I haven’t posted for a while. It has been a difficult time for me, as my mom passed away on the 7th. Below, I have posted about some of the places and sights that we saw during the trip from Charleston, SC to Wilmington, NC.

We left Beaufort, SC for St Johns Yacht Harbor which is just shy of Charleston, SC and traveled 64 miles, which was the most miles that we had traveled in a day. It took us 7.3 hours and we arrived on April 3rd and tied up on the t-dock. The next day we had a LOT of wind and the boat was rocking and rolling even though we were tied to a dock. We decided that it would be a good day to ferry the truck from Isle of Hope Marina, so we rented a car and off we went. When we got back that evening, it was still so windy that we choose to stay in a motel instead of trying to sleep on the boat. Whimpy, aren’t we??

Then came the call that changed everything. My brother called to say that my mom was failing and that we needed to get back to Pennsylvania. We made arrangements for a slip in the marina instead of leaving the boat on the t-dock and headed for PA., arriving in time to say our goodbyes to Mom.

We arrived back at the boat for yet another windy period. Although we had a tornado watch, we were fortunate that it was just windy. Others in this state were not so lucky and some area’s in NC were hit by devastating tornado’s that day.

We left Isle of Palms, went to the and then went Harborwalk Marina in Georgetown and then on to the Barefoot Marina in Myrtle Beach. Harborwalk was a nice stop and we could walk through town from the marina. Barefoot Marina was also a good stopover but be aware that unless you walk or bike, you won’t get to see much of Myrtle Beach. We left early in the morning, finally arriving at our destination of Wilmington, NC, where we will leave the boat until next October or so.

Just a personal note to add here – I’ve always heard how friendly the folks in the south are. This was NOT the case in South Carolina. We found that most folks to be quite stand-offish and the folks working in stores were quite often either rude or indifferent (or both). It surely was NOT the way we expected folks to be in South Carolina. Okay, there is my personal rant. Now, check below for photo’s that we took during this part of our journey. Remember that you can click on any photo to see the larger size.

We walked to the ocean from the Isle of Palms marina

This little dude tried eating sand - yuk!!

Gulls following in our wake to get the "goodies" we stir up

A crabber along the waterway

Dolphins often swim in our wake

Captain is getting a break while the admiral drives

One of the few eagles that we saw around MM 410

Swing bridge swings open so that boats can go though.

Plane landing at an airport nearby.

Looks like they are using a lot of energy to move along

Golfers crossing the ICW in gondola's

We passed many barges and tugs along the way

There you have it. Just a few of the sights that we saw during the last few days before we left the boat in Wilmington, NC. We will leave it there until next October or November while we spend the summer at our camp on Nicatous Lake in Maine.  Our plans are to take the boat back to Florida next winter and then continue on the Loop when the weather warms next year.  I will still be blogging as we travel to Maine and back so be sure to check back often.