Monday, October 29 – Mile 345 – 373 (The Rockpile):  Bob was bound and determined to “get outta Dodge” this morning, so with some help from the dockmaster, we left Myrtle Beach Yacht Club.  It was very windy and cold.  It seems that “Sandy” has decided to hang around for awhile and deliver us some winter.  We are concerned about our friends and relatives up north.  But besides being cold and windy, the sun is out and it appears to be a beautiful day.  After awhile, the sun coming in through the eisinglass on the flybridge, warmed us up.

            The only challenge today is “The Rockpile.”  To put it bluntly, this is a stretch of the waterway that has rock ledges on both sides of the channel and the bottom is hard shale or rock.  I can’t tell you how many horror stories I have heard about this place.  I thought for sure we were going to wind up like the Costa Concordia; Soundings Magazine would surely do a story about us, and it wouldn’t be pretty.  I am also positive I read somewhere that you should never do this stretch at high tide (usually it’s the opposite and you should never go anywhere at low tide) because at high tide you can’t see the rocks sticking up out of the water.  (All the better to rip out your hull, my dear…).  However, there is only one really bad stretch (Mile 349 to Mile 352 – only three miles).  Well, we did it at high tide – never saw any of the nasty little rocks, had about 18’ of water the whole time; never saw a tug or barge ready to run us up on the rocks, and navigated the whole area without a hitch.  So, that’s that for the rockpile.  I won’t lie to you and tell you that I wasn’t a little nervous.

            We needed fuel, and Bob is appropriately forever looking for the lowest price, and Barefoot Landing Marina (a beautiful resort marina that might call for a stop on the way back) seemed to fit the bill.  The wind was howling and it was a bit of a challenge to get tied up, but when we finished fueling up, the boat shot away from the dock like a racehorse and on we went.

            This stretch of the waterway is very developed with lots of expensive looking hacienda type houses with tile roofs and Palmetto trees adorning the landscaped grounds.

            Speaking of which, the Cabbage Palmetto is the state tree of South Carolina and is where Palmetto bugs like to call home.  Sounds very environmentally symbiotic, but Palmetto bugs are nothing more than gigantic flying cockroaches.  Just thought you would find this bit of trivia interesting…

All this eventually gives way to just a mish mash of residential homes, and you can see shopping centers beyond the houses (even a McDonalds).  There is nothing really photogenic along this stretch.  But somewhere around Mile 360, however, the landscape turns into wooded areas reminiscent of everglades.  Lots of cypress trees and the beginnings of that greenish gray Spanish moss floating and weaving among the branches.  Here the water covers large areas off the actual waterway, and it looks like water pathways disappearing off into the woods.  I am thinking, “What a great place to find alligators.”  No alligator sightings, though.  Although, I thought the same thing about the dolphins, and then there were gazillions of them leaping around the boat.  Hmmm…not quite sure I want the same experience with the alligators.  In all honesty, one would have to jump out of the water and snap its jaws at me before I would probably see it.   One or two from a distance would be fun to see, though.  We did see a few turtles sunning themselves on some driftwood.  I don’t know what kind they were, but they were big!  We knew the wind was blowing strong, but we were actually very protected in here.

            Right after the Socastee Bridge (Mile 371) we turned to port to enter the well-marked but narrow channel that led to Osprey Marina.  It’s a nice little stop that gives you a “care package” with laundry detergent, pens and paper, crackers (ha ha) and some pre-packaged breakfast sweet rolls (Bob was happy).  So we are tied up here for the night, and we will see what the weather holds for tomorrow.

            It’s funny, but as we were on our way here, I was thinking back to when we met this couple in Bath and had hor d’oeuvres on their boat then went to dinner with them.   I was thinking that encounters like this would probably happen often and that I needed to buy some more “cheese and crackers” to be prepared for those occasions.  Well, we haven’t had any more social encounters like that since then, and, darn, I have all those cheese and crackers…humph.  Well, guess who is in here with us tonight!  The same people – so we are going to invite them over, but it is getting late and Bob is taking a nap.  Maybe I won’t get to serve those cheese and crackers after all…