03/02/2025 ICW Day 61 : Sailmates

After meeting Peter Frank on his canoe trip, our inbox filled with messages from people offering kindness. Some were already in our wake, but Mark Kimball and his wife, Danielle, were ahead of us. They reached out first, inviting us to meet them—and their friends.

When I first began bike touring, I was amazed that strangers would welcome a grubby cyclist into their home. My first taste of this was in Mexico—a country I’d been warned about as a kid. Yet o found myself struggling to communicate with families who, without hesitation, gave up their beds for me. I would always protest, preferring my air mattress (and that the kid wasn’t ousted from their bedroom!)… but in those early days, it became clear that yes, while there are bad people in the world who hog all of the attention, there are also lots of people who are SO caring of other human beings that they would give anything they have to help another person.

Mark turned out to be one of those generous souls. He reached us through our website, offering us to stay at their place. As luck would have it, their HOA was having a get together that night—so we got an invite.

Their community is unique in that it is the only non-profit bar in SC. In fact, this setup is so rare that if they lose their license, they will never get it back. It’s precious, though, because many of the people in the HOA come to the community center to socialize.

“I came here as a single woman knowing no one, and now I have lots of friends and a community,” explained Danielle.

Most of the neighbors were—let’s call it “well-seasoned”—but that doesn’t mean they didn’t have sharp wit. In fact, if you were conducting a study on what it takes to become a (late) octogenarian, you might conclude from this group that it requires plenty of wine, maybe even stealing sips from your neighbor, and a bit of randy humor, such as naming your sailboat “Fourplay” (because, you know, there were four of them) and your dinghy “Quickie.” Which is somehow even funnier when delivered by a 90-year-old sipping Chardonnay.

“You have to remember, these people weren’t always this age,” Danielle quipped after a car full of neighbors drove by saying “Happy Anniversary” to Mark and Danielle—congratulating them on their first year together.

“I lost my bet,” someone yelled from the back seat.

“We didn’t think you’d make it that long!” another joked.

They flipped each other off good-naturedly. Probably the first time I saw an 89-year-old woman do that.

Later at the bar, Mark grinned and said, “You know, I read a story that fits our situation perfectly. It was about a hitchhiker. When he got in the car, he asked the driver, ‘Say, why did you pick me up? I could be anyone—even a bad person!’ The driver replied, ‘I wasn’t worried—because the probability of two serial killers being in one car is so low.’”

But upon getting to know Mark better, we found out he was far from the serial killer joke. In fact, we learned that he and Danielle have generous hearts for lots of people. One example was of a man who worked on the grounds. He had a problem with his teeth.

“Not only was it unsightly, but you could tell that it was a medical problem for him too,” Danielle explained.

They found out from this worker’s friend that the reason he hadn’t gotten the dental work done was a money thing. Mark and Danielle got the idea to help him and went around the community to see if people would contribute. In one day, they had the $5000 needed to help this guy out. He was so overjoyed and accepted their generosity. Funny thing was, we happened to meet this man the next morning, and his teeth were great. He seemed like a pretty happy guy.

Mark confided, “Yeah, he has 8 kids…. Some with different women… and that was before the dental work! So we joked that maybe we should’ve thrown in a vasectomy as part of the package deal.”

All in all, it was a short day on the water, but definitely a great way to end our time in South Carolina with some very fun and friendly people.