Today's pre-breakfast romp at the boat ramp was a little less eventful than yesterday's drills. The boatramp gives great access to a long dirt road, which makes a great place for running for the dogs, complete with a lot of interesting smells. This photo from the ramp was the evening before.
It looked like an 0800 departure would have the tide pushing us all the way, with a stop at a marina for gas without much current. The calculations where pretty close!
We bucked the current out the short stretch of Steamboat Creek, and it was pretty much all downhill from there. Sometimes, this is a good thing! We went up the North Edisto River, joining the ICW where we had left it on Monday.
To the south of here, the ICW is pretty much cut to connect rivers flowing seaward. At this point the ICW turns northward following the natural low marsh well inland. The surrounding land seemed a little higher, and there were more houses, many with loooong walkways over the marsh grass to connect them to their floating docks.
I loved the boat house matching the main house.
There was also this large commercial operation, with its barges, cranes, tug boats, and shipyard, complete with a couple hundred foot ship hauled out.
At some point our journey became the Stono River, though I'm not sure at what point the name change took place. We turned south on the Stono River just as the ICW kept going straight through Elliott Cut and pulled into St. Johns Yacht Harbor to get some gas for the RIB. Since we've left home, we've burned through 7.8 gallons.
I was impressed with the marina! There are nice floating docks, and nice looking facilities. But, the thing that impressed me, was the friendliness of the staff. A lot of marinas can't be bothered with such a tiny purchase, but the dockmaster I talked to by phone sounded delighted that I would come in, even though the marina appeared pretty full and busy. The dockhands welcomed us like friends they were delighted to see. (I did have to watch the one young man, who looked like he'd like to keep Mocha! Mocha was enamored with him as well.)
After our gas purchase, we continued down the Stono to near its confluence with the Atlantic, and ducked into another marsh grass creek, Bass Creek. We hunted around for a spot to return to later to anchor, and went back to the Stono for another half mile down to anchor off a great little sandy beach.
I imagine this beach is huge at a lower tide, but, even two hours after high tide, their was a lot of empty beach of hard packed sand for another dog romp. When we arrived, we had the place to ourselves, but, we hadn't been there long when I heard a small boat run aground in the creek immediately north of the point. A 26' Hunter (sail boat) came and dropped the hook a little inshore and up current of us.
I suspect this beach is the "picnic island" (our place at home) for Charleston boaters to come. This Memorial week-end, I bet this whole area is full of boats.
Thunderstorms gathered around us, and there was a special marine warning to the north, and the south of us. We went up into the Kiawah River, a little wider than our pre-explored Bass Creek, where we could get away from the marsh grass a little as the biting flies were looking for a good meal before the storm. Rain passed all around us, and the temps cooled off nicely, but, we didn't get any rain 'til around 10pm, when it rained enough to rinse off the boat good. The local news said parts of Charleston flooded.
Our anchorage, where the Kiawah River had shallowed to 14' at N32 38.275' W 080 02.676' was a great place to watch the distant storms.
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