Captain's Choice blog: Sunrise, Sunset

Click, another sunrise picture...nope I never get tired of taking pictures or observing sunrises and sunsets. Each one is different and unique and represents the start and end of another different and unique day that we will never get back. Or as the lyrics from "Sunrise, Sunset" from Fiddler on Roof go;
Sunrise, Sunset,
swiftly flow the days.
Seedlings turn over to sunflowers,
Blossoming even as we gaze.

Friday morning was no exception as we were up early and the sunrise was great. The terrain changed on our 77 mile trek from Charleston to our anchorage at Butler Island, just north of Georgetown in the Waccamaw River. We no longer have palm trees and the salt marshes look more like tall grasses with trees. We had dolphins playing, egrets fishing and a bald eagle soaring through the sky on this sunny 85 degree day. We don't usually travel that many miles in a day and we had several other anchorages picked out depending on how the water depths were, tides and winds. We probably would have stopped sooner but we were inundated with large horseflies, the biting type. I have enough no-see-um bites...we decided to push on. We anchored in 20 feet of water with good holding. The backside of the island is quite wide which would easily fit numerous boats with plenty of room between them, there were 2 other boats besides us.
We chose not to go into Georgetown but we learned some interesting facts about the area. During the mid 19th century, Georgetown led the world in rice exports and plantation life. The Civil War and its aftermath followed by a series of hurricanes ended the rice industry here. Rice was replaced by lumber and then paper, where a paper mill still operates today.

Due to how far we traveled on Friday, Saturday was a short day traveling 23 miles to our anchorage at Enterprise Oxbow (an oxbow is a U-shaped bend in the course of a river). We fell in love with the Waccamaw River with its Cypress trees lining the banks and it is fresh water! It is considered a blackwater river because of its dark coloration caused by pigments that have leached out of vegetation growing in the wetlands adjoining the river. The best way to describe the water is if you take a clear glass and fill it, the water looks like tea or bourbon.
The anchorage was fantastic, 8' of water, little tidal swing and just off the ICW. Being it was a beautiful Saturday we could watch all the pleasure boats go by along with a few looper boats making their way north. It was a really warm day and we thought about jumping in but... it's fresh water and the swamp was only 100 feet away...we were thinking alligators. Now we know they probably won't bother us but....we stayed on the boat. We later learned from Rod on Bee Haven that had we shined a spotlight on the area that night we probably would have seen many beady red eyes staring at us. Oh how I had wished I had known that while we were there. We did hear and see several big splashes and no fish around so now we are thinking it was the gators.

Onto every boater a little rain must fall...we knew the forecast for Sunday was rain and thunderstorms and had high hopes we would make it to Barefoot Marina 22 miles up the river prior to the rain. The rain showed up a little earlier than forecasted and out came the raingear, which I should mention I have only had to use 1 other time since starting out last July. I got wet as I readied the lines and fenders for docking but luckily the rain stopped as we docked and set up for our 2 night stay. We met up with Rod and Susie from Bee Haven, this is their home port and they just crossed their wake 3 weeks ago so now they are flying the gold looper flag. Congratulations to them! We had met them at the rendezvous back in October and had not seen them since. They very generously offered us one of their cars to re-provision and go out to dinner...thank you again.

There was more rain forecasted for Monday, between 3-7 inches and it poured. I'm not sure how much we ended up getting but we never left the boat all day. It was a good day for some maintenance items for Mark, and I did some art work.

Tuesday morning promised brighter skies and clearing but that didn't happen until early afternoon. Once we left the dock it drizzled on us for a few hours into our 43 mile trek to South Harbour Village Marina, just south of Southport, NC. Another state to explore and the ride was very pretty even if the sun didn't shine much. Once the rain stopped and the sun came out the wind picked up immensely. The captain did a great job docking with strong winds and current. We will be here for 2 nights. Tomorrow the divers come to do the bottom cleaning and change out our hull and shaft anodes. The captain would have to explain what anodes do but when asked he said that the short version is they are sacrificial metals that erode away to keep the underwater metals that are really important from eroding away. In fresh water we only have to change them about once every 5 years. In salt, much more frequently.