We left Fort Lauderdale on September 3, 2017 and headed toward Charleston, South Carolina. We were going to take our time going north along the coast, but with storms in the forecast, we decided to speed up our trip by staying offshore for two nights.
The water was busy with sport fisherman as we left Fort Lauderdale, but the weather was perfect.
Not too long after leaving, Erik lost a tooth. He was pretty excited.
Glen and I were on first watch our first night offshore. We witnessed a beautiful sunset and many many ships…quite an impressive sight so far from land.
Glen and I also were on early morning watch. I love early morning watch, as mentioned in a previous post, because of the sunrise. And, it didn’t disappoint this time.
The dogs did very well their first night offshore. Oliver got his “sea-legs” early on. It took Benny a little bit longer. Luckily, we hadn’t had any bad weather up to this point.
Erik came running out shortly after sunrise to tell us that he had lost ANOTHER tooth. The poor tooth fairy is going to go bankrupt!
We enjoyed smooth seas the entire day and were able to use our newly repaired mainsail.
We made it to Charleston on the morning of September 5, 2017. We passed Fort Sumter on the way in as well as some amazing waterfront homes. Arthur Ravenel Bridge and Morris Island Lighthouse were in the distance.
We had reservations to stay at the Charleston City Marina where they docked us at the Mega Dock. We felt a little out of place amongst all the giant yachts. It was a long trek to shore to walk the dogs, but they were so happy to be on land again. The marina was very nice and well equipped with anything and everything.
We decided to take advantage of the free shuttle, provided by the marina, and go into the city to sightsee, shop, and have lunch. We ended up finding a familiar restaurant, Another Broken Egg, that we had eaten at several times when we lived in Destin, FL. After lunch, we walked through the city without a real plan…just seeing and learning about whatever we came upon.
We found St. Michael’s Episcopal Church to be open, so we took a little tour inside. The church was like nothing we had seen before with the separated booths with doors.
We found a little park, Hazel Parker Playground, that had some fun equipment. We were the only people there, so we all played.
We decided to get some groceries while we were out. We found a nice store, Harris Teeter, where we found everyone’s new favorite soda…Cheerwine!! After shopping, we called the shuttle to come pick us up.
We made it back to the boat, walked the dogs, puzzled our groceries into the cabinets, planned our trip for the next day, and slept peacefully with the boat tied up to the dock.
Erik
When we got to Charleston, we parked at a marina called Mega Dock. We went to a broken egg place. We walked the dogs. Oliver was taking too long. We went to a park and did two twirly-birds. One twirly-bird looked like a trampoline.
Glen
When we were leaving Ft. Lauderdale, we had to go under the drawbridge. The man in charge wasn’t very nice. We heard a man over the radio say, ”Hey, did you forget about me?” Then the guy working the bridge said, ”In the process.”
A sport fishing boat had the right away of us who wasn’t very nice either (and was faster than us). What he did was drive right ahead of us four times. We couldn’t do anything about it. Daddy said that there was a good chance that they will cut their lines off. Once we got in the ocean, things started getting better. We set sail, and mama and I were on night watch. Near midnight, we saw some lights. Then as we went further, the lights got bigger. We soon realized that it was a cruise liner. Then as we sailed further, we saw more lights, and it was another cruise ship. Later, I went to sleep. When I woke up, it was freakishly calm. The water almost looked looked like glass. When we got to Charleston, we went to a place called ”Mega Dock”, AND THEY HAD WI-FI!!!!!!! We walked the dogs. We went out to eat at the Broken Egg Cafe, and it was really good. We went through the town and noticed that so many houses had a widow’s walk. It was weird how the streets were made of cobblestone. There were churches and old houses everywhere. We went to a park and Liam spun me in a thing, and I couldn’t get out. Later we went to a place called Harris Teeter, got groceries, and went home.
Liam
When we got to Charleston, we stopped our boat at a dock called “Mega Dock”. It was just like a big marina with a gas spot. The dogs needed to go, so we took them potty. They took forever. We parked there and went to go look at the city. We found a park where we played around. There was a small park with a few attractions. One of them was a little metal attraction where we spun around really fast. We walked to a booth where a bus taxi would pick us up. Only people using the Mega Dock were allowed to ride the bus taxi. We stopped at the next taxi stop and ate at a place called the “Broken Egg Cafe” where we got some breakfast for lunch. We walked through the city and saw a lot of stuff. We saw graveyards, churches, courtyards, a beach, and many restaurants. Then we walked over to a grocery store called Harris Teeter where we loaded up on groceries. Then we called the bus taxi to pick us up at the store. We didn’t want to carry all our groceries to our boat. Once we got back to the boat, the dogs were going crazy. I think they were mad when we went to eat without them.
