Arrival in Charleston, SC

We are now in Charleston, SC after several days of high heat, humidity and thunderstorms. I am weird, I actually like thunderstorms. I like the build-up and then the passing of the storm. I like them even better when our boat is

   parked alongside a sail boat with a tall mast!!!

The above storm hit just as we were arriving in Charleston. It dumped 1.5" of rain in half an hour.
Before we left Florida I did some fishing as you saw on my previous blog (my licence is only good for Florida). This time I caught two fish, both of which were hammerhead sharks. The first one was bigger than the second but got away before Gary could take a photo (a likely fish story my Mum said). The one that got its photo taken weighed about a 1lb and because the fish is on the prohibited catch list I could not keep it. Anyway, before I could get my hands on it, it chewed through my fishing twine and escaped without as much as saying au revoir!!

We passed several shrimp boats. One with its nets down fishing and the other returning home with its catch. The second one had many birds on its mast and lines just waiting for the fishermen to unload their catch.

 We also passed a flying flock of white pelicans. They are not as prolific in this area as the brown pelican so it was real nice to see them.

Despite the thunderstorms, we had a good journey from St Augustine to Charleston. We broke the journey by staying a night in Beaufort (pronounced
Be You Fort) , SC. The Manager in charge of the Marina was most pleasant. She suggested places to visit and where to eat. We started by having a walking tour of Beaufort in temps in the low 90s. Luckily, the old ante bellum homes were situated on lovely streets with overhanging branches to give lots of shade. The homes were nice to see and many had wonderful gardens. Gary and I took frequent rests due to the heat. At one bench, Gary spotted a huge live oak tree and asked me to take his photo underneath it. I obliged as an obedient wife should!!!!

                The view of the gardens along the Beaufort waterfront.

               An ante bellum house with really nice landscaped gardens.

 The photo Gary requested me to take of him standing underneath a VERY large Live Oak. His comment was "I have found something bigger and wider than me" end of quote!! His words not mine.

Beaufort trees were covered in Spanish Moss and were quite large. The tree is this yard was so large that the driveway was built underneath one of the branches. The branch then came down on the grass to the left of the driveway.

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This tree stretched across the road and had a warning about how much headroom there was for cars to pass underneath.

The Spanish Moss in this area had started to grow on the telephone lines and looked like dirty washing hanging on a line.
We left Beaufort after a very nice stay and proceeded on to Charleston. South Carolina has huge tides and we again entered the area where 8-9ft tides existed. Many people had to build piers over 500 feet long just so that their boats did not end up on dry land like the one in the photo did. 

                                                     Low tide
We had cloudy skies due to the thunderstorms and at one time could not tell where the sky ended and the water began.

The next photo is of a ship in dry dock being repaired. I was impressed with the way the shipped had been "wrapped" to prevent the dust particles, paint etc from escaping into the air.

Just when I have seen almost every type of boat and ship, we passed this lovely sailing boat. It must have been over 100 feet in length with a mast of over 100 feet. It must have had a great deal of waiting time to go under the many bridges we have encountered on our journey. I did not gets its name or its registry. I would love to have seen inside her.

Yesterday, I was lucky enough to see a Bald Eagle family in a tree off to the side of the waterway. There was Mum, Dad and a baby. The photo is not the best due to the distance but you can make out they are Bald Eagles (honest).

This little guy below hitched a ride with us for goodness knows how long. It looked like the crabs that could be found on the Mangroves and we haven't seen Mangroves for a while. He was very "crabby" when Gary helped him overboard.

On one of our charts it warned about a sunken vessel near the shore. Well, if the photo below is of the sunken vessel, it must of sunk, many, many, many years ago as only its mast was showing above the sand.

Once again, we encountered speed demons. I was driving when this boat went past and actually contacted him on the radio requesting a "slow pass". Well, as you can see a slow pass I did not get. Everything on the boat was tossed all over. Luckily, nothing broke. I get very angry with this type of inconsiderate boat driver and look at the name of his boat - "Peacemaker" huh!!!

The boat below I think was the equivalent of the "Ka" (that half a car"). It would certainly make docking the boat easier being as small as it was.

Kingston Rover Loop Map