Waccamaw River Valley

We had a wonderful dinner last evening in an Italian Steakhouse in the Outlet mall. The restaurant appeared to be thriving (a testament to the good food) but sadly it seems the rest of the mall is falling on hard times. Many stores were shuttered and the only ones with any semblance of a crowd were some restaurants and ice cream parlors...ah well.

We were only going about 28 miles  today, aiming for an anchorage in the Waccamaw river valley, and so we didn't cast off till 11am...

The trip was interesting. At the beginning we went through some fairly built up areas, with fine homes 

Two of the many nice houses we passed. This last one has a lifelike statue on the water's edge

(and some not so fine homes.

One notable feature was passing through a golf course which used cable cars to connect one hole with another...weird to use the ICW as a water hazard!

Cable cars carry golfers over the waterway

But after a few hours we left civilization (if that's what you want to call the Myrtle Beach area) behind and entered the Waccamaw River Valley...a truly beautiful nature preserve, with a largish (300 feet across) tree lined (mostly cypress), winding river with many creeks feeding into it. There are also many "oxbows" which is the term for a small branch of the river which winds around a small island and returns to the river. For most of the trip it was only Island Spirit and us meandering down this wonderful piece of nature.

I include some pictures that don't do justice at all to the beauty of what we could see as we wound our way down river.

After about 5 hours we came to an oxbow called "Cow House Creek" (if you zoom up the map in the link at the upper right of this blog you can see it). It is protected from the wind by  the trees lining each side and the current we saw in the river is a little reduced in the creek. The creek is about 100 feet wide and only one other boat is anchored (boats anchor in a line in this creek).  Later, around 6:30 just before it began to get dark, three other boats came in, for a total of 6 boats in the creek.

I include some pictures looking around the compass.

a

Looking North..Island Spirit and another boat infront of me in the creek

Looking East

Looking West

Looking South (behind us)

Excepting for the wind in the trees (and there isn't much wind..it is protected) and a few birds it is very quiet.

I'm writing this while sitting in the cockpit, very much enjoying the scenery before the sun goes down. Molli is reading a book on her kindle....just fantastic!

Later, after sundown, we'll go below and have a nice dinner (and maybe a bit of wine), read some more, and turn in ready to do it again tomorrow...on to Georgetown