We had quite an eventful day on Oct. 14. We continued our journey south on the ICW in New Jersey leaving at 7 a.m. and passing through some absolutely beautiful areas. Rows of waterfront homes were interspersed with broad vistas of undulating marshlands. Even Atlantic City looked nice from a distance! We saw herons, ibises and an eagle atop a tall tree branch. This journey (and other experiences we’ve had in NJ) truly dispels the oft stated disparaging remarks about the Garden State (mostly related to the NJ turnpike and Chris Christie).
The primary challenge of the ICW in NJ is the extreme shallowness in some areas caused by extensive shoaling. By mid-afternoon, the tide was getting quite low and we were entering some of the shallowest parts of the passage. We were being very careful to follow the most recent information on traversing these passages when THUD! we ran hard aground. The captain, to his slight relief, had done nothing wrong – neither the charts nor the navigational buoys showed this present danger. After futile efforts to free ourselves, we called Sea Tow who showed up minutes later and swiftly pulled us free. He invited us to tie up at his marina’s fuel dock for the night after advising us on how to deal with the hazards further ahead. He also noted that it was dead low tide with one area of only 3 feet that maybe we could plow through (we draw 4 feet). But silly us – we didn’t want to stop that early, so on we went – until we hit the forewarned area and ran aground as predicted! This time we would have to wait it out for a couple of hours until the tide turned. We were hard aground in a beautiful sea of marsh land from which we watched a magnificent sunset.
After some moments of expressed frustration, our equanimity was restored and we managed to find amusing things to do to fill the time! We tried to leave before sunset a couple of times but couldn’t get free until it was dark! Fortunately, one of the few available anchorages was just around a few bends – the appropriately named, Shelter Haven. This was a perfect little harbor for us – an ideal, protected cove just off the ICW lined with attractive homes (as much as we could see in the dark).
We anchored and settled in for a quiet night with a delicious dinner (pork tenderloin with whiskey sauce, mashed sweet potatoes and sautéed green beans with onions and garlic) that Lynn had started to prepare when we were aground. We went to bed very early (after the previous uncomfortable night) and slept soundly in very calm waters.
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