GEORGETOWN HARBOR, SAMPIT RIVER, GEORGETOWN, SC

10 December, 2004. Georgetown was not kind to us. When we left Barefoot Landing, we knew we were going to run into thunderstorms. The rain came at us pretty hard but we just beared it. It occurred to me that our mast was a 30 foot lightning rod above the boat but god chose not to smite us on this day (yet). The weather finally cleared and we changed into some dry clothes. Shortly before we arrived at Georgetown, it began to drizzle. Then the wind picked up. The waves had risen to one foot, then two, then three, then four. We battled the four foot waves, some of them rising to five feet. The boat was taking a beating and I genuinely feared for our safety. We launched over some of the five foot waves and our bow came all the way down underwater. A Coast Guard helicopter hovered overhead. We finally made it under the fixed bridge just before Georgetown and turned into the harbor where we anchored. The Skipper Bob book gave fairly low marks for holding (an anchor) which was verified in the middle of the night as we found ourselves up against another boat, tangled in their mooring line. We decided to attach to one of the mooring balls, unsure if someone was going to come and collect money for it. At that point, we didn't care. Fortunately, noone ever did try to collect for the mooring.

We dinghyed to shore and right behind us came Lisa and Joyce, who we met in Elizabeth City, NC. They were going for ice cream so we joined them. They had emailed us the day before, after reading our blog, and told us not to miss the shrimp dock in Georgetown. Rocky and I picked up 2 lbs. of medium shrimp for $4.39/lb. just before leaving there. That was probably the freshest shrimp I ever ate. When we were at the ice cream shop, I ran across the street to the ATM and couldn't believe who was sitting in front of the bank- it was Barbara and Peter, who we met at the Alligator River Marina. I told Barbara we were going to pick up some more rocket fuel and that we'd probably see them again. They were docked at a marina a few miles away and had just come into town for some supplies. I took an expensive cab ride to the post office while Rocky cleaned up the mess from our five foot waves encounter. There was a health club on the waterfront that charged $5 for a day's use of their facilities. I told the girl at the counter that we just wanted to take showers and she said she couldn't charge us just for showers so let us in for free. On our way out, she said that her boss had come in and she had to charge us the $5 each. We had bilge pump problems here, too, which Rocky fixed in the middle of the night. Even when we stopped at the gas dock on our way out, we had to rouse the gas attendant from his houseboat. Georgetown also stunk from a factory right next to the harbor. We will never go back to Georgetown, SC.