The Marathon from Marathon: Part 6

The Anchorages


We stayed in some beautiful anchorages along the way.  We were fortunate (most of the time) in arriving at the anchorage just before the skies opened sending down torrential rain.  Once secure at anchor, we would sit in the cockpit to watch the storms pass over, turning the skies from dark blue grey to beautiful shades of pink and orange. 

A storm passing over our anchorage just inside the Lake Worth inlet, FL.

Bud checking the anchor near Wahoo Creek, GA after the squall passed.

 

 The many changing skies as a storm passing just to the north of our anchorage off of Savannah, GA.

A storm passing our anchorage just north of Watt's Cut, SC.

Looking over south Miami from our anchorage off of Key Biscayne after navigating through the Biscayne Channel in an afternoon squall.

A double rainbow on the waters of Beaufort, SC after a series of squalls passed through.

One of our favorite anchorages just off of Watts Cut after navigating through several afternoon squalls.

When it wasn't raining at anchor, Bud would sleep in the cockpit to enjoy the cool evenings.  Despite the delightful sleeping conditions, I only joined him once because I didn't want to get eaten up by the mosquitoes and no-see-ums.  The one night that I did sleep in the cockpit, I covered myself from neck to foot with a sheet to keep the bugs off.  Unfortunately, I didn't cover my face, and it took almost a week before the bites disappeared.

Eaten alive by no-see-ums at our anchorage on Thoroughfare Creek, SC.

Keeping Close Quarters

When we couldn't find a suitable anchorage, we stopped in mooring fields and docks.  This was nice on two fronts:  Bud got much better night sleep because he didn't need to check the anchor, and we got nice hot showers.  When we were moving from anchorage to anchorage and trying to conserve water, we took sponge baths to ward off the foul odors.  To help stretch our water supply, mother-nature and geography provided a nice cool relief.  Just off of Wahoo Creek, SC, we anchored early to wait out an approaching storm and realized we could take advantage of the rain.  We grabbed the soap and shampoo, and took our first ‘rain-shower’ on Layla, using the water pooled on top of the bimini as our final rinse.  It was wonderful, especially after several sweltering days on the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW).  On one of my favorite anchorages just south of Watts Cut, SC or just off the Waccamaw River, SC in Thoroughfare Creek, I realized that the water surrounding us was fresh.  Bud got the great idea to scoop up a bucket of water on deck and clean up.  This 'bucket' shower was a refreshing end to our day along the ICW.  In some of my other favorite salt water anchorages, like just west of Bulls Bay, SC with dolphins swimming in groups of ten to fifteen, we would take a salt water bucket shower on deck and rinse with fresh water in the shower below.

We didn't take any pictures of our bucket showers, but they looked a lot like this.....