32°1′27″ N 81°2′52″ W
(Thunderbolt Marina)
Today the boat stayed docked in Thunderbolt while Chris & I went by taxi to Savannah to tour the city.
We started the morning early with fueling up the boat, pumping out the waste holding tank & filling the fresh water holding tanks. That will allow us to get an early start tomorrow morning for our trip to Beaufort, SC.
I filled up the diesel fuel tanks in Jacksonville & with the tanks now topped up again here in Thunderbolt I was able to calculate the rate of fuel consumption so far. It works out to be about 1.5 Imperial Gallons per hour travelled (or about 5 miles per Imperial gallon) which is very economical for a boat of this size.
I will continue to track my fuel usage to double check the accuracy of my calculations. This is important information for me to have because the boat does not have any fuel gauges so I have to make sure that I don’t run out. The boat has a range of several hundred miles between fill ups so as long as I get fuel every 3 to 5 days I will be ok.
When we arrived in Savannah we took a hop on hop off trolley tour. It was very interesting & the driver had tons of interesting facts & trivia about the city & its history.
About 3/4 through the route we hopped off the trolley in the market area & found a good place to eat a late breakfast/early lunch.
The temperature was brutally hot today with a peak of 35 C that felt like 45 C with the humidex.
Even the tourist carriage horses were finding it too hot today. We were happy to see their tenders giving them shade & lots of water to drink in between tours.
Savannah is a very interesting and attractive city. I wish we could have had more time to walk around the squares but it was simply too hot. Time to head back to the boat.
We got back to the marina just in time to see a mega yacht coming into the boatyard.
This beauty makes my boat look tiny & it is now docked beside an even bigger mega yacht that is at least twice as big as this one.
After the “boat show sail past” Chris BBQ’d an excellent dinner of swordfish steak plus kebab skewers with shrimp, onion & zucchini.
When dinner was done I went up to the marina office/guest facilities area to shower & do my laundry. I met a couple of crew members from the mega yachts who were sitting out on the patio having a chat. (See photo below).
Rachel is originally from New Zealand & works on the yacht in the photo above. Derek is originally from South Africa & works on the other ship docked beside hers. (Photo below)
Talk about a small world – Rachel & Derek met 5 years ago while working an assignment on the same mega yacht. Then they went their separate ways. They met again today at a restaurant here in Thunderbolt – with neither of them having any idea that they were in the same port at the same time. Needless to say, they have a lot of catching up to do!
Rachel’s ship leaves tomorrow for the Mediterranean & Derek’s ship is getting ready to cruise the American Atlantic coastline for the summer. Safe travels to you both!
Tomorrow we continue north on our journey up the ICW to places where mega yachts cannot follow.
Cheers everyone!