Friday April 15: Isle of Hope Marina

We left yesterday from our Walburg Island anchorage. It was an ok place to be for a windy night (which didn't die down as forcast!) but next time we'll choose a smaller creek. Won't be quite so much current.

Even hitting St. Catherines Inlet at slack tide was quite a journey! Fortunately it was only about 20 minutes across and then a turn west so we were with the incoming tide and sideways to the 20 mph winds. Uncomfortable for a period of time but certainly doable and we had reservations for the Isle of Hope (very appropriate name!) marina for a couple of days.

We finally started seeing the white pelicans again - apparently they don't like to fly any farther south than they have to - they seem to like it at the north end of Florida. So beautiful in flight with the black at the ends of their wingtips.

Usually they are on shore sharing a small slice of sand.

There were plenty of spectators on shore along Hell Gate - a notoriously shallow area of the ICW here in Georgia. Fun to see but my focus was really on just staying in the narrow channel that took us from the Ogeechee River to the Little Ogeechee River! Neither of these are really 'little' rivers and the wind was still quite strong. But again only for about 40 minutes to cross both of these large water areas.


Once past the rivers we were back to the protected areas of marshes and smaller rivers.

Made it to Isle of Hope Marina (Steve makes the marina reservations and thought to call a day ahead as the weather was forecast to not be very nice for today and tomorrow).

This morning the dock guys were dressed for winter! Really? A tossel cap? But then I had on jeans and a fleece - and I was in the boat!




We really like this marina. Not terribly large but nice folks here. And as an added plus they have 2 loaner cars for the transient boaters to use. Just about any store you need is nearby!

Including Sam's Club - for yet another battery. In the long run it's just insurance.

For whatever reason the battery we purchased in Eau Gallie just a short week ago proved to not have enough cranking amps to turn the engine over the way we would like. Not sure what the real issue was but solved it by finding a battery at Sam's with 1050 cranking amps! Turns the engine over like a charm :-)

Another stop was Home Depot. The hot water in the faucet has been reduced to a dribble.

A repeat problem. Small crystals form in the hot water (not the cold) lines for ??? reason. Eventually it clogs the line.

End result - very low flow. Only in the kitchen sink which has really small lines right at the faucet. Fixed and done!

Such a beautiful area with the live oaks and the spanish moss hanging.

The rains predicted never came. One more store run tomorrow for a few more things.

Hopefully it will be nice enough to take a bike ride through the area near the marina.

Then it will be off north again. We're headed for Edisto Island for a stop to see friends Jim and Linda Murray. Met them in 2011 when we were bring the boat from Cleveland to Florida. Such truly 'salt of the earth' people .....