Edisto Beach, SC to Skidaway Island, GA
Anchor up at 7:00 am and what a beautiful morning.
Skeet's bedroom is adjacent to the engine room, so when we get everything cranked up in the morning, the noise becomes his unavoidable alarm clock, but he emerges with a great attitude, ready to tackle the day and see how he can help. Today he was very pleased to learn that Ron was on driving duty, so Skeet's first assignment was to go back to bed. 😜
My day started with a live one-hour workout with Fonda Interactive Training (F.I.T.). Fonda and I have been close friends for over two decades, and workout buddies for almost as long. In addition to being a phenomenal person, she's an equally amazing personal trainer, and has been motivating me to stay in shape all these years through one-on-one sessions, group fitness classes, and now online interactive workouts. They have been a life saver on these longer boat trips, as we can go for days at a time without being able to stretch our legs on land. They're also perfectly suited to life in limited quarters, whether it's a tiny apartment or tiny floating home. If the weather is nice and we are anchored somewhere without much of an audience (!), I'll workout on the bow, but when it's cold like it's been lately, I can also luckily manage to do these online classes inside the pilot house.
Steve is not the most inspiring workout partner, but I still enjoy his (lazy) company.
Fonda divides each one-hour class into quarters, and using minimal equipment and bodyweight exercises like push-ups, planks, squats, and lunges, she manages to hit every muscle group and sprinkle in sections of cardio for good measure. It's really the best of all worlds - weights and cardio - and the coolest thing is that you can literally be at ANY level in your fitness experience and get a workout whose intensity is appropriate just for you. Fonda has a gift for giving modifications to every exercise to enable you to take it up or down a notch depending on your individual needs. She also manages to make the workouts something we all look forward to, which is no small feat. I'm not big on sales pitches, but I would encourage you to try her classes if you have any interest at all in what they're all about. Your first two weeks are free, and Fonda is happy to answer any questions you may have. She's about the nicest, most approachable, and most encouraging coach you could ask for.
Skeet took over the helm around 10:00 am, and while it's still a little chilly, he drove the boat from the flybridge until around 3:00 pm. It's hard to explain just how amazing it is to have a willing captain take over the helm and free up five hours of your time. Ron and I can get work done inside while Skeet takes care of keeping us on course, keeping an eye out for crabpots, slowing down to allow boats to pass us, or whatever other responsibilities might come his way, always knowing we are right here if he needs us or has a question. The boat traffic has honestly been pretty light, so it's not often we've had to worry about boats passing us in either direction.
Breakfast this morning was insta-coffee cake (just add water! 😜 j/k). Tastes better than it looks after being mushed in its oxygen-free home of the past few weeks. Skeet is a lot like me and is always thinking about food. When he's eating breakfast, he's asking about lunch. A man after my own heart. Today I got this text from the younger captain from his flybridge perch:
The "tasty bread" is this phenomenal sourdough boule I buy from a bakery just north of Wilmington called True Blue Butcher & Baker. I'm sure I've talked about them already ad nauseum, but they really make the best bread and pastries in the area. Or right up there with the best, for sure. Here's a picture from their website. I mean, YUM.
Here's the pimento cheese sandwich, as requested, on True Blue's lemon parmesan sourdough. You know you want some!!
Once he'd polished off his sandwich, he was back on duty, pointing out to me that the Woods Memorial Bridge in Beaufort, SC didn't have a tide board. "That's bad design, mom!"
Tide boards provide a numbered scale that allows boaters to easily see how much clearance they have under a bridge based on the current tide height. Skeet had also tried to communicate with the bridge tender (VHF channel 9 in SC; it's channel 13 in NC) to ask for his clearance (KORKZcrew needs about 18' with her antennas down), but didn't get an answer. We could tell that we'd easily make it underneath without any issue, so in this case, it wasn't a big deal, but the tide board would've provided some good visual confirmation and reassurance.
Cormorants have been a regular part of the scenery all along the waterway, and they are so fun to watch, whether they're diving beneath the surface or drying their wings above it. If you're unfamiliar with cormorants, they are "aquatic predators that eat mostly small fish, but will also feed on aquatic invertebrates such as insects, crustaceans, and amphibians. They dive underwater to capture prey in their long, hooked bills. Cormorants spread their wings primarily to dry them off after diving underwater to catch fish, as their feathers are not waterproof and become easily waterlogged, allowing them to dive deeper; this means they often need to perch with wings outstretched to let the sun and wind dry them out."
We crossed the South Carolina border into Georgia around 3:00 pm, and Ron drove the rest of the way until we anchored at 5:30, with Steve once again showing the way.
Night night KORKZcrew!
10.5 hours underway; approx. 65 nautical miles traveled
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