Crew Log for November 23rd, 2022
Trip Summary:
Waccamaw River (Wacca Wache Marina) – Georgetown, SC
Trip Distance of 18.7 NM, Total Distance To-Date of 1,932.1 NM
Departed at 08h30, arrived at 12h15
As much planning and thought that we put into this trip, we have always tried to be flexible to visit an area we hadn’t planned on, or conversely, skip by some we had originally planned to visit. Admittedly, the detail in the planning has gone down considerably since we left the Chesapeake. That said, we typically look a couple of days to a week out and figure out anchorages or docking ahead of us and make a rough plan.
A couple of days earlier, I was reading the Waterway Guide for the ICW and I noted that Georgetown was a favorite stop for many heading down the ICW. Georgetown is the third oldest city in South Carolina, after Charleston and Beaufort, and the second largest shipping port (after Charleston). During the antebellum period, indigo and rice were the major exports, replaced by lumber products after the Civil War.
This was the first time we started to hear about things like “Lowcountry” and the Gullah dialect and were surprised to hear that rice had been grown in the area. There is a Rice Museum in Georgetown that highlights that period in history and there is also a paper mill and steel mill, that still dominate the viewscape and occasionally the air space.
Georgetown is roughly the size of our hometown of Truro, Nova Scotia and everything seems to be within easy walking distance. There is a beautiful Harbor Walkway along the waterfront with a great selection of restaurants, shops and museums. The architecture was distinctly southern colonial and the streets were lined with massive live oaks, covered in Spanish moss.
This was American Thanksgiving Weekend, which is the start of the Christmas holiday season. Christmas decorations were going up everywhere and most of the US boats were scrambling for space to pause for the weekend. Schools are closed for the week leading up to Thanksgiving and it is the busiest travel weekend in the US. The marina was full, the anchorages were crowded, and the town was already busy with tourists.
Georgetown was less than 20 nautical miles away from Wacca Wache Marina so we had a relaxed start to the morning. After a brief chat with the Marina Manager, we pushed off the dock at 08:30 am. Mid morning for us! As we made our way into towards Georgetown, we were approached by a couple of other sailboats and a trawler who insisted on passing us just before the tricky harbor entrance. Soon after we understood the urgency since all 3 of them dropped their anchors right in front us, in what appeared to be the entrance to Georgetown Harbor.
One of the things we noticed more and more as we make our way south, is that most of the anchorages are full of fulltime liveaboards and derelict vessels, which can some times limit how many transient boats can anchor. Georgetown harbor was particularly bad. There were dozens of boats lining the harbor entrance with shredded sails, other were submerged or beached and some looked to be permanent homes. When we asked about it at our marina, the dockmaster said the town was looking at hauling the boats out of there and creating a mooring field so they could manage it. Aside from being an eyesore, the environmental damage of leaking fuel, sewage and other decaying boat parts was significant.
We diverted our course to avoid running into the 3 boats trying to anchor and almost ended up adding Elizabeth M to the beached boats on the far side of the harbor. Georgetown has a major commercial fishing fleet and, given where the 3 boats anchored, it wasn’t obvious to me how the fishermen, or anyone else for that matter, were going to negotiate passage in and out of the harbor. The Harbormaster didn’t either apparently, since shortly after we tied up at the marina, we saw the 3 boats heading down to the anchorage across from the pulp and steel mills.
Safely, and comfortably tied up, we made our way into Georgetown for an afternoon of exploring. The town marina had beautiful full service docks and a very nice Captains’ Lounge area with beautiful laundry and washroom facilities. All right in the center of town.
Our first stop was the Rice Museum which we never did visit, given we got distracted on the first floor. The Museum had a really nice shop on the main floor that in addition to selling local rice had a great selection of local art and crafts. As Judy strolled through the shop, I stood in front of the CD player doing a toe tap and head bob to some really good jazz music. Sadly, the shop owner couldn’t tell me who the artist was and didn’t offer to eject the CD.
We strolled down towards the fish market, stopping at another Crafters’ Co-op. The crafter on duty turned out to be a Newcombe from Bath, Maine, who now lives fulltime in Georgetown. She knew all about Nova Scotia and on her last trip, visited the Newcombe Fire Department in Lunenburg County of all places. Apparently her son wasn’t overly impressed with the firehall named after his mother’s family.
We stopped at the local fish market that had barrels of sized shrimp in addition to some wonderful fresh fish. We picked up a hog fish fillet, which was delicious.
As we made our way along the Harbor Walkway, the excitement of being in the south grew as we spotted signs warning us not to feed or tease the alligators. Naturally, the remainder of the afternoon was spent looking for alligators, without success. We did find time to visit the Maritime Museum and learn about some of the local history and enjoy some of the holiday decorations.
Several people told us we “had” to have supper at the River Room Restaurant. Despite being a little more upscale than our usual dining choices, we were freshly showered and wearing clean clothes, so we thought we’d splurge. It was unusually quiet when we walked into a restaurant that got such positive reviews from the locals. It turned out, their “supper seating didn’t start until 5 pm”. Ok, first of all, we eat on our schedule not the River Room’s, and secondly, I would in all likelihood be asleep before we finished supper if we waited for the evening’s supper seating.
We opted instead to go to The Big Tuna restaurant next door. In addition to being in an old fish shack, it had cheap cold beer that came wrapped in camo coosies advertising an Attorney at Large. The door handles were old boat parts. Most choices were deep fried, so the chance of food poisoning were slim. We felt completely at home.
We had the “waterfront” room completely to ourselves until a family of 4 came in and sat down. I am guessing it was Mom and Dad, their son and one of his buddies. I almost spit beer through my nose when the conversation started with, “so Mom, what exactly happened when the gun jammed anyway?”. None of our kids have ever asked their mother that, but then again, I don’t think Judy has ever been duck hunting.
On the way back to the boat, we stopped at a local bakery that was just closing up for the holiday weekend. They did have a limited selection of cookies left for our dessert. As we chatted with the owner, she said her friends referred to the pulp mill as New York City, since it was all lit up at night. It did resemble a New York highrise on second glance.
We were leaving this quaint South Carolina town in the morning and celebrating US Thanksgiving alone, on anchor, in a creek beyond McClellanville, South Carolina.
But more about that, next time.
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