St. John's Harbor Marina, B&B Seafood and Harbour Town Marina & Resort

Sunny and hot were a LONG time ago!  We left Charleston Harbor Marina on Sunday and headed across the harbor and through two bridges on the other side of the harbor and went all of 7 miles to put us at St. Johns Harbor Marina on the Stono River.

The trip wasn't all that pleasant, it was rainy and gusting to 22 knots.

We signed up for two nights because Monday was predicted to be even worse!  Predictions were correct.  Record rain fell for most of the day.  We took advantage of the courtesy car and the "girls" headed to West Marine and Harris Teeters.  Believe it or not we spent more time in West than in Harris!  We used the car both days and were glad to get out of the soggy conditions aboard.  The trip to the car (a very long walk due to a small bridge being out of commission) was the most harrowing part of the day!  We gathered aboard Brunelle  for a communal dinner on Monday night.  Maureen made Pumpkin Soup, I did Avocado/Grapefruit salad,  Kathy brought egg rolls for appetizers and Jeanne served yummy cookies for dessert.  

We headed out early on Tuesday even thou there were a few more showers, but sun was expected by noon and did finally shine right on cue. We were one boat short because Pete had to make another quick drive back to Delaware to be there for his 89 year old mom who ended up back in the hospital. We played the current game all the way to Mosquito Creek where we tied up to B&B Seafood's dock. The current game means that for a time you might get a 1-2 knot boost from the current and then all of a sudden it's 1-2 knots against you.  The Billy B (the resident shrimp boat was out when we arrived, but came in around 4:30pm. 

Jeanne and Dan both captured the essemce and source of GREAT SHRIMP.

Another communal dinner, this time with shrimp.  Maureen remembered me making a recipe from Feast Afloat (a great cookbook I have) and I guess we recreated history having the same dish in the same place only one day short of five years later! The whole place is full of "atmosphere" but devoid of amenities, but the shrimp is fresh and reasonable.

Harbour Town Yacht Harbor is certainly a change from B&B!

We left early this morning to get to the bottom of Hilton Head Island at the Harbour Town Marina and Resort.  We had a lovely day, sunny, a little cool but no problems along the way.  We pulled into the fuel dock at the marina, fueled up and were about to head to our slip when the dock master said, "If you want to see Al Roker, he'll be over on the 18th tee at 3:00"  ...as part of his Rokerathon...doing a weather report from all fifty states in one week.  WELL  I was ready to rush right over.  As soon as we docked I dragged Maureen to go see what we could see.  We saw quite a crowd and joined it for almost half an hour before they announced he wouldn't arrive until 4:30.  We started to head back to the boats and spied a girl carrying a goat.  We didn't get that picture, but did get this one.

Something about a goat sighting contest going on.  They hope Al Roker would 'sight" their goat.
I later learned that indeed he did succeed in making this the 22nd sighting...?!?

I wasn't to be deterred by a small delay and headed out at 4:15 for the 18th tee.  I was headed off by a couple I had chatted with earlier while waiting and they said they were making everyone watch the event from across the harbor entrance.  I dutifully headed over there wishing I had taken Dan's big camera with the telephoto lens.  The wait was almost an hour and I busied myself taking other shots, but finally Al arrived and it was at the very most a waste of time but I did get a few pictures.

Al can be seen in the orange cap.

While I was waiting a was trying to see how well the zoom on my underwater camera would work...

 I learned when I got back to the boat that Pete and Kathy have decided to head home to be there for Pete's mom and take the boat back to Chesapeake.  We will definitely miss their company.

 We had a pleasant dinner out and will be saying good-by to our other two companion boats tomorrow.  We plan to head offshore tomorrow, come in at Jacksonville and end up in St. Augustine on Friday evening.  I'm guessing my next post will be from St.A.  ~~~~~~~_/)~~~~~~~~M&D