St. Augustine, Fl mm780

 

 

We traveled a leisurely 50 miles today down the ICW south of Jacksonville.  It was a lovely, sunny, warm day.  The only real challenge was going through Jacksonville the currents were so strong and so conflicting that it created turbulence for quite a ways.  Then, for some reason, the strong, conflicting currents under the bridges caused “Belle” to fish tail so much that there were times I feared we might meet up with the bridge.

 

Again, as most days since Wrightsville, NC, we saw dolphins, but they were too quick to capture on film.  More pelicans and seagulls lined the waterway.  Not many boats today, but the ones that passed us had no courtesy and sped pass causing tremendous wake.  Fortunately, we had everything safely stored down below.

 

 

We passed lovely homes with elaborate boat docks/porches.  This one made us think it looked like something Robert would have built. The house was equally as lovely with planters filled with red flowers, like Maggie would display.  We went by too fast for me to get a photo of it too.

 

 

 

Here’s a photo of my favorite house.  It was light pink with teal trim inside the white woodwork.  I like the porch too.  If it had a metal roof and was further south I’d be even more delighted.  Dream on. 

 

 

 

 

Can you believe these cars on the north side of the inlet???  Those waves are in the ocean!  The people are sitting in chairs fishing at the water’s edge inside the inlet!

 

 

 

 

I never saw the fort from the water before.  We will tour it tomorrow.  The last time I brought someone here the story was turned around so that the Spanish were the heroes and Americans left feeling bad for what their forefathers did.  Originally, Americans left feeling patriotic.

 

 

 

The St. Augustine City Marina only had mooring buoys available, so we are sitting out in the river.  We finally put our dinghy in the water so we can go to shore.  Just when we were beginning to think we didn’t need it!  Here is JB after paying for our mooring. 

This city is my favorite with its incredibly old history where it flip flopped between Spanish and English rule.  JB hasn’t been here, so I am so looking forward to sharing all that awaits with him.  We will share it with you tomorrow.

WE FOUND FLORIDA!!!! BUT…

Coordinates: 30degrees 33N, 81degrees 27W

It appears we have traveled south 8 degrees and about 50 degrees east.  Where are we?  mm 726 on the ICW off of Amelia Island just north of Jacksonville.  50 miles to St. Augustine.  It seems once we get going and the weather is gorgeous we just want to keep going.

(Wild horses on Cumberland Island, GA)

 

 

If you remember, I once said we might get Florida charts.  We were told you can download them on the computer and JB said he did.  But about 10 miles back his computer lost its GPS, charts, the works.  We were off the paper charts.  Our cell phones stopped working.  All we could do was follow the markers.  After being a bit spoiled it was eerie.  This is when we started cutting up and making jokes out of the situation.  What else could we do? 

(Ft. Clinch on the north tip of Amelia Island, Fl)

We had two trawlers following us all day.  After going about 6 miles without charts or Garmin the trawler behind us hailed us on the radio and told us we made the day very easy for him.  Ha, Ha, Ha!  He asked where we were staying the night.  When we told him Alligator River, he said he was staying there too.  At that point, JB told me, “It’s like the blind leading the blind”.  The trawler is from Cape Canaveral, Fl but spent a month at Olverson’s Marina.

JB is now working on his computer and trying to get everything working again . . . . . . . .

I knew he could do it!  It only took about 30 minutes and he has everything fixed.  That’s my guy!!!  His comment after looking at the chart for tomorrow, “Oh, great. There’s a passage that would put Georgia to shame!”

We have had quite a trip in the last 15 days.  Tomorrow we will arrive at St Augustine and stay there until Tuesday.  As of Tuesday we will be at the Daytona Loggerhead Club and Marina for a week.  Then it will be to Stuart for the winter, or at least until our bank account recovers! :-)  

 

JB IN FLORIDA!                                           JAN IN FLORIDA!

We were thinking about continuing this blog until we get to Stuart around Dec. 1 or 2.  How does that sound to you?  Thank you so very much for reading and participating in our journey.  We hope it was fun for you too.

Jekyll Harbor Marina – mm 684

Coordinates 31 degrees 9N, 81degrees 29W

Thanks for the comments to yesterday’s post.  We commented to your comments.  Check it out!

Forgot to tell you yesterday, we passed Moon River.  The MOON RIVER, of which the song was written by Johnny Mercer and sung by Andy Williams.  I love that song!

Today is the 14th day on our way to Florida.  We have adjusted so well to this lifestyle it seems like the three of us, Belle, JB and me, are as one.  The rhythm of the water gently rocking our home is comfortable and joyful.

JB took this photo while underway.  He said it looks like Miller Time.  What do you think?

 

The magenta line of our course in the ICW on our charts was even more difficult to follow today.  We traveled mostly at low tide. (Can you see the tide line toward the top of the marsh grass?)  The chart started showing alternative routes in dotted lines.  I really don’t know how JB figured out how to proceed. It was mind boggling.  No street signs here!  He had the depth finder alarm set for 5’ which means 6.5’ because of its location.  The thing was going off all day!  Some times he was in the center of the river and the chart showed him in the marsh!  For a short time we followed a sailboat in these shallow depths.  The had their sails out so they could heel which raised their keel.  In retrospect, JB said he wouldn’t do that stretch of the ICW again.  The weather was so good we should have gone out the St. Catherines Inlet and come back at Brunswick.

JB called ahead for gas at Ocean Petroleum in Brunswick, GA.  It was 5.5 miles off off the ICW.  He was told they sold gas for $2.69/gal.  Sounded almost too good to believe. When we arrived around 4pm we were told they only sold diesel.  Even the guide said they sold gas!  Now we were forced to continue and no real anchorages nearby.

 

Turning lemons into lemonade, we decided to spend the night at Jekyll Harbor Marina.  We had dinner out.   Tomorrow we plan to ride our bikes around the island, finish our laundry, and get a late start for Cumberland Island, Ga.  We plan to anchor out and dinghy to shore.  It is supposed to be an extremely beautiful island with wild horses.  It was once the home of Andrew Carnegie’s brother.  At that point, we will only be 7 miles from Fernandina Beach, FLORIDA!!!! 

Buckhead Creek South of Savannah, mm 608

Coordinates:  31 degrees 55N, 81 degrees 5W

WOW!  Thanks so much for the many wonderful comments.  It really means a lot to know someone is reading this.  But it means even more that you are enjoying it! 

Since we left Charleston, most of the view has been of marshes and beautiful, large homes.  We spent last night at Beaufort, SC.  Refueling was a big “ouch”.  Gas was $3.50/gal.  We stayed at the Downtown Marina.  After docking we walked the town, about four city blocks, than walked back along the River Walk.  It was nicely landscaped with Bermuda grass and large two person wooden swings hanging from concrete structures.  It was too dark to take photos.  We ate out at a local favorite where they had TV’s.  What a treat!  JB got to watch sports and I watched Glenn Beck!  It was another treat to get back to the boat and watch TV.  It had only been a week.  And, naturally, I saw ‘Dancing with the Stars’ again.

Back to more marshland.  It was overcast with light rain this morning.  I stayed below and gave myself a manicure.  Meanwhile our course was so winding that JB couldn’t use the auto pilot.  Around noon, when it cleared up somewhat, I went topside and he was talking about anchoring out because it was so difficult to steer.  Honestly, it was so bad we would have surely gotten lost it he didn’t have his laptop set up as a Garmin showing us where we were.  So many ‘islands’ of marshland and so many ways to turn. YIKES!  I didn’t blame him.  So I looked ahead in the Cruising Guide for an anchorage only to find that we were 20 miles from Hell Gate.  The Cruising Guide has always been very conservative, but caution prevails and it was very explicit in that this was a very dangerous 1 mile cut between two rivers that always shoaled in.  It strongly advised that the safest time to attempt it was mid-tide and rising.  Now I don’t know how people navigated these waters prior to all the electronics we have on board.  We both searched for the Tide App on our phones and learned that we were in the rising tide.  High tide was in two hours.  We agreed to go for it!  With 15-20 mph winds whipping around us as we twisted around the marsh islands and through Hell Gate, we safely conquered the cut!

 

         

When we entered SC, the tide variances grew to 3-6’ and all docks where floating.  I tried to capture the extreme length of these docks (makes ours look tiny).  At the end of the dock is a floating platform.  Most boats are kept on lifts. 

 

The tides in GA have an 8’ variance.  I thought it was really great when I saw the moon cycle was part of the weather news.  So many homes are built so close to sea level.  It just isn’t logical to me!  I can’t imagine what happens during the flood tides from storms and hurricanes.

 

We are in shrimp country.  I keep asking JB to stop by one of the many shrimp boats we have seen to buy several pounds cheaply, but I haven’t convinced him yet.  We will make it to Brunswick tomorrow.  In fact, he says its the last place to buy cheap gas before FL.  Haven’t given up on finding cheap shrimp yet!  And “Yes” we did pass up Savannah.  The negative information from the guide talked us out of it.  We decided to save it for a land trip.

 

This gives you a little idea of what it has been like today.  We traveled through Thunderbolt and Isle of Hope.  We are currently in an 20’ deep anchorage with three sailboats under the word, “Bing.”

Charleston, SC

 

If you are having trouble finding the comment section, It is located at the end of each day’s post in blue.  It isn’t very big, so you really need to put your glasses on! :-)  We enjoy your feedback.  Thank you for making this blog interactive.  Miss you, Jan

We took a 1 1/2 hr bus tour of this historic city today.  It was incredibly awesome!  So we took photos of things we wanted to share with you.  This photo is of a style home called Charleston Single.  Notice the fire hydrant and tree with the black door to the right. That is the front side of the house on the street. The black front door actually leads to the side porch. If the front door was closed, the house was closed to visitors because the southern belles were in their petticoats fanning themselves on the porch on hot summer days.  No one walking by dare look at the porches.  When the ladies were properly dressed the door was left open.

This is the Calhoun House.  The largest private residence which we heard was owned by a DC attorney.  The third floor is used by their family.  The first two floors are filled with an amazing collection of antiques for the tourist. Calhoun was VP under Andrew Jackson and supposedly was responsible for the Civil War.  There is a lot more history, but to be honest, we couldn’t remember it all.

 

Notice the gray dots on the front of this house. Charleston is on a fault line along the east coast. In the late 1800’s they had a 7.2 magnitude earthquake.  This concrete house  had walls that were pulling away from the center. So they devised a way to slowly tighten screws to put the walls back in place. The dots are the ends of the screws. Now they are part of the decoration!  The first floor of this building was under water during Hurricane Hugo. 

Bubba, our tour guide, recommended Hymans Seafood Restaurant for lunch.  It was another fantastic experience.  Eli, the great grandson of the original owner, stopped by our table to make sure everything was satisfactory.  All celebrities come here to eat.  Our table had a brass plaque that said, “Timothy Dalton ate at this table.”  The food was to die for.  We ate so much we don’t even want dinner tonight!

Charleston, SC mm 467

Thanks for checking in with us.  Please fell free to make comments at the bottom of the various posts as I check them daily. Its great hearing that you love reading about our adventure.  Thanks for the many positive feedbacks. Love to you all. Jan

 

We cruised about 50 miles down a “ditch” (dredged canal) to Charleston arriving at 1pm today.  We are both loving this lifestyle so I spent most of the day looking up trawlers and catamarans for sale on my I phone.  Life is tough.  Sometimes I feel like the Millers, always on the go. 

 

Once we arrived in Charleston we walked to the market.  The place was extremely crowded. I suppose this being a Saturday didn’t help!  I managed to get a good price on a Sweetgrass basket.  So I’m very happy. :-)   I’ve been wanting one of those ever since I first saw one 20 years ago and was too tight to spend the dough.  But I lost a bet JB says I made when I told him I didn’t need to buy anything on this trip.  Oh, well.

Tomorrow we are going shopping for a universal remote for our TV since I left ours at home. Somehow I didn’t think walking the three steps to the TV would be a problem, but it appears we need it to do programming to get all channels. Then we are going to wash the salt spray off the boat.  I’ll catch up on laundry since we have use of a free washer and dryer.  Maybe our burgees will finally get mounted.  Doesn’t sound like an exciting day does it?

You know that problem we had before we left home about not being able to find things?  Well, we are only living in a 14’ x 34’ space. I believe that is less than 500 sq. ft. So you would think that might alleviate the problem.  Initially, we had some difficulty remembering where we stored things.  That is understandable, right?  Well, the other day, after JB’s nap, we were sitting on the sofa and talking when he asked me if I knew where he left his pants (jeans, that is).  Being a “stupid” question, I gave him the “stupid” answer. “In the bedroom where you left them.”  This caused me to think about what his ‘man talk’ really meant when he asked me where he left things.  I finally came to the conclusion that instead of using brain power to locate his things (a lowly task, no doubt), he would ask me where they were so I would fetch them for him.  So ladies, do you find your guy doing the same thing?????

I found out how far it is to Stuart on the back page of our Cruising Guide that takes us to Fernandino Beach, Fl. It’s 1076 miles. Not much more than the 900 we estimated.  We have gone 557 miles.  So we are more than half way ‘home’.  That sounds so GOOD.  We discovered today that Savannah is 8 miles off the ICW, so we plan to avoid it as we are smelling the sweet air of Florida and are eager to get there.  Sun and warmth.  Oh, yeah.  We’ll be loving it!

JB just cooked me a filet mignon steak dinner with fresh asparagus and baked potato.  Got to go and eat dinner. Miss you. 

Waccamaw River to Minim Creek, SC mm415

 

I FINALLY WENT BACK TO PREVIOS POSTS AND READ YOUR MANY COMMENTS.  THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR GREAT FEEDBACK.  LOVED IT!  ISN’T IT GREAT COMMUNICATING THIS WAY?  AND IT IS REALLY AWESOME TO SEE MORE FOLLOWERS SIGNED UP EACH NIGHT!

We stayed at another quiet anchorage last night, but got there so late I was too tired to write much.  The freshwater Waccamaw River south of Myrtle Beach was by far the most beautiful area we have seen. We were so exhausted, I wasn’t thinking when I made dinner and blew a circuit on our generator when I tried to use the microwave and both burners on the stove simultaneously. Yes, we have to juggle what we use when using the generator.  I served JB this pathetic half cooked dinner.  I’m not sure if he didn’t complain because he is such a sweetheart or because he was so exhausted! We kept the generator working to heat the cabin til 8:30 then turned it off.  We snuggled up in bed and didn’t awake til 7am. It was 50 degrees in the cabin!

On our approach to Georgetown, mm403, abandoned rice fields lined both sides of the river. Georgetown, founded in 1729, was the main hub for carrying plantation produce to market and supplies to plantations.  Rice and indigo plantations were established along the waterways. (Notice the remains of an old wharf in this photo.)  By the 1840’s this area produced half the rice consumed in the entire U.S.

 

In Georgetown, JB found a place to dock at the City Dock and Harborwalk.  We had a fresh seafood lunch at the River Room in a building built in 1888.  It originally  housed a dry goods store on one side, with a food store on the other and hats were made upstairs. The original walls and hardwood floors have been restored. Sorry, didn’t take a photo of it.

 

W.D. Morgan, a New Yorker, moved to Georgetown before the civil war and as mayor had planted the many live oaks lining the streets today. He also established the sewer system, electric lights and dug the deep water channel from the inlet.  Here is a photo of his house.  It is gorgeous and maintained like the McChesney’s live there!

 

 

Two blocks from Front Street was the Prince George Winyah Episcopal Church, built around 1750 with brick from the ballast on British Ships.  It is still in use today.  Does this make you feel young?

It was sad to leave Georgetown.  Any chance you get to come here will be well worth your time.  It is a most awesome place!

 

We stopped a few miles down the river to get fuel as we had called all the marinas in the area for their price. It took forever to take on another 201 gal of fuel.  Meanwhile, I was filling the water tank.  It seems we go through water as fast as we go through fuel!

Further south, we entered another dredged cut.  We rather like these because we don’t feel the wind which is a good thing this time of year.  After anchoring in Minim Creek we both rested.  We have been eating the best salads thanks to Uncle Nelson who gave us a fantastic container of petite heads of fancy lettuces from Costco.  And JB picked all the green tomatoes off his vines so some are ripening every day.  YUM!  Tomorrow we go to Charleston, SC and plan to stay at the Charleston Maritime Center Marina near downtown. I love this place!