I have a really crap night’s sleep. No reason. Not cold. Just a frustrating few hours wide awake while Mike is sound asleep beside me. I do eventually get back to sleep though and wake up late as a consequence.
Having looked around pretty much the whole of Beaufort on foot, we decide to avail ourselves of the marina’s courtesy car. We are allowed to take the car for one hour, and as they only have one, not four as in Beaufort, North Carolina, we are given strict instructions on not to go over the swing bridge in case we get held up and people are waiting. We immediately go for the swing bridge and the bloody thing is opening. Sitting in a long line of traffic waiting for just one yacht to come through, you reflect on the idiocy of these dammed things in this day and age.
Ten minutes later we are off again. Although the swing bridge starts to close almost before the boats are through (as we found out the other day when it opened for us – which of course is different) you can’t believe the backlog of traffic it causes. No wonder they won’t open many of them during rush hour.
We have no map (we had to tell the girl we just wanted to go to the grocery store and that was all the instructions she gave us) we head out confident of getting back within the 50 minutes left to us. Driving around we realise that this is actually going to be easy as there doesn’t really seem to be anything to look at in the environs. We do, however, go over the bridge we are going to go under tomorrow. As you climb the hump of the bridge, it seems so high – how come our little boat only just fits under it? Weirdly, they seem really low when viewed from the bottom of your mast after a bad experience!!!
We return the car on time and go back to the boat. There is a new boat in front of us and as we approach, we spot the British ensign flaying out behind just as the owners appear.
William and Frances have been sailing the east coast for some time and hand us some important information about our next port of call – Savannah. Apparently the pilings at the city dock are a haven for … cockroaches! Ugh!! Scuttlers!! I hate them and start to review my desire to visit the place.
After chatting a while we go back to Jeannius for lunch. I found some smoked salmon in the freezer and we are to have that with some of the bagels we bought yesterday. The smoked salmon turns out to be the best I have ever eaten, and the bagel is pretty bloody good too. The salmon is wild sockeye salmon. Wonderful.
William comes over and invites us for sundowners on their boat tonight, bringing back memories of the WARC. Ahh, friends that I miss!!
We spend the afternoon wandering around the art galleries in town, something I have found that I really enjoy even when I am not buying. Having a beautiful 5 foot by 4 foot new painting waiting for me when I get back to the UK is enough for Mike’s wallet! I reward Mike for his patience with an ice cream. Bribery always works!
There seems to be some sort of folk festival or singing competition going on around the park area. As we stroll through, there is one guy twanging on a banjo, no doubt singing about his dead dog or the fact that the wife has gone off with the butcher, and in the bar opposite, there’s some guy droning on with his guitar. If you stand in the middle like we do, it’s a revolting racket! Give me hard rock any day.
At 6 pm we go over to see William and Frances. They have invited other people too and there are eight of us huddled together in the cockpit of their Hallberg Rassey. We need to huddle too as immediately the sun dips the temperature plunges. Frances kindly provides beautifully warm wraps and lovely appetizers while William makes sure that our glasses are continually filled with bubbly stuff.
We take our leave and go back to Jeannius for dinner and an early night. We have to be up early in the morning to catch the next bridge at low tide. Oh goody. Another bridge to argue with!!
Position: 32 deg 25 min N, 80 deg 40 min W
Distance so far: 3339 miles
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