June 8, 2008.

We’ve left Charleston in our wake, but before doing so, we had to deal with Lenscrafters yet again.

After waiting for over a week, Christy’s new lenses hadn’t shown up at the store as promised on Wednesday. On Thursday we found out by phone that the lenses hadn’t even been made yet in the top secret Lenscrafters lens building facility, let alone shipped. The best they could do was to promise that they’d be shipped on Tuesday so we should have them in another 6 days. Christy is in Menopause so she’s a little less patient than usual (read that as hormone induced fits of rage). Editor’s Note: That is completely untrue, the part about fits of rage. <- Whatever the editor says. She very calmly and firmly explained our problem to yet another Lenscrafters employee. She was not making progress until she asked for the name, number and address of the head of customer service at their Corporate Headquarters.

Suddenly, the woman realized that they had generic lenses that could be made to fit Christy’s prescription instead of the pricey name brand lens we’d been waiting for. That’s right, and they were right there in the store, had been all along.

We were on the first bus to the mall the next day so we could have the new lenses put in Christy’s spare frame. We dropped off the glasses, walked the mall a bit and picked up Christy’s new eye wear. The new lenses were good and we will still have to have the primary glasses changed to the correct lenses somewhere up the coast. Once back at the boat we got everything ready to be up and underway the next morning.

We’d been listening to the VHF and had heard quite a few calls for towing assistance in the ICW just north of Charleston, so we were committed to traveling in the ocean instead of the “ditch”. We planned to stop in Georgetown to see family and friends but traveling on the outside complicates that a bit.

The trip from Charleston to Georgetown is 68 miles. We can do that in a day, but that would leave us with a trip of 97 miles to get from Georgetown to Cape Fear, NC. That would be an overnighter. If we combined the 2 trips and made one larger jump we could save about 30 miles and still only have to do one overnighter. No brainer, sorry Georgetown.

The tide wouldn’t be cooperating, as it would be coming in until noon on Saturday. So we hauled anchor at 1000 figuring we’d fight the incoming tide and arrive at the inlet at about slack tide. Hauling the anchor didn’t go as smoothly as planned. I retrieved the slack chain until the anchor was directly under the bow of the boat. I could tell that the anchor was not stuck to the bottom but it was snagged on something. Crap. The water there is solid silt with about one foot of visibility and roaring through at 3 knots. After about forever, the windlass was able to draw the anchor up to the surface and exposed our problem.

It was an old anchor/mooring line that’s been lying there on the bottom since Moses parked the ark here. It’s 7/8’s inch line and was folded and twisted back across itself several times so at one point it was 3 inches thick. It was a rat’s nest that had completely enveloped our anchor with three separate ends held taught to the bottom.

I couldn’t raise the anchor any further than water level. I couldn’t reach it to cut the line away. I wasn’t even sure if this line wasn’t still being used in the anchoring “system” of one of the local boats that are moored here. There were no locals close to us but I couldn’t take the chance of cutting it and decided to try and untie the knot with our boat pole. It was a lot like trying to untie the Gordian Knot with a hockey stick. Except, it worked. It only took ninety seconds of pulling, tugging, poking and twisting and the ropes started to unravel and fall away. We were underway.

The trip out the inlet was easy as we did hit it at slack tide with only a very slight breeze behind us. We had all sail up and found ourselves ghosting along at about 2 knots. It was going to be a 24 hour trip so I decided we could afford to be patient, which was risky, what with Christy’s medical condition as described above.

Three hours at 2 knots, followed by three hours at 3 knots, did little for our progress. After about 6 hours we found ourselves moving along at 4 knots in the light 6 knots of breeze. The water was once again dead calm as we slowly made our way towards the Cape Fear River. Finally at about 2130 hours the wind had all but died so we had to start the engine and motor through the night.

Propagation is the deciding factor in how well your radio works. If the propagation is crappy, then so will be your ability to receive and transmit. On this overnighter we had the best propagation we’ve ever had for the entire night. We could very easily hear Coast Guard broadcasts from the gulf coast of Florida which is several hundred miles behind us.

So we listened intently to a pair of mini dramas as they unfolded. The first was a guy on a single engine, 24 foot center console fishing boat. He and his buddies broke down 60 miles off the Georgia coast. Another boat that had been out there fishing towed them westward until fuel issues became a concern for them. So they were left adrift still 45 miles from the coast.

The Coast Guard arranged commercial assistance for them. When he was asked if he preferred SeaTow or TowBoat US he replied that it didn’t matter as he didn’t have any towing insurance. (BIG mistake) Both towing services were contacted and both scrambled to find one of their boats that had twin engines and enough fuel capacity to go out and get them. After several hours SeaTow was on their way. It took 4 hours for him to get on scene and several hours longer than that to complete the tow. At over $200 an hour that bill was gonna sting.

They really did get lucky though. If not for the nights extraordinary propagation their calls for help would probably have not been heard. Single engine, tiny boat 60 miles offshore, dumb asses.

As this rescue was ending another unfolded. A woman got on the radio and very calmly hailed the Coast Guard. After they replied, she reported that her boat was anchored and her husband was having chest pains. The radioman got her coordinates and told her that they had an asset patrolling in that area and he’d get in touch with them.

As soon as he told her that, she replied “They just passed by, right now”. From the initial call until the time they were on her boat was less than 2 minutes. Talk about being in the right place at the right time. Christy and I have anchored there and have never even seen a Coast Guard patrol boat in that area. They loaded the guy into their boat and took him to a nearby marina where they had an ambulance waiting to transport him to the hospital.

Just before dawn we got a bit of breeze and rolled out the genoa and motor sailed into the Cape Fear River inlet. Once we had to start the engine last night we plotted our arrival to make sure we hit the river on an incoming tide. It all went perfectly and we rocketed up the river at 8 knots.

After a quick 10 mile jaunt up the river we stopped in Carolina Beach, NC before noon. Our friends from the Packet Inn keep their boat here for the summer so we’ll be dropping in on them for a visit or several.

It’s incredibly hot here, as it was in Charleston, but thank God for a bit of ocean breeze to help cool things off. One of the bridges we would have had to transit if we had stayed on the inside was inoperable for a day and a half. It’s been so hot here that the metal had expanded to the point where the bridge would not open. They’ve been spraying it down with water in between openings in an effort to keep it cooler.

We should be here for a couple of days before we head out the Masonboro Inlet on our way to Beaufort, NC.