Our few months at Amelia Island Marina came to an end in April. We enjoyed our time there immensely; I’ll have to write something up on our experiences. But my insurance asks that I get North of Cumberland Island, Ga by July 1 and since our plans to head to the Bahamas in June fell through we brought Ventolines back “home”.
The trip was basically an over nighter. If all went well we would leave on a Friday with the tide and end up in Charleston about 32 hours later. We made it in 30ish.
The crew for this trip would include Keith again. But two new crew signed on Steven and Cesar; but have sailed before, just not on my boat and not offshore. We all arrived at the boat on Thursday night. Cesar and Steve bunked in the saloon/salon. Keith took the vberth and I, of course, to my cabin with awesome mattress from Charleston Mattress Company. I slept like a baby. The others, not so much.
In the morning we hit the beach diner for Breakfast. Filled up the Jerry can with diesel and then went to return the rental. I drove to the drop location; where I hoped to Uber back. Sadly, the Hertz location was closed. I called Hertz to find out what I should do. All the while I am eyeing the clock so I can leave and make the turn of the tide out of the inlet. Hertz support first tells me I have to return the car to Jacksonville airport 40 minutes away. I imagine the time lost to traffic and getting back to the marina and simply say, “No!”. “Your company did not flag this when I made a reservation and chose this as a return location; you have to deal with this.” She transferred me to someone in the US that is used to dealing with irate customers. It turns out, Hertz has pretty good customer service. That next person handled the entire issue and I simply dropped the car at the marina and they picked it up later. They also called every few hours with an update on the status. Nice.
With that out of the way, we cast off the lines and headed out of the basin. We had a pleasant trip up the ICW, past historic Fernandina Beach. I hope they get their city docks back on line soon. But they are still suffering from the last two seasons of Hurricanes.
As we approached the inlet someone started talking to us through their “load hailer”. They had guns. It turns out if you don’t respond to the CoastGuard when a sub is coming through, they give you a personal visit. But after we halted our progress they were happy
to move on to the next boat not monitoring channel 16.
Once through the inlet we took a left turn and hoisted the sails. The afternoon of sailing was fantastic. But by early evening the wind had faded and we began motor sailing.
I had a great time. The three crew did not. We lost our first person just over an hour outside the inlet. The other two got sea sick later that night when the waves shifted to our starboard aft quarter. That’s not exactly accurate. The main wave action was from that direction; but we had swell from two others that would life the boat and rattle it from side to side. With no wind to pressure the main sail it was a rocky night. That boat movement wore down everyone.
Everyone recovered by middle of the next day (save one). They pushed on with their watches. Just before we made it to Charleston harbor a front began passing through. We had 3 hours of blinding, nearly white out conditions. Thank engineers for AIS!
Ventolines is now tied up in her slip. Back in the comfortable confines of Charleston Harbor.