Sailing the Intracoastal Waterway

photos

We departed Savannah about 4:30 this morning. We will travel south in the ICW until we reach Brunswick, GA about 6:370 pm. It is an overcast, low cloud day. There is a lot of leftover standing water on outside decks from yesterday's torrents of rain, but it is not raining or even misting today. It is only about 60 F though and windy so not really comfortable outside for sailing. The curves and marshes of the waterway are interesting though. We saw one crabber emptying his traps. We saw a shrimp boat headed somewhere. Lots of  birds, docks, homes, boats, yachts, sailboats. We have not seen any dolphins though the Captain announced at breakfast that they were thick.PS. We did finally see a dolphin come out of a winding creek out of the grassy marsh. That was a surprise!

Speaking of breakfast, there were no menus this morning. They were promised so we could place our lunch & dinner orders but they never appeared. The kitchen will have to punt for lunch since they usually have our orders plated & ready to deliver when we sit down. That or everybody is being offered soup, salad & a cold sandwich or entree. We'll see. Last night a fellow passenger went table to table during dinner & asked everyone to order brownies for dessert tonight. I think the kitchen got wind and conspired to thwart her conspiracy.

Yesterday there was some kind of plumbing drainage issue on deck 2. We saw the men coming and going from cabins with a plumbing snake. This morning we had breakfast with a couple who said they packed all their stuff in their suitcases and then crew carried it up to an empty deck 3 cabin for them. They said they moved between 8 & 9 pm. They said 3 cabins moved. There had been 4 empty cabins up here. They said they were told after spending the day snaking and not finding the drain blockage that they'd have to bring in specialist plumbers. Presumably  before next cruise since they've told us it is sold out sailing back to Charleston.

Anne has scheduled a scavenger hunt today, it is too social for me to participate. I had expected more of an Easter egg hunt. She had a military honoring event, a future cruise booking event, we got a past passengers' cocktail party invite for 11:30 am. We don't really want cocktails and hors d'oeuvres then so I don't know about that. At 2:30 pm is round 2 of boozy charades, indoors this round. Pass. At 3:30 is another lecture by Harold on leftover topics. I hope we'll Finlay watch the DVD this afternoon. Dinner, 8 pm port overview for Brunswick, I hope , though the Ship to Shore says Savannah. 8:15 music in the lounge.

We did attend the past passengers event. Anne gave away ball caps. She said you could have a travel mug instead, so Clay took a cap & I asked for the mug. She said she'd get me one but not yet. Oh well. We had some delicious fresh brownies and I took some to the women with the write in campaign as well, so still a win. Lunch was as expected without  pre-orders. Salad, soup, turkey BLT, patty melt or portobello melt. Berries in champagne or ice cream for dessert. After lunch, we spotted the 2nd bald eagle of the day and a big cluster of dolphins.

We did watch a Bruce Willis movie this afternoon. We hadn't seen it before. The Prince, no idea why the  title, but Bruce's role was almost a cameo. It was engaging though violent. We are docked on the port side in Brunswick, Ga at 5:10 pm, so ahead of schedule. It has been misting with lower visibility all afternoon, so we were glad to stay inside. There was a party of porpoises dockside to welcome us to Brunswick. It doesn't look like there is anything of interest in walking distance of our dock.

We are here until 3 am on Friday. Tomorrow we had a choice of a $45 Tour to St. Simons Island, or $15 transportation only, or Sea Turtle Center & Jekyll Island Tour for $50 and a $50 shrimp boat experience. We chose the $15 morning transportation only. Based on tomorrow's hourly morning forecast we'll hope to miss the rain but carry rain gear. Clay is signed up for the shrimp boat. They've been warned to wear dirty clothes! He has high expectations. I expect a quiet afternoon alone with perhaps a nap.

In other news, Flickr sent me an email saying they are deleting the photos from free storage accounts like mine effective sometime in January. I currently have over 3500 photos linked or embedded in my blogs there. I have my work cut out for me over the holidays for sure now!

I'll post this now assuming no surprises.

photos