May 10, 2014 Left Brunswick

Woke up early, left our slip to get to the fuel dock by 8:30 am.  Fueled, wind blowing again,even harder coming straight at us.  Pounded getting into the channel, decided instead of going thru the sound we would take the Back River again since we were protected and it was shorter to the ICW north.  Came around the corner from the Brunswick channel and when we saw a Coast Guard boat rapidly approaching us.  He asked how long it had been since we had a safety check.  Told him we had a sticker from a few months ago but could not produce the "gold sheet" so they asked permission to board us. They tried to board but the waves were so high it was hard for them to pull up beside us and we were getting close to going under the bridge, so we said we're going thru the Back River, can you follow us in there, he reluctantly said yes. I asked why they wanted to board us, we had a safety sticker that was still good.   As they were telling me that it wasn't enough without the "gold sheet", the driver of the boat came up beside our boat and started yelling at two of the three kids saying BOARD, BOARD, NOW.  The two young ones came aboard our boat, found a place to sit and started asking questions and right it down on a 3 page sheet.  They were very nice,young recruit.  We were able to show them everything they wanted to see, they didn't insist on going down in the boat.  After 15 minutes or so they told the driver of the Coast Guard Boat they were ready, had a little visit with them while they were waiting to be picked up.  Said they just left the station and we were the first boat they saw.(Actually we were the only boat out)  We now have our "Gold Sheet" and only need to show it the next time we get stopped.  Haven't met anyone else who has been stopped by Coast Guard or Customs/Border Patrol.  Hmmmmmm?  Anyway after being warned of the shallow water at a certain spot in the river, we told him we had been down it the day before.  So off we went out of the wind, winding around this little narrow stream in the marshes of Georgia noticing the tide was going down faster than we had expected.  Just as Curt said "How brave do you feel?" we came to a sudden stop, both looking at the depth meter and seeing 7.9 feet, realized we were aground in the mud at the spot where the Coast Guard had warned us.  Wind from behind blowing 15 knots with the current pushing us up on the mud island in the middle of the channel even more, we sat there astonished, another first time, in one day?  The Coast Guard boarding us then this.  And we had such an early start this morning.  God laughs at our plans once again.  Wondering what we would be missing by waiting to for the tide to come up getting us off this mud, we thought still in disbelief that we could just anchor and pull ourselves off.  Not realizing how strong the current and wind were pushing us on we spent an hour working at that.  Two jet boats came by on our starboard side, one got by but Grandpa who was showing him the safe area to go thru got stuck.  He worked at getting off for 30 min.  I ended up throwing him a rope, he was able to pull himself across the muddy water to our boat, pulled on our anchor rope and eventually got himself in deeper water as he rocked the jet ski, pushed it out of the mud as the current along with the wind was carrying him down the river as he edged his way backwards, sideways, forward.  When he hit deeper water, off they went, no Thank-you, no wave, nothing.  Strange but he is a motor boater from the south.   So we kept working, rested,decided the Tide would be up in the next 45 minutes so started preparing the anchor on the stern that pulled the boat closer to the port side in deeper water making us face downstream instead of sideways and loosening up the bow anchor. After 3 hours on the mud we started floating and with Curt's expert planning ended up perfectly on the stern anchor that he shifted to the bow as we became free.  Took a bit of encourage to get that anchor up but when we did, turned and off we went with the Tide filling our river taking us back out to the ICW.  So much for getting off early this morning.  10:30 to 1:30.  It was amazing within 60 min. of the change in Tide directions it had come up about a foot.  Found our anchorage down Crescent River, slightly protected from the 10-12 knot winds.  Happy to have the wind go down to nothing at dark, but the Natz were biting.