Brunswick, GA to Isle of Hope Marina, Savannah, GA, mm 590

July 2, 2016

While we were sitting on the bow yesterday evening, we saw one of the large cargo ships leaving to start its journey out in the Atlantic Ocean.  This morning, as we were headed back to the AICW, we saw another cargo ship on its way into port.  When it was at the mouth of the inlet, it was hard to tell whether or not it was moving or already docked, but soon it became apparent that we were going to pass each other.  The water around the marked shipping channel was plenty deep, so I just cruised outside of the channel until the ship passed so that the captain wouldn’t have to worry about what crazy maneuvers a recreational boater might make.

Large cargo ship headed into port

Channel markers in shipping channels are much bigger than regular marker buoys.  The line of water to the left of the buoy shows the direction of the tide current.

Since it was the busy July 4^th weekend, we had called ahead to our next several marinas to make reservations, particularly for July 4^th itself.  The first marina we had called about availability for the 4^th was booked, but we were able to get a reservation at another marina not too far away.  Today, we were headed to Isle of Hope Marina near Savannah, GA, 93 miles away.

The Garmin, left, is our primary chartplotter, but we also have Raymarine Dragonfly and run Navionics on our iPad as backups

Although our cruise was mostly the now routine salt marshes, we did have to pass across 6 inlets, which brought a welcome change of scenery from the fairly narrow grass-lined waterways.  On any weekend, the waterways near inlets are busy with boaters, but the long holiday weekend meant that there were even more cruising around, headed to and from the sandy inlet beaches.

This is a zoomed out view of our navigation chart which shows all of the inlets between Brunswick, GA, and Savannah, GA

When we crossed our last inlet of the day, it seemed like the wind kicked up a notch.  In the AICW channel, the tide was going out and seemed to be picking up speed as we got closer to our destination.  When we arrived at the marina, we had a pretty stiff current at our bow and a 15-20 mph wind at our stern.

View of the AICW from the dock at Isle of Hope Marina

Since we were docking at the end of the fuel dock which was a long face dock on the west side of the channel, we were already lined up to push against the current going in.  There was a small boat waiting to fuel and the captain thought about going in before we were docked, but then chose to wait when we got closer and he got a better look at our size.

Despite the current and wind, it was a pretty simple docking – or would have been if the dockhand had been more experienced.  Rob threw the bow line to him and instead of tying it off and then grabbing a stern line, he tried to pull us forward by hand.  The current was strong enough that this allowed the bow to swing out, making it harder to hold as the current caught more of the port side.  I had to power the bow back over while Rob got our pet netting undone from the rail opening so that he could jump onto the dock to help the dockhand.  Rob grabbed the bow line and held us on a cleat while the dockhand finally grabbed a stern line and got it tied off.

Lorelei IV docked at Isle of Hope Marina

Rob got us checked in and the lady in the office told him that we could have the marina courtesy car for the night since we were the only transient boat at the dock.  Savannah’s historic downtown was only about 7 miles away, so we drove into town.  Those of you who have been in marina courtesy cars before know that generally they are… less than perfect.  The bearing in the AC fan was going out in our car, so it sounded like a tablesaw at best but progressed to full blown sawmill status at times!  Rob finally gave up trying to fiddle with the fan speed dial since this occasionally improved the sound back to tablesaw, and we went windows down after that.

Since it was Saturday night – again on a busy holiday weekend – there was absolutely no parking unless we wanted to pay an arm and a leg for it.  We still enjoyed a quick tour by car, and then headed back to the marina since it was getting late and we still needed to cook dinner.

We generally eat most of our meals on the boat, partly to save money and partly because Rob is fairly picky about most foods.  We both like ribeye steak and have found that Sam’s Club has great ribeyes at a great price, since you can generally buy 3 nice steaks for the cost of 1 steak at a restaurant.  Rob says I grill them better than any restaurant anyways.

While we were in the midst of our preparations on the back deck, several people in the marina came to visit with us.  There were 2 guys who were also Hatteras owners who kept their boat at the marina, and 1 lady who also had a boat at the marina who was interested in getting a bigger boat and moving aboard at some point.  We always hear interesting stories about their boating history and future hopes and dreams with regard to their boats, and we usually pick up some tip or bit of knowledge.

Isle of Hope Marina