To shake down the boat after its long sequester at Ross Marine, we wanted to make a trip off shore. Nothing more than a day or so. The first opportunity would be around the end of December
for the Christmas break afforded for school and in my case work. But we needed to get back for just after the new year, since, well, work and school.
Amelia Island looked to be the perfect spot. I bit more than 24 hours (should have been around 30-35 hours) down the coast. There were a few places we could have bailed out should the weather turn nasty once out the relatively safe confines of Charleston Harbor. Places such as Beaufort, SC, Hilton Head, Savannah Ga and Brunswick, GA all have entrances that are some w
hat maintained. They all could provide some refuge before we arrived to the well maintained commercial/military inlet of Fernandina.
We intended to leave with the turn from high tide, but circumstances conspired to prevent us from being on the boat and underway. So we got a late start but did not suffer any ill current because of it. I may have finally started liking having that bow thruster, as it made dealing with the current grabbing my bow somewhat trivial.
We still managed to flow out of Charleston with the tide and before long we had sails up close hauled to our destination. The new Schaefer furler worked smoothly as expected, with roller furling main equally so. Outside the harbor with full sail and 12 knots of breeze it was a bit chilly. We countered the temp change with inserting the vinyl enclosure panels around the cockpit.
It was both Jennifer’s and Wyatt’s first time offshore. I wondered how they would handle it. Both did exceptionally well. We had a watch schedule of couples to start. Jennifer and I had the first watch; Keith and Dacia Schrecengost had the second. We chose 4 on 4 off and just for the over night; starting at 8pm. The first watch was me by myself, as Jenni
fer stayed with Wyatt to help him sleep. She actually stayed on watch with Keith after hours ended.
The night was absolutely perfect. We made progress of about 5 knots over ground and the sky was clear and cloudless. Once out of the effects of light noise from the coast, the starts and meteors came out to shine. Its one of the things I relish offshore, night passages where the boat does the work and I can relax. So I did.
Off watch, I was not able to get much sleep. This is often the case for me the first night or too out. Since this was supposed to be a day and a half sail, I wouldn’t get much sleep.
The next day was uneventful until the Racor decided it had enough crap from my tanks and clogged up. Luckily the previous owner had extend the hoses enough on the Racor to pull it into the cabin to deal with. For $5 more he could have extended it to the door of the engine compartment so you could change it easily. Oh well. One of several things identified on this trip to address (which was the point of the trip). After the change and bleeding the injectors we were back to motor sailing, for about 2 hours. The engine died.
After changing the filter the first time, I switched to my second tank. I have two 40 gallon tanks. According to the fuel gauge it had 20 gallons in it. When the engine died I thought we had two tanks fouled with crud. Luckily, the wind picked up substantially, to 20 knots so we could make progress. The sea state had picked up with it and I didn’t feel like dealing with the Racor then; since messing with diesel in the cabin on a rocking boat isn’t quite my favorite past time.
When I came on watch I found the bad news. The wind had shifted to exactly where we wanted to go and we where having trouble tacking starboard. We were basically 
sailing 15 miles east and west to get 2 or 3 miles south. All night, taking and course changes make for noisy sleeping conditions. So no rest again. I started feeling the pressure to get into port for Christmas… My son was not happy at the prospect of being at sea another night.
As fortune would have it, we got a small reprieve and the wind shift enough for us to sail south. But the wind would have to change for us to be able to sail into the inlet. It did not. So with a dead engine, possibly from a clogged Racor and not wanted to short take 
through rip-rap jetties I made the call. To Tow BoatUS. About 7 miles from the mouth of the inlet. And who should arrive, but Santa himself. A red sleigh, uh, double engine Rib with a white bearded tow boat operator. He had us in by 1pm or so and Christmas was saved.
I still had the return trip to think about, so after Christmas I turned to the Racor, but this time attached to a calm dock. It was clean. Both fuel gauges showed adequate diesel. Could the tanks have been so fouled that debris dislodged and clogged my lines? Crap. I called Southeast Tank Services (setankservices.com), and they could not do it until Thursday; two days after I wanted to leave. I would miss the better of the weather windows.
Thursday arrived and they got there sometime need 4pm. They have a set of machinery that filters and some what jet washes the tanks. It will clean what is in the tanks to 1 micron. Nice.
The first tank was nearly full. The gauge matched the amount left. But it was exceptionally dirty. Two hours later it was nearly pristine, when a small tragedy struck. The jet slipped out of the hole it was in and spayed diesel around my cabin. Nothing soft received a coating luckily, maybe a few papers out on the Nav desk. But it took quarts of simple green and lots of oil absorbent towels to get it all; if we did. It will take months for us to get the diesel smell out. But, it was an accident. They did the best to make it right by cleaning and cleaning. They also refused to take any compensation.
After that small disaster they moved on to the other tank. But when they opened it up, it was empty. Not completely empty, just no fuel. What it did have was large, crusty, black deposits. The fuel gauge was stuck, though. with crusty deposits. He couldn’t clean it with no fuel in it. He offered to drive up to Charleston in a few weeks to clean it for free.
Other than the diesel spray to the cabin. I have to say the diesel does clean up interior wood trim nicely. These guys were professionals and provided customer service I don’t often see. At all steps of the process they explained what was happening and how it works. When they discovered things that didn’t look right, they pointed it out and if they couldn’t fix it suggested how we could. Now that doesn’t seem like much, as it should be the baseline for all service professionals. But I have noticed the trend today that you either have to pull the information out of most workers, they won’t volunteer it. So its refreshing to get the level of professionalism and service provided by a company like Southeast Tank Services (setankservices.com).
This set us up to leave with one full, clean tank ( I also added 10 gallons to the dry tank so that it could start agitating those deposits). One problem, we were past the window we needed to motor the ICW. We would need 4 days at a minimum, accounting for tides and running aground in Georgia. That left us the offshore option, but with a front bearing down we would have to wait and see the conditions. According to predict wind we would have one day of westerlies after the front passed; but they would be light to nothing. This would be followed the next day by 25 to 30 on the nose for a final day of beating into sloppy seas left over from the passing storm. It was a short window and required everything to go perfect to make it into harbor by midnight the second night. Not the best. This is one of the problems with making these passages and still having a job. I don’t have open ended windows to wait for the weather I want.
So I left the boat in Amelia Island and drove home. Thirty plus hours by sea in a sailboat, was accomplished in 3 hours with a car.