Southport NC to Georgetown SC

—Blogpost written by Bob

Southport to Barefoot Landing

By 8:30 AM (Thursday, November 7, 2019) we were completely through our first obstacle of the day, Lockwood’s Folly.  The combination of good buoy locations, Hank’s excellent navigation briefings at Southport Marina, and my waypoints from past seasons made this seem easy but I knew that one small screw up could make us go aground. Actually the lowest depth we saw was 7 feet near G71A (but on the red side of the channel) which was before we got to the main ocean inlet intersection area. It was about 1-1/2 hours before low tide and, fortunately, the low tide of the morning was not an absolutely lowest tide—the low tide this morning was about a foot above the absolutely lowest tide.

Our next obstacle of the day was Shallotte Inlet crossing. We entered the Shallotte Inlet area at about 9:15 AM, just 1-1/2 hours before low tide (10:43 AM). Again, we got through this obstacle area unscathed, even though two critical buoys, G81 and R82, were missing.

Three temporary "danger" buoys mark a shoal at
Shallotte Inlet crossing but if one is anywhere
close to these buoys you're aground.

The afternoon high temperature was a balmy 83 degrees. We changed into shorts and tee-shirts and opened some of the windows of the cockpit enclosure.

We passed through New River, SC and into what is known as “the rock pile”, our last obstacle of the day.  (When this canal section of the ICW was built, the constructors had to blast through rock. Now, there is a very deep section cut through for boat traffic and submerged rock ledges on both sides. The worst part is about 3 miles long.)  We have never had a problem in the “rock pile” and today was no exception. Maybe, we’ve just been lucky.

We removed the pages from our Waterway Guide
dealing with bridges and then laminated them
and bound them.  We regularly use this
in our cockpit while cruising the ICW.

We made it to Barefoot Landing Marina, our day’s destination, at 1:15 PM. Today, we traveled 44 statute miles in 6.75 hours for an average boat speed of 6.5 miles per hour. (We had to wait about 15 minutes at one opening bridge and we had to travel slowly through today's obstacles.)  It's nice to get our traveling done in the morning!

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Today is Lola's birthday--she is now 2 years old!  When we arrived at Barefoot Landing Marina Lola got a lot of attention--everyone thought she was beautiful!

Barefoot Landing to Georgetown

It rained hard all night and it was still heavily overcast at 7:30 AM on Friday, November 8. The temperature was noticeably cooler (mid 50’s) than yesterday (mid 80’s).

When we departed Barefoot Landing Marina, the wind blew us off the dock (when we released our dock lines) and we were immediately on the ICW heading south again. It was easy peasy.

As we motored south on the canal south of Barefoot Landing we passed by numerous mansions along the ICW near Myrtle Beach SC. It seems like every season more are being built.

Numerous McMansions occupy the land along the
ICW in the vicinity of Myrtle Beach SC.

As we motored by I wondered how many of the home owners even know their next door neighbors and if their McMansions make them happier than other people. Do they feel secure in such a large home? Are they just summer homes?

As we got south of Myrtle beach, the water-side homes were much less opulent and we would occasionally see Trump-2020 flags, usually accompanied by both the American flag and the Confederate flag.

Fifteen or so miles after leaving our slip, the Socaste Swing Bridge (the only opening bridge for the day) opened for us after a 10-minute wait or so. 

The Socaste Swing Bridge opened for us and another
boat.  Since there is a high fixed bridge in the
background I wonder how long into the
future this old swing bridge will be used.

Then we entered the upper reaches of the beautiful Waccamaw River. Much of this long winding river borders on a cypress swamp. The afternoon temperature reached 60 degrees. We were comfortably warm inside our cockpit enclosure wearing tee-shirts and jeans.

Colorful foliage along the beautiful
Waccamaw River.

Lola perched on the top of the companionway
whille enjoying the ride down the
Waccamaw River.

We reached Georgetown SC at 2:30 PM.  We planned a 2-night stay at Hazzard Marine but we were diverted to Georgetown Drystack Marina (next door) at the last moment because Towboat US brought two boats into Hazzard Marine for emergency repair service and they were occupying slips reserved for transients.

s/v Rainy Days was nestled inside the face dock
at Georgetown Drystack Marina.

The temperature is expected to get down as low as 36 degrees tonight--I'm glad we are in a marina with shore power!  It is unusual for us to have been in marinas for what will be five nights in a row but we will be anchoring most of our time in Georgia.

A Stay Over Day in Georgetown

Today, Saturday, November 9, 2019, we are not moving.  We did grocery shopping in the morning--a guy at the marina gave us a ride to the nearby Food Lion.  When we returned I took the following pics around the marina.

Three shrimp boats moored
in Georgetown SC.

A nice reflection from a
nearby power boat.

I flew my Penn State burgee from our starboard
spreader for today's football game.

At noon, Penn State (undefeated and ranked #4 in the nation) played undefeated and #17 in the nation) Minnesota--it was a big game and one that I deliberately got a slip here so that I could watch it on TV.  Unfortunately, Penn State lost by a score of 26-31 and is no longer undefeated.  Penn State was driving toward a winning goal but was intercepted at the goal line with about 1 minute to go.

We got showers after the game in preparation for an early departure tomorrow morning.


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