Rosalie B. wrote:

... [my husband] ...
... is determined that we should go outside from
Charleston to Florida. I'm not very happy about doing that. I can
manage up to 18-22 hours, but not longer because we don't handle
sleeping in shifts well ... and I feel that our
judgements (both of us) will be impaired if we are short of sleep.
And I think it will take us longer than that to go from Charleston
to the St. Mary's River (just the ocean part is 145 nm, not counting
going out and coming in).

It definitely _will_ take more than 22 hours (depending of course on
conditions and how you like to run), but by and large this is not such a
tough run in average conditions. The prevailing wind is unfavorable, but
quite often it doesn't "prevail" on this stretch. I've run it both ways and
the only times (actually twice) I've had a little too much "fun" was
north-bound with a big following sea on the approach to Charleston harbor,
with commercial traffic thrown into the mix..

Going south you can take a short cut through the Charleston south jetty and
save 3 or 4 miles. Look on your chart and be advised that it's quite deep
through the cut, but still probably worth running during daylight.
Otherwise Saint Mary's inlet is easy. I like to make the approach from well
offshore, but that's just my own preference. I am not an expert on the
passes along the GA coast, but many of them are tricky and very
weather-dependent, so one cannot always count on an easy (or even safe) exit
or entry.

If you are at all concerned about the GA stretch inside, then you will find
big help from the tides through GA (as I am sure you already know). As an
aside, it's often easy to find shoaling just below Fernandina on the inside
route, so it really may not make much of a difference in either case.

--
Good luck and good sailing.
s/v Kerry Deare of Barnegat
http://kerrydeare.tripod.com