Cabot Lyman, the owner of Lyman-Morse, had some advice for us way back in August. If friends want to visit, he said, tell them they can pick a time or a place, but not both.

In other words, don’t count on us being anywhere at a particular time. We simply don’t know when weather or illness or boat problems will monkey with our itinerary.

Latest example of this phenomenon is happening right now. We’re in Fernandina Beach, Florida, where we were towed (again!) to the Amelia Island Yacht Basin after our engine conked out on us (again!).

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After pushing to get to Charleston for Thanksgiving, including our first overnight passage since New York City to Cape May — we were rewarded with a fantastic four days there. We had some great food (including Magnolias, Cru Café, Hominy Grill, CO, Basil) and were, once again, unabashedly touristy, taking a horse-drawn carriage tour of the city and visiting Boone Hall, a nearby plantation. We also took care of some more mundane items: haircuts (just trims, really) for me, Soren, and Elsa, and some re-provisioning at the local Harris Teeter grocery store.

Here are some images from our time there:

Beautiful vernacular architecture.

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…is how a fellow sailor we met described the Intracoastal Waterway (“ICW”). After our action-packed week visting family, friends, and historical sites in Washington, DC, it took about a week to get back into the groove aboard EXIT. There were days coming down the Chesapeake when we were the only boat that we could see which, along with the cold and rainy weather, contributed to a sense that we were late making our way south.

Reaching down Chesapeake Bay (by ourselves).

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We made it through the first section of the ICW and then sailed overnight to Charleston, SC – all of which Drew is preparing to tell you about in a blog update. In the meantime, here’s a tidbit about Charleston.

While running some errands one afternoon we wandered into a grocery store called Southern Season. It was more of a specialty foods store than a supermarket – aisles and aisles of spices, grains and beans, fresh-baked bread, and so on. But there was no mistaking that we were in the South when we saw an aisle labeled “Cheese Straws.”

And then this:

An entire aisle dedicated to hot sauce and BBQ sauce. How can you not love?