Travels with Polar Pacer: Oriental to Charleston

Oriental, North Carolina to Charleston, South Carolina, October 23 to November 1, 2010

Q. How many pairs of binoculars should you have on board?

A. At least one pair for every set of eyes in the cockpit.

We started out with two pairs by Bushnell (7x50 and 16x50) that never get taken out of their cases, a small pocket size pair that we thought would be handy to carry ashore (Of course we never think about them until we’re ready to use them and there’s no point going back for them.) and a pair of West Marine’s best, bought during a 50% off sale, that have lived with us in the cockpit since day one. We sometimes had to fight over them. Not anymore. A trip to the marine consignment store in Oriental produced a pair of previously owned, high end 7x50’s from Fujinon for $85. A comparable pair in Defender’s online catalogue are $682. I think we got a good deal.

I still can’t find where I stashed the small pair. There are just too many hiding places. I know they are somewhere on the boat.

Dolphins in the Adams Creek Canal. They really are hard to take photographs of so I have resorted to taking lots of video and cutting out the long stretches where all you see is water. These were the first ones we spotted this year while traveling down the Adams Creek Canal.

Sometimes life just gets too technical.

It all started with wanting to know how much electricity we were getting from our wind generator. (Well, it probably really started a year earlier when the 60 amp alternator that came with the new engine was replaced with an 80 amp alternator in order to charge the batteries quicker.) We installed a battery monitor made by Bogart Engineering .The first thing the battery monitor told us was that we were not getting as much charge from the 80 amp alternator as we thought we should be getting. Although we do not often need to run our engine solely to charge batteries, it would be nice to get the highest possible output when we do and minimize the engine running time.

When we were in Washington, DC a Balmar Max Charge MC-612 was purchased and the 80 amp alternator modified so they could work together. Everything seemed to be fine except that the tachometer was giving erratic readings. A switch was put in so the alternator could be operated in Small Engine Mode when we are motoring and need the power for the propeller.

When we went to start the engine to leave Hampton the new starter battery was dead. This was a surprise as we had been plugged in at the dock for two days and the house batteries were fine. We used the crossover switch to start the engine and hoped that the situation would fix itself. When there was no change in the status of the starter battery after several days we decided to stop at the next West Marine and get a new one.

Two days later, after leaving Morehead City, the house batteries were not charging and the amp meter on the new monitor was going crazy. The problem indicator light on the echo charger was blinking. The newest starter battery was reading 17.1 volts. We were in crisis mode at a point on the ICW where the dredged channel is very narrow. Outside the channel the water is very shallow, even for our 3 foot draft. After some complicated maneuvers that must have been entertaining to the morning traffic that was catching up to us, we managed to get the anchor down at the side of the channel where Tom proceeded to disconnect the external regulator, remove the 80 amp alternator and reinstall the 60 amp alternator that we had started out with a year ago.

Boats at anchor at Morehead City, North Carolina

This year’s hurricane season was predicted to be much more active than what we saw last year and has proven to be just that. Ida was as far as they progressed through the alphabet last year and this season we have already seen Tomas. Although none have come close enough to cause us any concern, we have watched their formation off of the coast of Africa and with the help of many excellent weather websites, tracked their progress across the Atlantic and up the coast of North America.

Hurricane regulations for one of the bridges.

Just so you know what to expect if one hits.

This menacing cloud came by Wrightsville Beach where we were anchored but did not amount to much.

Making perogies in Wrightsville Beach. The silicone baking sheet works well for rolling out dough in a small space.

The stretch of the ICW between Wrightsville beach and Myrtle Beach does not have a lot of choices for good anchoring. Skipper Bob’s Anchorages Along the Intracoastal Waterway (a.k.a. A Cruisers’ Bible for the ICW) lists Shallotte Inlet at mile 329.5 as an option with good holding and wind protection with a strong current and a sandbar building in the middle of the anchorage. The next option was 10 miles and at least two hours away. It would probably be dark before we could get there.

We saw a boat anchored as we approached and it looked like there should be enough room for Polar Pacer as well as the other boat that was travelling with us. We had just pulled over to the side of the channel to let Mutual Fun pass by. The next thing we knew we had been picked up by the current and deposited crosswise in the river right on top of the sand bar! We were in 2.7 feet of water. We need at least three feet and a bit to float and the tide was still going out. We put out a stern anchor to prevent us from being pushed any deeper into the sand. Attempts to get ourselves unstuck only accomplished polishing the propeller with sand.

TheTow Boat US driver arrived about ten minutes after we placed the call for help. Twenty five minutes later he had pulled us off, assisted by Mutual Fun’s dinghy pushing from the side, and did not leave until he was satisfied that we were safely anchored for the night.

Tow Boat US and Mutual Fun to the rescue.

Being a fan of the blues I was looking forward to a stop at Barefoot Landing in North Myrtle Beach. I had read about the the House of Blues Concert Hall located there and was hoping for some good entertainment. Yes, there is a concert hall, and yes, the establishment has a blues theme but no, there was no live entertainment of any sort in this run of the mill restaurant chain on a Thursday night – not even a local one man show playing for free beer. Oh well, for happy hour they were serving $2 beer and very large $3 margaritas. The décor had a certain amount of entertainment value too.

The House of Blues at Barefoot Landing. The patchwork siding is recycled metal from old barns.

Fine art on the walls at the House of Blues

The pub crawl continues. Burgers and Beer with the Mutual Fun crew.

The strategy to get the best value for your marine docking dollars is to plan your arrival as early in the day as possible and leave as late in the day as possible. The Charleston City Marina is one of the more expensive marinas on the ICW and we really wanted to get our timing right. We anchored in Whiteside Creek, just off the waterway and 10.7 miles from the Ben Sawyer Bridge that separated us from Charleston Harbor. The bridge opens on the hour starting at 9 AM. We left the anchorage as soon as there was enough daylight to navigate. We expected to have the current against us and were prepared for a leisurely trip to arrive for the 10 AM bridge opening. The tide tables on our electronic charts are sometimes subject to interpretation and we ended up with the current in our favor and it looked good for the 9 AM opening.The closer we got to the bridge the narrower the navigable channel became and the busier the boat traffic got with everyone having the same idea – to make it to the 9 AM opening. We were reluctant to push the engine too hard as it had been overheating. Sure enough, the alarm went off and we were forced to slow down and let things cool down a bit much to the annoyance of the sailboat captain who was right behind us wanting to pass without having to move over into the shallow water to do it.

We managed to get the engine cooled down and reached the bridge enough ahead of time that we had to wait for a few minutes. In the process of waiting we drifted a little too close to the crab trap line on the edge of the channel and picked up a marker line with our prop! There we were, tangled up and the bridge about to open any minute. Tom was quick to locate the Henkel bread knife, lift the drive leg and saw through the line. No damage was done and we still had enough time to motor through the bridge with the rest of the pack.

Remember Fred? He was with us for the Halloween season last year. Well he was back again this year.

This time he decided that the new storage lockers on the back deck would be a good place to stow away.

We discovered him when we returned to River Dunes from a shopping trip in Oriental. We think he may have been hanging out on Tangier Island and crept aboard when we went to Hilda’s for dinner. Fred was disappointed that Halloween in Charleston was such a quiet affair. Most of the big parties and club events happened on Saturday night and we didn’t arrive until Sunday morning. Decorations were still up and we saw a few college kids in costume who were either just going home from the night before or on their way to an afternoon “hair of the dog” party.

Leftover decorations in the yard of a frat house.

The Charleston City Marina (a.k.a. The Megadock) is convenient for exploring the historic city by foot. By taking different routes between the marina and the downtown area there is always something interesting to see.