Quick backtrack. After I posted the blog on that lovely warm day in Beaufort, we went out for supper to celebrate Tom's birthday (early). We lucked into a really great spot called Aqua. Sort of an American tapas bar. Great fish, scallops, Kobe beef, a nifty bento box, grits (I loves grits), fresh tuna, and a creme brulee that nearly killed the boys. Go there if you're ever in Beaufort, NC. (In SC, there's also a Beaufort, but it's pronounce "Bewfurt.")

After Beaufort, we motored to Mile Hammock Bay. (The boat is just our damp motor home these days - the sails are basically fashion accessories. Good thing diesel prices are okay in this part of the country, about $2.25 or so a gallon. If you've got one of the mega motor yachts that fly by us on a regular basis, that might not be a comforting thought, but since we travel on average at about 7 knots, we burn a gallon an hour, and we put-put for about 8 hours a day, so we don't break the bank.) Nice quiet little cove, with about 10 other boats. Just an anchorage, no civilization to speak of unless you count the constant Warthogs and helicopter traffic from nearby Camp LeJeune, the largest Marine training base on the East Coast.

For the next day, the captain's log reads "Hairy ride through New River Inlet, heavy current, many shoals. Delayed by two bridge openings, several speed bumps." The speed bumps were the shoals . In Nova Scotia, it would be "crunch" - here it's an odd "bump, lurch, lift, plow, speed up and carry on." And repeat every hundred feet or so until you pass the inlet that's shovelling all the sand in from the ocean side. Resist the urge to go below and pour a drink.

So welcome to South Carolina. It's a lot like North Carolina, but NC might be better because it doesn't have Myrtle Beach. Both states have miles and miles of new construction on the canal and the beaches. It all looks pretty much the same, and it's almost all empty this time of year.

We tied up at "Dock Holidays" in North Myrtle Beach. A couple of weeks ago, Tom decided it was time for him to go home and visit his girlfriend, and his flight left from Charleston. When he booked it, that's where we hoped we'd be, but we landed a bit short. No problem, we'll rent a car, we said, and drive to Charleston, which is what we did, but whoo doggies, what a peck o' trouble it is trying to do business when you don't have a phone, a car, or a fixed address.

There are almost no functioning pay telephones anywhere in this part of the state. Not in restaurants, on the dock, in stores. There was a Hooters about a half-mile from the marina, and in desperation, I wandered through it, trying to get someone's attention and ask about a phone. No one was looking at me. I finally got a cheerleader/waitress to make eye contact and tell me "no ma'am" about the phone question, so I got the hell out. Tom said I should have asked for a job application.

I tried two other restaurants, and finally got a pay phone at the grocery store a mile from the marina. That was where we finally sorted out the car rental the next day, although we did have to go into the store to get a phone book. Trying to find a rental outfit that would come and pick us up was a challenge, given that taxi rides to and from rental offices at the Myrtle Beach airport would have tripled the cost of the car rental.

After a couple of months on board, we'd managed to forget that Cell Phones Rule the World. I went into the ladies washroom at the marina, and noted another pair of shoes in the stall next to me. The toilet flushed, and then a woman's voice said Rally? or Reely? or something like that, so I figured she thought I was her friend, and I said, um, no. And then she said, so they pulled you over, did they? And I thought, what the hell? She stayed in the stall, and the one-sided conversation continued until I left the room. She couldn't stand up and pull her pants up because she was holding her cell phone. Could the person on the other end hear the toilet flush, I wondered? At a gas station on our way back from Charleston, a zaftig and voluble blond with real big hair got out of her red BMW and talked non-stop to the air in front of her face all the way to pay for her gas, and back to her car. We assumed an earpiece. It was surreal.

Also surreal was the outlet mall across the road from the Walmart where we got the car. Shop, shop, shop, til you barf, it's Christmas, y'all! Walmart every four or five miles, Hooters every two or three miles, discount beach wear and tourist trash every quarter mile (Ladies bathing suits - $29.95!! Sunglasses - 25 cents!! - TShirts - 10 for $12!!!!), enough franchise restaurants to seriously alter the size of your butt and those of all your friends and family, more golf courses than you can shake a stick at, funlands, miniature golf, superslides, Nascar theme parks, lawyers offices, fireworks stores, Food Lions, Harris Teeters, and the occasional Piggly Wiggly, and some ugly stuff too. The whole Grand Strand made us feel as if we were too much in the world, and we were very happy to relinquish the Hyundai rental, get back to the boat with lots of supplies and get the hell out of there.

Myrtle Beach people were really nice though. Except maybe at Hooters.

But we did deliver Tom successfully to the Charleston airport on Monday morning, and after a long day of backtracking two and a half months of sailing and motoring, he made it back to Halifax. He's happy to be home, but tells me it's cold there. Ha! We expect to see him again onboard sometime in January.

Next stop, Georgetown, SC, which we'd driven past coming and going on our way to the airport. We saw a really big turtle, actually just his head, swimming up the Waccamaw River. At first we thought it was a snake, but thank you, no, it was a turtle. We anchored in the small harbour, and in the morning, launched the dinghy without Tom's help (we felt so self-sufficient - there are things that are so much easier when you're 6'3" and have no creaky bits, but the oldsters managed in any case) and had a wander round town looking for exotic stuff like a propane fill-up. No luck. We did get a hose and some washers, but like most everywhere else, the library and the post office have moved out to mall land, and the Myrtle Beach postcards are still in my pocket.
At the hardware store, they had an incredible array of hunting and fishing supplies. Our very favourite thing, and we've seen a lot of camo baby clothes in the last month or so, was a camouflage cell phone holder. Made my day.

We're currently holed up at the Isle of Palms Marina. Left an anchorage at Awendaw Creek early this morning, and that was a weird night. It was a current against the wind situation, and we skated around as the wind changed direction and the tide turned, and you just never knew what you'd see when you looked out the port. Anchor held just lovely though, and we spotted an American Oystercather (bright red bill) and I thought I saw an alligator, but I really can't say for sure. Lots of big sticks in these parts.

We'd hoped to spend the afternoon in Charleston, but the Ben Sawyer Bridge at the entrance to Charleston doesn't open in winds over 25 mph, and they were honking at about 40 during our approach and it was pouring rain just to add some atmosphere, so we turned in at Isle of Palms, and Randy executed a tricky bit of driving in strong winds and current, and got some admiring nods from the dock audience. There's always fellas hanging about with a keen eye for disaster.

Tonight it's hot showers, Pussers, the IPod is jazzing the place up, and I might even indulge in laundry. Then, south again. We could be in St Augustine in about 8 days, so get those cards and letters in the mail today!