d&b kayak

Yes, we made it through the GA wilderness and are spending the night on Saint Simons island in the King and Prince resort. This is amazing after 5 days in the wilderness. They contacted us and offered us a great rate so we could not pass on the opportunity. Thanks for the help! Here is what happened to get us to this relaxed state…

The night before leaving Tybee Island we had a great meal with Dale and his Family, then headed over to hear a presentation by Jeff Alan, who along with Mark Schoon, is paddling around Scandinavia. We were curious to hear about this adventure because oddly enough Mark Schoon was the first kayaker to help us out in our journey. When our tent poles broke in down east Maine we had them shipped to his house in Bar Harbor and he delivered them to us. Sadly, we arrived after Jeff Alan presentation had started . Oh well, we did get to say hi and get to meet some other kayakers from around the country and globe such as Hadas Feldman from Israel and Cheri Perry and Turner Wilson from New England. Its always encouraging to meet people who are as excited about the experience of paddling as we are!

The next morning as we were getting everything ready, we busted another skeg cable… $40 dollars and an hour later we were back in business. Bethany and I are notorious for damaging our skeg cables and this was the first time we ever had to buy one so thanks to all the other paddle shops for free skeg cables along the way, we did not realize how expensive they were!

Dale dropped us off at the water and we had a leisurely paddle to the south tip of little Tybee island. We spent the afternoon fishing and relaxing but then the wind dropped and we were covered with little no-seeums. Ahh I think I almost scratched my legs off just in the few minutes it took us to get inside the tent…

The next morning the wind and the wave forecast was picking up so we decided to paddle on the inside behind wassaw island. After paddling the length of the island we had another sound to “jump” over. GA sounds are infamous for being sketchy places due to the high tides that GA has. Whenever you have a strong current meeting the ocean swell it makes for some fun times… And the Ossabow sound was no exception. We made it across safely but not with ease and back to the intracoastal waterway. As the sun began to set we once again realized that we just were not going to be able to make it to our intended marsh campsite so upon seeing a sign for a Marina we decided to head in there and seek shelter. They said no lodging for 15 miles but they would let us set up our tent for the night… Just another buggy night in GA.

Awaking to south winds we struggled along for 5 miles but quickly realized that there was just no hope of crossing the Saint Catherine’s sound on a day like that so we set up a small campsite on a marsh island. Caught some fish, read and had a nice relaxing time.

After a great nights sleep, the north winds were blowing and we zipped along all the way passed Sapalo island were we were planning on staying in a small cabin in the marsh thanks to Danny of Altamaha Coastal Tours. He offered to let us stay on the island if the timing worked out and was also a wealth of information about the GA coast. However, the day we arrived there were some other folks staying there. As the sun began to set and we had almost made it to our campsite for the night, a power boat zipped along side of us and Ashton told us he was staying in the cabin, and to come stay with him for the night. Sounded great so we turned around and pulled up to a small cabin in the marsh. We spent the night learning about the island and having a good time eating steak and shrimp! Thanks so much Ashton for letting us interrupt your fishing trip!

Once again we woke up to north winds. Awesome. We paddled our way down to Saint Simons island and got picked up at a Marina by the King and Prince Resort. I wish every island that we pulled up to provided us with such luxuries. Upon arriving we realized that we needed a rest day and decided to stay two nights.

So here we are having a great day and preparing to head on to FL! If the south wind dies down we should be there by the weekend! I cannot tell you how excited we will be to reach the “Key West State.”

P.S. We also just wanted to say thanks to all the folks who helped us plan our journey down the GA Coast. Thanks Nigel from Savannah Canoe and Kayak, Danny from Altamaha Coastal Tours, Dale and Debbie, and Michael of SouthEast Adventure

We made it to GA a few days ago. What a good feeling. I can only IMAGINE what it will feel like to make it to the Florida border.

So here’s what happened from Charleston to Tybee Island:

We left Lance and Tracy’s house to paddle from James Island to the end of Folly Beach. It was a gray and gloomy day but we made it there with smiles. Lance picked us up near the bridge and we stayed one last night with them. The next morning we left from Folly Beach and headed out oceanside to Edisto Beach. It was a really nice day to paddle. The seas were calm and we enjoyed paddling the whole time. We arrived at Edisto Beach State Park tired but happy. Normally we are hesitant to land at State and National Parks due to past experiences BUT this place was great. The ranger who we met helped us carry our boats from the beach to his pickup truck, (already amazingly kind and helpful in comparison to other experiences)  and he even went and got a different pickup when he realized just how LONG our kayaks are. We were dumbfounded by the kindness since it hasnt been like that since WAY back in Maine at Reid State Park.  He set us up in a campsite very close to beach access. Our neighbors and another couple from the campground were cooking up a huge meal and they invited us to join them. We dined on steak, pork, onions and potatoes, cornbread, and fresh caught shark. It was an all around great evening.

The next morning we woke up to MORE food from our neighbors. Jason and his family are from Augusta GA and he owns a custom motorcycle business, Southern Cycleworks  with really really REALLY nice handmade custom choppers. He has no website and seems to be against the internet altogether but if you are interested in sweet bikes, find him in Augusta. I doubt you’d be disappointed. We were enjoying the campfire and breakfast and new friends when the sky opened up and the entire Atlantic Ocean seems to be pouring down on us for a long while. Dan and I ran for our tent and waited it out. We were crushed to see little puddles of water sneaking in our wonderful tent. Apparently, after using our tent as a HOME for the past 4 months since we got it last May, the waterproofing had weakened (combined with a awful campsite selection) and we were in a wet tent. Not good. Ill forgive the tent of that since its been wet in a kayak more than its even been dry and these things happen. It was a pretty depressing blow though at the time. We had wet clothes, wet sleeping bags, wet thermarests and so on and so forth. I needed a full hour at least to come to grips with it all. Finally the rain let up and we dried our clothes at another neighbors campfire and talked with him about life and everything else under the sun. The rain continued all day. It was pretty hard to stay positive. Atleast we got to dry a few things out before we went to sleep that night.

The next morning, our friends from the Shark dinner two nights before were on the beach to wave goodbye to us. It was fun. We left Edisto Beach and headed to the St Helena Sound.  It was a really wide sound and we had to work to get across it. The currents were annoying as well as the fact that it was STILL gloomy outside. We paddled all day long and when the sun was setting we were still 10 miles away from our destination on a deserted island. We were hearing booms all day too coming from Paris Island but we didn’t know that was where they were coming from at the time. We decided to find a backup plan since we didn’t want to accidentally camp in a military bombing range… nor did we want to paddle 10 more miles. From the marsh, we called the Fripp Island Marina. Nate answered the phone and said “Let me call you back.” We waited and he called back and said “Come on in!” Relief. We paddled to the Fripp Island Marina and when we arrived, the Fripp Island Patrol arrived with us. Apparently Nate found out that it was absolutely NOT ok for us to camp there but since we were already there and the sun was almost gone, Fripp’s Island had to find something to do with us. Oops.  The Patrol officer, with his brown leather belt and shiny gun, decided the best thing to do with us was take us to the fire station. We camped out behind the station for the night… trying not to think about what had happened only a week earlier to a man there: Gator bites off man’s arm on Fripp Island!

We survived the evening and got to the boat launch by 6:15 am thanks to the Fripp Island Patrol. Unfortunately it was still pitch black dark outside. We hung out until around 7:30am and then paddled on towards Hilton Head. We had suspicions that our nephew was going to be born that day for unknown reasons and called Dan’s older brother William from the marshes. We found out that Jamie was in labor and Charlie, (our nephew) was on his way! I have never wanted to be back home more than that moment. The rest of the day we were checking our phone for a text message or a call letting us know we had a nephew born. It was so STRESSFUL! The paddle was wet, cold, rainy and long NOT to mention we were on pins a needles about the action back home. A we crossed the Port Royal Sound, we had to fight the whole way. Wind and waves and current were all not in our favor and it took us almost an eon to get across that thing. Exhausted! We pulled up to the Skull Creek Marina and asked if we could keep our boats there. Unbeknownst to us, Hilton Head is FULL of gated communities and Skull Creek turned us away on the grounds that it was nearly impossible to get to the place by car unless you lived there. That’s a good reason. They did give Dan a donut. The next place we stopped was simply because we saw 3 kayaks headed there, and then we saw kayak racks. Turns out it was the storage for Outside Hilton Head. Sarah, who was guiding a trip that cold wet rainy day called her “higher ups” and they gave us the go-ahead. Sarah even helped us load our heavy boats on the racks and offered us a place to stay if our planned place fell through. (Which it most definitly did not as you will read about in a moment). Cold and wet, we called Sally and Danny and they came to pick us up on a moment’s notice.

William Charles Cox the III was born that night around 10:00 pm.  6lbs, 1 oz. Totally Rad.

We stayed at Sally and Danny’s for 2 nights. It was wonderful. Talk about resting and relaxing…. we ate like kings and queens. We enjoyed a tour of Hilton Head. We watched a funny movie. We seam sealed our poor tent. We read books. We planned for our GA leg of the trip. We enjoyed good conversation. We got to go shopping for warm clothes and more since it was so darn COLD. We also stopped by Outside Hilton Head to thank them as well as get some beta for paddling in FL. We were really surprised when they gave us each a camelback water bottle for free! I’ve ALWAYS wanted one and Dan has always said “Im not paying that much for a water bottle!” Ha. They are really expensive as far as water bottles go and we were really overwhelmed. SO…. clearly…. we had a great time in Hilton Head with Sally and Danny.

Danny dropped us off at the water near 8:00am and waved goodbye. As we stood in the cold after he left, we realized that the 20-25 knt wind combined with the 40 degree temps did not make for a good day to paddle. We only had long underwear and rain gear since we had mailed all of our cold weather paddling gear home in NYC. We had some trouble deciding but we finally chose to call a cab and stay in a hotel for the night. It just made sense and everything is much cheaper now that it is the offseason! We actually got a ride from the same guy who turned us away at the Skull Creek Marina 2 days before! It was a good day of doing absolutely NOTHING.

The NEXT morning, take two, we left from Hilton Head and paddled on to Tybee Island, GA. Since it was still a bit windy, we went the conservative way on the backside rather than out on the ocean. It made our trip MUCH longer but we just aren’t dressed for immersion right now in the colder weather. (YOU BETTER BE WARMER FLORIDA!) The paddle was rather non-descript other than an alligator sighting and… crossing the Georgia border! Good times.

Dale picked us up and we had a yummy dinner with his family and then long talks over GA charts about the best way to approach the paddle.

We are actually here on Tybee the same time as a seakayak symposium. Dale offered to let us stay a few days and meet some of the paddlers. Even though we aren’t participating in the event, due to the cost of participating it is still fun to hang out with fellow paddlers!  Fun! We leave to paddle south again tomorrow morning.

This is where the planning ended…

In Myrtle Beach, Steve T. and his family took us in for the night. It was an unforgettable stop because Steve took us to the heart of Myrtle Beach Bike Week. It was over the TOP. I had no idea what biker culture was like really and we got to go to 5 biker bars that night, taking it ALLLLLL in. We witnessed tire burn outs, old school bikers, new school bikers, nudity, hells angel wannabe’s, the burn-out king, an AC/DC cover band, and santa. It was absolutely overwhelming and crazy. Thanks for taking us Steve! Now we can say we’ve been to biker bars.  Oh and Stephen cooked us an amazing breakfast the morning we left.

The next day we paddled down the Waccamaw river to Pawley’s Island. The river was a new environment for us and was a nice change from the normal beach scenery. Once we arrived Kat picked us up at the Reserve Harbor Yacht Club because they very kindly let us keep our boats there overnight. Kat is a dear friend of the Foy’s who let us stay at their beach house for the night, even though  they were out of town. We ate a really yummy dinner and slept well.

Paddling away from Reserve Harbor was tough mostly because we knew we were headed towards camping for a few days AND it was gray, chilly, and rainy. We paddled rather cheerfully for hours until we rounded the corner into Winyah Bay. The wind and rain really picked and the bay begun to get choppy. Thankfully the guys at the Yacht club had let us know about a campsite on a really small island right in the middle of the bay. We decided not to head all the way out to the ocean and made it to that little tiny campsite just as everything got worse weather wise. Thank goodness. We curled up in our tent, snacked on trail mix, and looked up a bed and breakfast for the next evening on our blackberry.

The next day was filled with nothingness. Boring. hot. slow. ugh… one of those days that it’s hard to remember much at all about the paddle other than time passing slowly. We made it to McClellansville tired and called the Cape Romain B&B that we had looked up the night before. Jim, one of the innkeepers, came and picked us up at the boat ramp and took us back to the inn. We met his wife Marianne and later his son Joe (Jr.) and his lovely girlfriend. We enjoyed a filling tasty dinner and shared lots of stories with eachother of “peril” on the water. It was really fun.  Joe and Marianne actually offered to let us stay at no charge for the night. We could not have asked for more. It was a perfect recharge after such a lame night before and a hard slow boring day of paddling.

It was a good thing we slept so well at Joe and Marianne’s because the following day we paddled hard all day against wind and current to get to Caper’s Island to meet Clyde Carter and the Brevard College Immersion Group that was out for a week seakayaking. I (bethany) went to Brevard College for my undergrad and went on this same type of trip in 2005 and Clyde was my professor. I also had the opportunity to co-lead the trip 4 more times after I graduated. We had been trying to make it to Capers in time to meet up with the group for over a month and it was the best feeling to finally make it to our long awaited waypoint on the gps after so much anticipation. It was so fun to see all the students and participate in the learning process. We got to hear a lesson on yeast baking (which i was assigned to teach when I was a student) as well as a lesson on firebuilding. We had a blast. Clyde Carter is probably my #1 role model in my life after my own father, (who is awesome as well….). I just cant tell you how much it meant to be able to make this happen.

We paddled with them the following day until our paths diverged and we headed on to James Island in Charleston. The paddle was upbeat and we enjoyed following winds and current. Not bad at all. When we finally landed though, I was exhausted, even slicing my heel on an oyster shell getting out of my boat. Not fun. My old friend from college, Lance Elzie, came to pick us up and let us stay with them for the weekend. Lance gave me my first kayak paddle and really was very influential to me in my first kayaking years, not to mention now. He even helped me pick out the boat I am using for THIS trip. His wife, Tracy is an incredible photographer who takes amazing shots. You can check out her blog at Tracy Turpen Photography. You will love it too. Trust me.

We have been taking a break here in Charleston for the past few days. The highlight of our break was when we got to meet Tom of Habitat Crew. He is ROWING a SAILBOAT from Cleavland Ohio, to Key West, Florida! You read that right. He is in Charleston taking a break too and we were able to meet up for dinner. Tom is so wonderfully laid back and has the same outlook on life it seems that we do. He invited us on his boat for a little while, made us some “boat oats” and then we went to Hyman’s Seafood for dinner. We had a great time swapping storied about our adventures and the common things that we have experienced on our journey’s. It’s not often you get to meet someone having the same type of experiences and someone who understands what a trip of this nature is like. We couldn’t get enough of him. If you have a place for him to dock his sail/row boat from here to key west, email him at rowforhabitat@gmail.com (and you can email us too if youve got a place to stay for that matter)

So… off to more southern shores tomorrow. Had a great last week or so.

whew! we have made it to state #12. feel free to celebrate with us by doing a little jig in your computer chair.

((jig))

ok. now that the nonesense is over, here’s the story of how we got here from Morehead City, NC:

Mom dropped us off early morning in Morehead City. As we were packing our boats, we realized that we had left our power chagers and extra batteries at home! Whoops. Mom made sure to send it next day to Bonnie in Wrightsville Beach so it would be waiting for us when we got there in a few days. We then paddled to Swansboro with no problems. We landed at Barrier Island Kayaks, greeted by its owner Lamar. He took care of us and helped us fix our boats up. We headed over to Cedar Point Campground and got out everything to cook dinner and realized that we were missing our Snow Peak stove. Good Grief! Pizza delivery night.

The next day we paddled down the ICW through the Military base. Since we have a history with Military bases, we were nervous. It worked out thank goodness. The ICW was open for transit and we made it through with no trouble. We made it to the New River Inlet and camped for the night.

Things got interesting the next day. We paddled on south and near the end of our paddling day, we ran into a looming thundercloud. Yikes. We pulled up to a landing in Holly Ridge, NC. We got into lightning position on our PFD’s a good distance from one another and settled in to wait out a yucky storm. As if on cue, a man and a poodle pulled up in an old truck. There was a decal on the side of the truck that said “Stump Sound Campground.” um… GOD HUG. He offered to take us back to his house so we could wait out the storm and meet his lovely wife, Martha. We hopped in Preston’s car, next to his poodle Rascal and headed to safety. We actually ended up camping there, eating dinner with them, AND heading out to breakfast the following morning. It was a fine development out of a very gloomy storm. Something along the lines of “Trail Magic”…

After our very very good breakfast, we were able to paddle all the way to Wrightsville Beach, even through wind and rain. Who knew that a bacon egg and cheese biscut could fuel that much positive energy? Sopping wet at the Bridge Tender Marina, we called Bonnie, one of Dan’s friends from college. She came and rescued us. We had dinner and crashed around 8pm.

We took the next day off and enjoyed relaxing. Bonnie took us out to Red Robin, which hit the spot like nothing else could. We also bought a new camp stove, the MSR Pocket rocket at the Wilmington store of Great Outdoor Provision Company. Whew.

The following morning we woke up to a homecooked breakfast keeping warm in the oven, cooked by Bonnie before she headed off to work. Bonnie’s Bed and Breakfast? I would recommend staying. It’s pretty exclusive though. We were very happy. Bonnie came back with our forgotten chargers and batteries and we were off to the marina to get back on the water. The paddle was slow because we were going against the tide almost the whole way, especially 1 mile north of Snows Cut in Carolina Beach… one mile, one hour. ugh. Thankfully, Ethan, a member of Christian Surfers, picked us up in his new truck, (which we promptly dented  with our boats… major oops)(SORRY ETHAN). He cooked us a yummy meal and we slept like babies with the ocean breeze coming in out windows.

Carolina Beach to Oak Island might have been one of the easiest paddles of the trip. Gotta love days like that right? We pulled up just north of the Oak Island bridge at the South Harbor Marina and my great Aunt and Uncle came and picked us up. We enjoyed a night of Country Club life watching my 85 yr old great uncle break it down on the dance floor, and enjoy some fun karaoke. I was tempted to partake but could not think of a song to sing. (Any good ideas for future times?) We slept well again and then ate a great breakfast the following morning.

Our next place to stay was offered to us via a man named Michael, who found out about our trip voa the Great Outdoor Provision Company Blog! He offered us his beach house in Holden Beach. Once we got there, we met him and his brother Louis, all of whom are huge NC State fans. We felt like we were back at home. (Although we are Duke fans, we understand the hometown sports love). . . Michael took us out to eat at Provisions, which is world famous… atleast it should be. Michael was great to talk to as well as a thoughtful host, not to mention a paddler himself, having paddled a lot of the water around the area. He had good information to offer us about the upcoming days. 

The next morning we set off rather early and… it was chilly. Hopefully that’s not a sign of things to come. We thought we had left that behind up in New England. We waved goodbye to Michael and headed south towards Little River, South Carolina. We paddled past the floating bridge to Sunset Beach and soon got to South Carolina! (what a fabulous feeling let me tell you…) The paddle was nice, the weather was nicer, and we made it to the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club with smiles on our faces. Capt. Charlie and Marianne, my Aunt in-laws, let us use their slip there, and also took us in to stay with them. We went to church with them and met the Kanoy’s, who prayed blessings over us and made me cry… like i always do when people pray for me like that. It was a sweet moment.

We have been resting here today, taking a good rest day before the push ahead towards Charleston… It’s been fun so far.