In Georgetown SC. 04/30/2021

 So we have not posted a blog in a few days, and there is a reason.  It has been a rough couple of days for us fighting the engine overheating issue that we have been having.  We do have some nice pictures of Hilton Head, Beaufort, Charleston and Georgetown, but you will have to wait until my next post to see them.  This is just a quick "we are struggling but OK" post.

As I said, we traced our coolant leak to a water pipe coming out of our turbo.  We ordered a new "O" ring on line and had it shipped to Hilton Head.  It arrived on Monday and I installed it.  We left out on Tuesday and overheated in less than 1 mile.  We return to Hilton Head and after contact a mechanic in Chattanooga, thanks Jim and Joann White, I learned about bleeding the water systems.  That competed we left out again, but it was still leaking.  We made it to Beaufort where I tried some other fixes, that did not seem to help.  We had a long day into Charleston and reached out to a mechanic in Georgetown that could look at the boat on Friday.  We left out on Thursday for a 70 mile slow cruise day into Georgetown.  

We did have a mechanic come to the boat 1st thing Friday morning, but did not feel comfortable with his recommendations.  More on that in a  later post.  We got a recommendation of a 2nd mechanic who came to the boat and feel we have a better course of action.  We will extend our stay here until Monday and try to get the leak fixed as well as a couple of other potential issues.  

On the bright side, we did have a really good time meeting up with Jim and Joanne White in Hilton Head, who we met at Green Turtle Bay in September of 2019.  We also managed to have a lot of fun with "Jackpot" and "Happiness Is" in Georgetown today, eating lunch, walking the town and docktails.  

Sorry not a lot of cool stuff in the this blog, but we have been stressing over the boat issues and not really in the mood to blog.  I do have a lot of pictures to post which I will do soon.  

Keep us in your thoughts and prayers!   Hoping tomorrow brings good news.

Jekyll Island & Savannah (4/21-4/24)

Wednesday  4/21/21

Day Miles:      32

Total Miles:    4229

Travel Days:   79

Total Days     175

Thursday  4/22/21 - Saturday 4/24/21

Day Miles:      92

Total Miles:    4321

Travel Days:   80

Total Days     178

We left Fernandina Beach and headed to Jekyll Island.  We are now no longer in Florida as we crossed the boarder somewhere into Georgia.  The scenery changed from developed Florida homes to nothing but miles and miles of sawgrass.  Still interesting as we have not seen this before.  The AICW winds around quite a bit in this area.

First sailboat we saw actually sailing

Jekyll Island Marina

We arrived at Jekyll Island around lunch time and began our normal end of cruising chores.  Wash diesel soot off back, engine room check, shut down electronics, etc...  I still have the issue of loosing coolant in the Port engine but I can keep it in check by adding water to it.  The marina has a courtesy golf cart that we were able to secure for 1 1/2 hours.  We rode pretty much the whole island.  Beautiful old mansions with manicured lawns and huge trees.

Driftwood beach

Mansion

After our self guided tour of the island, we met up with Jackpot and Happiness Is.  Jackpot reminded us that they were making red beans, sausage and rice for dinner.  We made Skyline dip, Happiness Is brought salsa, there was also corn bread and a charcuterie tray.  Skyline was a big hit as most had not tried it before.

The night ended with another perfect sunset.

It was an early start on Thursday as we had a 92 mile run to Savannah.  Winds were blowing pretty hard - 15-20 so making the trip out into the Atlantic was out.  It was also a cold morning for boating at 51 degrees.  As were were headed into a North wind, and the speed from the boat, the front snaps on the isenglass wouldn't hold.  We ended up taking the front panels down.  While the boat was running on plane, I went down into the engine room to see if I could find where my coolant leak was coming from.  Good news / bad news is I did find it.  It is leaking out of a water pipe that I tightened up the other day.  A lot of the cruise was trying to find a mechanic that could come fix the leak, as well as a canvas shop that could repair my snaps.  No luck on either.  We did find a canvas shop that had the snaps that we could pick up and then I can try to change them.  Once we got to Savannah, I looked up the "O" ring that I think I need to fix the leak and we are having that overnighted to Hilton Head.  After a long day, we just took the courtesy car about 2 miles to dinner at Castaways.  Dinner was actually good and it was nice to relax after the stressful day.

We made plans to use the courtesy car from 9:30 to 11:30 to run some errands on Friday morning.  Nobody had it reserved after us, so she gave us the car until 1:00.  Good thing!  Went something like this:  Canvas shop, West Marine, Dollar General, Canvas shop, Walmart, Kroger, gas station.  Car only used 1 gallon of gas.  Back at the boat, Marcia began to put things away and I gave the entire boat a much needed washing.  Cleaned up, then it took us over 40 minutes to get an Uber to take us into downtown Savannah.  It was a great town to stop at.

Thought it was a cool name for a bar.

Reminded me of Don's dog "Griz"

City Market

Lot of cycle carts

Steep steps

Warning - Mature audiences only

River walk

Waving lady statue waves a handkerchief at passing ships on the Savannah River in hopes that her departed sailor lover is on one of them.

Riverwalk

Dinner at Huey's  - local beer and a lemon drop, with sorbet in it.

Gumbo was really good.

Shrimp etouffee

Beignet's for dessert

Lot of walking but it was really fun checking out Savannah.  We are not traveling on Saturday which turns out was a good decision.  It has been raining here all day.  I did switch out the snaps that I got from the canvas shop and did some chart plotting and cleaning on the bridge.  Marcia is in marathon laundry mode, paying bills and cleaning.  Dinner on the boat tonight and off to Hilton Head tomorrow.  We made plans to meet some friends that we met in Green Turtle Bay back in September of 2019.  

 

Fernandina Beach (04/19 & 04/20/21)

Monday  4/19/21 & Tuesday 04/20/21

Day Miles:      61

Total Miles:    4197

Travel Days:   78

Total Days     174

Good news is that it finally stopped raining when we left St. Augustine on Monday morning.  The sun was out although just a little chilly.  More good news is that I recommissioned the Auto Pilot and made some adjustments and it seems to be working better now.  We ran 61 miles to Fernandina Beach.  I ran the boat on plane most of the way, wanted to watch to see if we were going to overheat again.  Not a lot to see other than marsh land and houses.  We did pass a Navy work yard and were quickly informed that we were too close by the Security Boat.  We moved!  Good news is that it did not overheat, but when I checked the fluid level it was down about a gallon.  Continue to research and troubleshoot with Washington Marine.

Leaving St. Augustine

Shrimpin Boat - think it was named "Jenny"

Lot of flat ground

6 miles of no wake zone - yes it was hard

Navy Yard

Long docks

Town of Fernandina Beach

We arrived at Fernanda around 1:00.  I did a quick wash on the back of the boat and some checks, then we cleaned up and walked into town.  The 1st stop was the Marlin & Barrel Distillery.  They close at 4:00 and are not open on Tuesdays.  We made it there and sampled some of their Rum and Vodka's.  I was bummed they were sold out of their Bourbon.  We decided to go into the old bar Palace Saloon.   Florida's oldest tavern.  Originally named the "Ship Captain's Bar", the Palace Saloon has been a bar since 1903. (Prior to that it was a haberdashery).  The original bar was a true "gentleman's establishment" with complimentary towels for patron's to wipe the foam from their mustaches and solid brass spittoons for those who enjoyed a good chew with their beer.  Check out the original carved mahogany bar, brass cash register, tin ceiling and inlaid tile floors.   

I had to purchase a bottle of Smoked Pepper Vodka for my Bloody Mary's.

Bar Picture

Brass register 

Original tile floor

Original tinceiling

Marcia tried their Signature drink - Pirate Punch

While we were at the bar, fellow Loopers Jack and JoAnn from Jackpot and Rommel and Amy from Happiness Is also came in.  We ended up staying there most of the afternoon and then we all walked to the Salty Pelican for dinner.  Good move as the seafood pot pie was excellent.

Seafood Pot Pie

Dinner group

After dinner it was a short walk back to the marina.  Nice view of our boats and we caught a great sunset.

Back at the boats, we continued the party on "Jackpot".  I did have a cigar and then got into the Bourbon.  We all made plans to walk up into town and get breakfast in the morning.  Not going to lie that I was feeling a little rough for breakfast.  Jackpot and Happiness Is left for Jekyll Island and we did some chores.  Laundry, chart plotting, engine room checks, mainly for the overheating issue.  Turned out to be a nice day.  

PS - "Happiness Is" has a cat and a dog on the boat.  They purchased a collar for their cat but it did not fit.  Now Lucy is sporting a new harness.