Charleston (SC), day 1 – Historical Town

Monday 18 June: Arriving Charleston, South Carolina.
It was an uneventful night, motoring all the way from Savanna. There was a bit of swell which gave Cloudy Bay an odd rocking, but it wasn’t too uncomfortable.
By 7am we are in the channel entrance coming into Charleston bang on dead low tide. We cash the early ebb up to Fort Sumter, which is a very important landmark, where the first shots were fired in the Civil War. It looks in ruins and we read it is sinking 7inches per year.
We are booked with the Charleston City Marina which is located on the west side of the historical town. But before we go further in on Ashley River, we take a full circle of Charleston Harbor to have a look at Charleston Harbor Marina & Resort and at the Maritime Museum where the huge aircraft carrier York Town lies moored.
The Harbor Marina sounds tempting as it has access to the resort facilities and is slightly less expensive (US$2.15/ft) than the City Marina, but is located on Hog Island, across the bay from town, and transfer to town would be a bit of a faff; plus we won’t be on the boat to enjoy the resort anyway. The Maritime center has good location close to the historical town, and is the least expensive of them all (US$0.95/ft), but availability only for 2 days and that won’t work for us.
Investigation completed, we proceed up the river towards the anchorage area opposite the City Marina. Quite a few boats anchored here, so it must be good holding. We survey an area and drop the anchor in 6m of water. Tide will change at 2pm, we’ll see then how we swing compared to the neighboring boats, which are mostly on mooring buoys. We notice the river is much cleaner here than it was in Savannah, and a lot less boat traffic.
There is a single handed HR46 anchored next to us. After a short chat with its owner over VHF, we gather some local knowledge with regards to this place.
The usual drill: sunshade up (it feels exceptionally hot and humid today), dinghy in the water, and we are all set to go ashore. Hm, but do we dare to go walk in the burning sun? Better wait till later in the afternoon.
We do a bit of admin, including book a rental car for tomorrow to head inland for a few days to meet Caroline and David, friends from long ago.
After lunch, which we have in the cockpit, the wind picks up (where was this wind yesterday and last night, when we needed it, eh?) and we have to remove the over boom sunshade as we were sailing over the anchor. The cockpit and the boat heat up instantly.
We then venture ashore and one short Uber ride later, we are by the market, in the historical town. Very pretty streets, with nice houses and gardens. The French Quarter is particularly nice.
During our walk we stumble across Jeni’s, a very inviting ice cream parlor, where we have the unusual (for us) goat cheese cherry ice cream. Yummy. It comes in freshly made waffle cones, double yummy.
Our mission this evening is not to admire the architecture but to check out the rooftop and cocktails bars, which we already have a list and map of! So, in French Quarter and later on King Street, we tick them one by one, and shortlist our favorites: Pavillion Rooftop, Prohibition, The Warehouse.
We settle for the evening in the Cocktail Club, where a band plays Beatles covers till late into the night. Very nice atmosphere and quite crowded for a Monday evening. The cocktails menu is raising our interest as we read through very unusual combinations of ingredients, and try a few cocktails which are ok, but not to rave about.
By midnight we are both giggly and also very sleepy, and we return to Cloudy Bay hoping to find her where we left her. Unsurprisingly (we have been warned on the strong currents), she did drag anchor about 20m. Hm, good job we secured a place in City Marina, where we will move in the morning.
So ends our first day in Charleston, where looks like we will have lots of fun.