Thanks to our friends at our home port in Lake Erie, we had a gift certificate to stay at the Charleston City Marina for a couple days. It's a great marina, right downtown. We walked to the shopping district and enjoyed the sites and sounds of Charleston on Friday and Saturday. We thought we might stay through Sunday, but a weather window opened and our trusty captain Bill made the decision to head out to sea. Yep folks, this was going to be our first overnight passage in the Atlantic Ocean. We would travel 156 miles from Charleston to Brunswick GA, at times being 20 - 25 miles offshore.
Just the two of us.
In the dark.
In the ocean.
With no one around.
No radar.
No working cell phones.
ICE CREAM FACE!!!!!!
Actually, the trip turned out great. In fact, it was an experience of a lifetime. I don't have many photos (duh, it was dark), but I thought I'd share a few highlights from the trip.
Some of the beautiful homes along the waterway as we headed out from Charleston. We sailed right past the spot on Sullivan's Island Beach where we got married. So cool to see it from the water.
1pm - 6 pm
We headed out of Charleston with our hearts in our stomach, but determined to get this experience under our belts. It was sunny and cool but not cold. We headed offshore, turned to starboard and headed south. We decided we'd each take 3 hour watches. My first one was from 3 - 6 pm. As the sun was setting around 5 pm I saw two dolphins next to the boat. Cool. I walked up on the weather deck to get a better look. The next thing I knew, I saw about 8 more dolphins jumping in the water and headed toward the boat. "Bill, get up here and see this!" He grabbed the video camera and got lots of great footage of the whole group of dolphins swimming with us. They were literally inches from the boat, weaving in and out in front of the bow wave. You could even hear them squeaking. Sooooo cool! We agreed this had to be a good sign!
9 pm - midnight
I took a nap while Bill had his watch from 6 - 9 pm. The sun had set but we had a new moon which illuminated the water a bit so you could watch for any debris in the water. When I first came up I could still see a few lights on shore, but they were far away. There was one boat off to our port side but it was moving off in a different direction. Bill went down to get some rest and I was all alone. It's weird how different the water is in the dark. You become much more aware of the sounds around you. "whoooo, whoooo." What the heck was that? Guess it must be some kind of seagull or something that I can't see. "kerplash!" What's that loud splash? It was different from the other waves splashing against the hull. Could it be a dolphin? Or a whale? Or a MONSTER!!!!!! I started laughing to myself. Girl, you got yourself one ACTIVE imagination. But you know, now I can see why the sailors of old had so many tall tales to tell. When you are out on the open sea in the dark you really do start thinking that something strange is going to come up out of the water and swallow your boat. At the end of my watch I wasn't really that tired but I was kind of cold, so I woke Bill up and he took over duties.
Here's a shot of our sleeping quarters in the aft cabin along with all our gear that we'd put back in there after Donna left. Bill said it looked like a hamster had settled in there. We had to curl up in a little ball to sleep. But it was nice and warm!
3 - 6 am
Bill got me up for my watch and warned me that it was REALLY dark out there. Turns out the new moon set (just like the sun sets) so now we had NO light. In fact, you couldn't even see past the bow of the boat. This made Bill very nervous, but I tried to have faith that we'd be protected. On the up side, the darkness provided the best gift possible...a sky that was covered with a million, bazillion stars. I mean, I've NEVER seen anything like it. It was absolutely breathtaking. And at this point, there were absolutely no other lights or boats or anything in sight. It was so dark that you couldn't tell where the water stopped and the sky began. It just looked like you were surrounded by stars. My favorite part was to lean out and look straight up at the huge sail against the backdrop of the stars. It looked like we were sailing in the Milky Way, just like they describe in children's books. No movie or special effects group could ever replicate the scene. The cool air on my face, the sound of the waves lapping against the boat as it sliced through the water and the blanket of stars stretching out in all directions. Words do not do it justice. I wish all of you could experience it some day. It was pure heaven.
Around 5:30 am Bill came up top to join me. I went down for a nap from 6 - 7:30 so I missed the sunrise. But he took the pic below. He also had a group of dolphins join him again! Lucky bum.
Sunrise over the Atlantic.
The rest of our trip into Brunswick, GA was a little "sporty" as Bill would call it. The wind kicked up quite a bit so it got really rocky. We trimmed the sails and made our way into the long channel into Brunswick, docking around 3 pm...26 hours from when we had started. What would normally take us 4 days on the ICW, we were able to do overnight. Yahoo! I asked one of our dockmates to take a picture of us right away so we could remember the moment. Who am I kidding? This was an experience I'll NEVER forget!
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