The Cooper River Marina is a Charleston County owned and operated facility. It is located well upstream on Cooper River from the Charleston’ downtown/historic district, on the grounds of the old US Navy Base. While the dockage is pretty good, even if somewhat unsheltered, and the shoreside support buildings are very acceptable, you will be docked a long way by land from most Charleston attractions.

We docked at Cooper River Marina during the month of November last year and were very pleased with the cleanliness of the facility and the very friendly and most helpful staff. We hope to stay at Cooper River Marina again the next time we’re in Charleston. It’s very cool watching huge ships traveling up and down the Cooper River…nothing boring about this marina.
Ginny Walsh

Click Here For The Cruisers’ Net’s South Carolina Marina Directory Listing For Cooper River Marina

I would add to Captain Arnold’s recommendations below for cruising Charleston Inlet and Harbor (apparently he is speaking about nighttime passage of these waters), to have a well functioning and very visable GPS chartplotter aboard. There are so many lighted aids to navigation in Charleston Harbor, it’s very easy to become confused. And, there has been more than one tragedy in these waters from vessels trying to navigate after dark.
Personally, we never cruise these waters at night. If you choose to do so anyway, please proceed with the greatest of caution!

Charleston Bay area generally is notorious for shifting shoals, low depths at low tide. Keep very carefully to main channel markers and particularly if entering Shems Creek or at the top entrance to the ICW – can’t tell you how many boats I’ve seen stuck there – even small center cockpit fishers drawing only 2ft. (At one time one of them was me 🙂 And for sure stay clear of the “jetties” and go either side of them through the green and red markers. When approaching Charleston in the main channel (to starboard coming in) which the big ships use, you can see a spotlight on one of the downtown buildings and aim for that always keeping it in sight (if you stray out of the channel the light in effect dissapears)
Best wishes
Arnold

I penned the first edition of my “Cruising Guide to Coastal South Carolina and Georgia” in 1985, and have been researching the waters around Charleston ever since. However, even I have never cruised upstream of the “bridge” on upper Wando River. Below, Captain Arnold certainly does make it sound like an appearling prospect, however, at least by dinghy (on the uppermost stretch).

The prettiest area of Charleston’s waterways is the upper Wando River – it has good depth all the way up to the old bridge – and the only DIY very well equipped yard in the Charleston area is up there – I forget it’s name alas. Dinghy up further to see some very pleasant marshlands and wildlife. You can moor in a small creek west of the new Charleston Bridge, just east of the container dock facility, which goes behind the town of Mount Pleasant – around 8 ft of water in the middle – and a nice little beach as bonus. As a matter of interest the only two people to lose their lives – boatowners – during Hurricane Hugo, decided to moor as far up the Wando as they could get. Theoretically they were correct – but Hugo barreled straight up the Wando for about 20 miles. One last message from one captain was that he could see nothing but white water on the windscreen – and logs rushing past…….. Then his VHF went dead.