Wedding LOVE

Brianna and Colton, Bride and Groom

After racing down the coast to Brunswick Georgia in 25 days and missing Hurricane SANDY, we were treated to two weeks of family visits. We delighted to witness the most beautiful wedding of Colton and Brianna. Radeen and I both really enjoyed the family festivities and the warm Phoenix sun. Time was spent enjoying meals, preparing for the wedding, and enjoying the rehearsal party where I learned it is NOT a good idea to drink shots with the wedding party who are all 21-23 years old. WOW....that was a very bad idea...but silly fun at the time. The next day, there was no AM, only an afternoon that I recall.

After our Phoenix visit, we spent 2 days with more family in Atlanta, Georgia on our return trip to the boat. These visits were a great distraction from the boating life, and it was really wonderful to spend time with people that really know you and love you. After returning to the boat, it was difficult to get back up to speed and into the cruising mode, not to mention the 25-30 knot gale that was blowing offshore for a few days. But after re-provisioning the boat and clearing off all the bird dirt and city dust, Island Spirit was ready to go, and to continue our trip to the Bahamas.

Here are a few photos of the 375 photos taken!

Tammy, Radeen and Taelor

Bridesmaids: Rachel, Brianna, Eden, Taelor and  Erin

Groomsmen:  Zach, Colton, Kevin, Evan, Mike

Father Mark and Son Colton

Tammy and Radeen

Taelor, Shane and Krista

Brianna, Rhonda and Colton

Radeen in the garden where the ceremony was held.

Brother and Sister: Mark and Rhonda

Rose Marie and Krista Marie

Brianna reading her vows to Colton

Krista, Rhonda and Mike

Radeen and Tammy

Hayden and Radeen

Calendar 2013

Tenth Anniversary Edition
IPphotos.com IPYOA.com 2013 Calendar

We have released our Tenth Anniversary edition 2013 Sailing CALENDAR. This calendar is sold to support our Island Packet web sites at IPYOA.com and IPphotos.com. The Calendar profits are used to pay for the two servers storing and serving our 12,000 Island Packet photos at IPphotos.com and the new dedicated community web server running IPYOA.com. These three web servers are serving tens of thousands of web pages each month to the Island Packet Community. We appreciate your support and encourage you to purchase our calendar here. Thank you!



Here are the photos and pages of this Tenth Edition Calendar

PS:
If you are interested in Island Packet Yachts, we also encourage you to JOIN our Island Packet Yacht Owners' Association. This web site is not only for IP owners, but also for Island Packet Dealers, Brokers, and Friends all interested in sharing the "JOY of Island Packet Yachts."

Brunswick Landing Marina, GA

Hurricane SANDY, 3 days after we dock!

Known as a HURRICANE HOLE, a safe place to dock your boat during hurricane season, Brunswick Landing Marina is truly a safe place, well built and very solid. Since we ran down the east coast early, during Sept and Oct, we had planned to make this our destination. We booked a dock here months ago, before we left the Chesapeake Bay and we have been running for Brunswick from the first day we left.

Lucky for us, we had great weather all the way south, and we were able to arrive here a few days early, which turned out to be perfect due to Hurricane Sandy. Brunswick is as far west as you can go on the east coast, plus the NE flow of the Gulf Stream tends to divert the path of hurricanes away from this spot. Brunswick Landing Marina, GA is THE place to store your boat during hurricane season. We feel lucky to be here and we feel safe leaving our boat here as we fly to Arizona for a family wedding.

Here is a photo essay of Brunswick Landing Marina:

Island Spirit docked on pier #4
Notice the CONCRETE floating docks....full length....NICE

Massive dock cleats....notice the heavy dock lines...
Thank to GREG!

CONCRETE PILINGS!
Docks ride up and down via these rollers

Powerpost, cable TV and water. Notice the concrete pilings

15 PIERS, 20 boats per pier...WOW...this place is massive
Ramps lead up from docks to a dock house on each pier

FREE WIFI on each dock house

Car parking right at the docks within steps of each pier.

Island Spirit in dock, mainsail lashed, double dock lines

Bath house and clubhouse between piers # 8-9
Bath house at pier #1 also

Clubhouse, library book share, TV, lounge

Clubhouse continued... tables and sofas for cocktail parties

FREE LAUNDRY ....yes, that is right.....FREE

EACH Dock House has a nice grill, table and chairs

Inside slips are for the large catamarans which means...
.. there are 30 spots like this.
The north end can take larger boats and more cats as well.

GOOGLE MAP of Brunswick Landing Marina

Pier numbering begins at the south #1 and #14 at the north

Northernmost Pier #15 has many single slips also part of the marina!

View Larger Map

If I were looking for a place to dock our boat during hurricane season again, this would be the spot. Many cruisers make this their starting point for cruising for the winter. For example: Arrive here, to your decommissioned boat before Nov 1. Set up your boat, install your sails and canvas, clean up the boat, provision, prepare. Depart ASAP for points south, South Florida, Bahamas, etc. Sail all winter, Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb, March, April, May. Come back to Brunswick June 1, dock here and decommission the boat, putting it away until Nov 1. Now, go home or do land based travels and family visits and then start again. This is what many cruisers here are doing, because it is such a safe place to leave your boat in hurricane season, June 1 to Nov 30. We are glad to be here!

Offshore Beaufort to Brunswick

Sunset the night before we departed Beaufort, SC

Beaufort SC to Brunswick GA via offshore is a 104 nm trip. Traveling at 5-6 nm / hr, this can take some time. The real challenge on a leg like this one is not the coastal sailing, it is the tides at both inlets. Tides on the Georgia Coast are 7 to 8 feet and the current associated with these tides can run at 2-3 knots.

So a sailboat that motors at 5-6 knots will need to run with the current, adding this extra speed as opposed to running against the current. Considering two ocean inlets 70+ miles apart and figuring out the time and distances for exiting one inlet on the out flowing tide and making the next inlet on the inflowing tide can be a fun (and lengthy!) discussion.

iPad and Navionics, we use this for tides, currents and backup nav

Radeen is really good at these calculations. We use our iPad with Navionics software for currents and a piece of paper and pencil and we go at it. We find the max current at each inlet and run a route on the computer for assistance, and then we calculate our speed and time of arrival for each point.

With the anchor up at 4 pm, we were able to run the tide out to sea by sunset, then sail the 70 miles of sea overnight and make the next inlet at 8:30 am for the inflowing tide. We arrived Brunswick GA as scheduled and docked around 11 am. We were tired from only sleeping 2-4 hours while offshore, so we took a long afternoon nap. Offshore sailing takes days to get into a rhythm, and so with a short run of only one night, you never really get into a good sleep pattern. Imagine driving all night till 11 am the NEXT day, and then finding your way around a strange town and parking your car in an unfamiliar parking garage. This will give you a clue as to what we just accomplished!

Here are some photos of the area...

Horse Drawn Carriage Rides at Beaufort, SC

Spanish Moss on the harbor trees

Island Packet friends:
Larry & Gerry IP37 Galileo, Hayden & Radeen with
Marjorie and Jeff, IP45 Far Niente

Cruising Island Packet Friends,
Sam and Carolyn of IP-485 Malaka II
connected with us in Beaufort for breakfast and a long walk.

Sunset as we exited Port Royal Sound for sea

One of the last sea buoys leaving Port Royal Sound near Hilton Head

Set course for Southwest down the Georgia Coast

Our NIGHT view with a moon - very bright! Notice the red instruments.

Daybreak, sunrise 8 miles off St. Simons Sound, GA

Commercial Shipping outbound as we enter the tight inlet motor sailing

Pelicans greeted us at Green #15....thank you

Sidney Lanier Bridge, 185 feet of clearance
as we approach Brunswick, GA

Now, we are in Brunswick, GA which has been our destination since departing Rock Hall on Sept 27th. We will secure the boat here (during hurricane season!) and fly out of Atlanta to Phoenix AZ for a family wedding. We are very excited to visit our family.....can't wait....