to get to Charleston for a dinner date with Thomas and Donna, our friends from Wilmington.  It was an 8-hour day, covering 112 miles.  The overcast and windy conditions were back, with highs about 68 degrees.  It was foggy to begin the day, with humidity and occasional light rain later.

    The character of the Intracoastal Waterway was mostly swamp, with dredged channels in and out of established creeks and rivers.  That was true above Charleston as well.  We ran close to the Atlantic Ocean, which we could see at times.

     Just up the waterway from Savannah was Hilton Head Island, probably the best known and most well developed of the barrier islands in that area.  We pulled into the marina at Harbour Town to see the famous red-and-white striped lighthouse.  Their slip rate was $1.50 per foot per night, and they were an hour’s drive from downtown Savannah.

     Further up the waterway was Windmill Marina, where the South Carolina Yacht Club was located.  We had visited that facility in 1994.  It had a lock to separate the saltwater from the fresh water in the marina, which permitted them to have fixed docks, no barnacles, and clear water in the marina.  The lock was 80 feet long and 20 feet wide.  Upscale real estate was sold all around the marina with an almost full development of fine homes among the live oaks and Spanish moss.

     At Charleston we got a $0.10 price discount on fuel due to our BOAT US membership; the net price was $1.269 per gallon.  Slip rental was $1.25 per foot per night, including electricity, water, and cable TV.  City Marina was on the Ashley River, on the west side of the Charleston peninsula.  We were not inside their concrete breakwater, which was advertised in the marina book we had; and we had some movement there due to winds and river traffic.  The tourist industry in Charleston was reported to us to be quite strong, and it was full for the upcoming weekend.

     Thomas and Donna picked us up at the marina and drove us downtown to a nice restaurant.  They knew the city and had offered to show us around, which we appreciated.  After our meal and discussion of the next day’s plans, we taxied back to the marina.  It rained hard for a couple of hours as a front passed through the area.

Lay Day in Charleston, SC, Friday, March 17, 2000

     It was St Patrick’s Day, and the weather cooperated by giving us warmer temperatures and no rain.  We walked the area of Meeting Street and Market Street, down Meeting St to the Battery and the park at the point of the peninsula.  We toured the Nathaniel Russell House, completed in 1808, which was being restored.  We learned about these old houses and their porches on the side of the house, with a front door looking like a door into the house instead of onto the porch.  There were more of these houses in Charleston than in Savannah, I believe; but both cities had character and style that was different and appealing.

     After Donna and Thomas returned to their home, we took the horse-drawn carriage ride.  The driver pointed out one house that was recently sold for $3.5 million.  The driver said they would put another $3.5 million into the house in renovations and then sell it for a profit.

     We ate at a restaurant that was recommended for “low-country” cuisine.  Their version of okra gumbo, for example, was served like an ice cream scoop of mashed potatoes; it had very little liquid in it.  The gumbo was really like a stew of okra and tomatoes.  The food was okay, but not as good as we had in Savannah. The people were friendly; we continued to be pleased with the courtesy of the people we met.

Charleston to Myrtle Beach, SC, Saturday, March 18, 2000

    Wind woke us up about 4:30am.  We were pushed away from the dock so much I thought we would have to have help getting our lines from the dock.  It looked like we might not be able to jump from the boat to the dock.  The weather forecast was unchanged for the next two days: 30 knots of wind from the E and NE, seas offshore 7-10 feet, increasing to 8-12 feet, small craft advisory.  It was 48 degrees at Charleston airport at 7am, and the high for us was about 60-65 degrees.

     After we did get away from the dock (there were a few gusts with pauses that allowed us to disconnect cables and lines), sailboats asked us for harbor conditions more than once.  It seemed we were going up into the wind and the current all day.  Most sailboats going north just stayed in port; there was little forward progress likely in those conditions.  Our fuel consumption increased due to the winds and currents.

     We ran 9 hours, our longest day on that trip.  I wanted to get to Myrtle Beach and show it to Angela, although I had not been there since college.  It was really important to follow the markers as the ICW wound its way through sounds, rivers, creeks, and landcuts.  I would not want to make that trip without charts; some of the markers were hard to see and to separate from the river channel markers.  I was disappointed in our GPS chartplotter.  Not only did it have few of the markers, it did not even show the ICW as a channel in some places.

     One of the areas that particularly concerned me was the “rock pile” at mile markers 350-365, right at Myrtle Beach.  The cruise guide said cruisers hated this area because of rocks protruding into the channel on both sides, some of which were underwater.  The tow companies and the propeller straightening companies had large ads in that portion of the book.  I had just straightened our props and did not want to have to do it again.

     Apparently we got there at dead low tide, because seeing the rocks was not a problem.  They were there, and they looked dangerous if you ran over them.  But there was enough room for us to get through by paying attention and staying in the middle.  I understood cruisers were sometimes met by a barge that wanted his half in the middle, and that would cause a problem.  The ICW was so shallow (6-8 feet deep) and so narrow that barges could not use a lot of it.  We only saw two on that trip.

     Fuel was obtained at the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club, adjacent to Coquina Harbor, where we spent the night.  Diesel was $1.19 per gallon.  Slip rental was $1 per foot plus $5 for electricity.  We rented a car for $22 and drove to the Grand Strand to see the sights.

     I had heard they had built music halls there, perhaps like they did in Branson, MO, where the entertainers own the halls.  The country music group, ALABAMA, seemed to own two such places.  There were probably a dozen or more, with blues music, popular music, country music, chuck wagon and horse racing, medieval plays: all with dinner in a family atmosphere.  These places were larger than the Grand Ol’ Opry in Nashville, and the lights on the buildings reminded of Las Vegas.  I think one of the places there was called the Carolina Opry.

     It was a real tourist area, apparently based on golf and the beaches.  I heard there were 50-100 golf courses in the area.  I heard the Grand Strand was 20 or 50 miles long, along the Atlantic.  It reminded us of Orlando with the tourist rides, putt-putt golf courses, motels, and restaurants.  We ate at Copeland’s of New Orleans, which had been a favorite of ours whenever we were in Baton Rouge or New Orleans, LA.  There were huge restaurants like the Hard Rock Café, Planet Hollywood, and others with a ball-sports theme and a NASCAR theme.  I was glad we got to see it.

     On the ICW, there was a dock at Barefoot Landing, which offered free dockage for up to 3 days.  There was no electricity or water, but you could walk to an outlet mall, several name restaurants, and a few of the large music halls.  If a cruiser were going to spend some time in that area, that was the closest place to dock; and the price was right for slip rental.

Myrtle Beach, SC to Wilmington, NC, Sunday, March 19, 2000 and Return Home

     We woke to temperatures in the low 40’s, and the water hose would not coil.  The electric cable was stiffer than usual, too.  We pulled out under cloudy skies at 7:30am and arrived in Wrightsville Beach about 12:30pm.  We fueled up and returned to mile marker 288, our marina called the Masonboro Boatyard and Marina.  We ran the engines 5 hours and covered about 70 statute miles.

     Coming up the Cape Fear River, we had strong winds, current, and markers with new numbers on them.  Fortunately no new markers had been added, so I could generally tell from our paper charts which marker we were passing by its position relative to other markers or landmarks.  But channels kept turning off the river channel, and it was confusing.  We found our turnoff okay, but I’m glad we had paper charts and newer would have been better.  The GPS chartplotter was a disappointment on that run.  It did not show many buoys, and in at least one place it did not even show the waterway.  The Cape Fear River was a wide river with lots of shallow places and sandbars in it.  We had whitecaps in the protected ICW north of Carolina Beach as well as in the river.

     Fuel had jumped to $1.36 per gallon.  One operator told us they had received a price increase every day for the past two weeks.  Ashore there were increased prices for gasoline for cars, with prices ranging from $1.50-1.80 per gallon.  Slip rental at the marina was $484 for a month.

     Trip 2 was pretty much over at that point.  We rented a car and did some laundry; and we had dinner with friends, Allen and Joyce, and their daughter, Ali.  We drove to Charlotte, NC to stay Monday night with my aunt and uncle, Rebecca and Gordon; and we flew home on Tuesday, March 21.

Statistics for Trip 2

815 miles
59 running hours
1127 gallons of diesel
Average price of diesel was $1.31
Average gallons per mile was 1.39
Average gallons per hour was 19.1
Average fuel price per mile was $1.81
Average speed was 13.8 mph

Changed the Racor filter and the engine fuel filter on the generator three times and changed the oil and filters on all three engines once.

Statistics for Year 2000 Cruise, Trips 1 & 2:

1315 miles
98 running hours
2067 gallons of fuel
Average fuel price was $1.46 (high in Bahamas)
Average gallons per mile was1.57
Average gallons per hour was 21.1
Average fuel price per mile was $2.30
Average speed was 13.4 mph

Changed the Racor filters twice on all three engines and the fuel filter on the generator twice on the trip to the Bahamas. For both trips, changed a total of two main engine Racor filters and five changes of the Racor and the fuel filters on the generator, plus one complete oil and filter change.

We experienced higher fuel costs per mile when we were off shore, which seems to be due to the resistance of the waves and the consistently higher RPM and speeds when we didn’t have to slow down for boat traffic.  In Trip 2 we had higher average speeds and lower gallons per mile, which indicates the offshore runs consume more fuel per mile at lower speeds.