Bumpy, bumpy, bumpy...

Bumpy... very bumpy!




We left Georgetown, SC this morning and headed back out into the ocean.  The forecast was for winds 10 to 15kts out of the SW and seas 2 to 3 feet.  We saw 2 to 3 feet seas, but it didn't happen until mid-day.  We had solid 4 footers all morning which made for a very bumpy ride.  No waves over the boat, but with the wind out of the SW we got lots of spray over the top.  The boat did great and handled things well, but had a very wet ride.




Since it was pretty rough in the morning, we changed out course and headed for the Charleston inlet.  We had enough rough seas and thought we could still make our goal via the intracoastal, albeit much later than we hoped.  By the time we got to the Charleston Inlet, the seas finally started to subside to the 2 to 3 feet forecasted.  So we changed our heading again and made for the Savannah River entrance.  The rest of the day went pretty well until about 1:00pm.




At 1:00 we noticed the port engine hesitating a bit.  It periodically would drop 50 to 100 rpm's.  After seeing the drop in rpm and "hearing" the change in the motor, I knew pretty quickly that we had a clogged Racor.  We ran for about another hour hoping it would not get any worse and we could get into Savannah without issue.  However, it was not meant to be.  The problem continued to get worse and the engine was now loosing 200 rpm's.  It was time to change the Racor.




Luckily, John had plenty of spare filters on board.  So we shut down the port engine (always an uneasily feeling when off-shore) and turning directly into the waves.  Dave drove while I went down into the engine room and changed out the filter.  I was able to get it changed out in about 10 minutes.  Again, John was very prepared and had a container of diesel fuel in the engine room, so priming the filter was not an issue.  I topped off the new filter with fuel, checked for leaks and we were back up and running.




We arrived today in Thunderbolt, GA just before 4:00pm.  We got the boat topped off with fuel and gave her a good wash down today as she was covered in salt.  It felt good to get in early today and have more time to really go over things.  We have developed a small exhaust leak on the port exhaust elbow.  That will need to be replaced once we get into Ft Myers.  Otherwise all is well.  No pictures today since we were off-shore all day.  We hope to run down to St Augustine, FL tomorrow.  The forecast is for 2 to 3 feet with South wind at 10kts.  That should make for a good ride tomorrow.