Saturday, December 31: New Year's Eve in Jacksonville

My time here has been enjoyable. I think it is the first extended 'alone' time since ????? It was a beautiful day - 70's and sunny with some wind. The boats around the marina are still decorated with Christmas lights so it's still pretty festive.

The past month in Cleveland and California meant seeing family and friends. My mom came back to the farm for the first time in 2 1/2 years with all of my brothers able to make it also. Quite the celebration :-) It went well even though Mom didn't remember living there for 50 years - and she thoroughly enjoyed Solomon (Mandy's new baby). Christmas was celebrated at Matt and Wendy's place. There are lots of holiday pictures that I will put on Picassa web one of these days :-)

I had reserved a compact car from Enterprise for the weekend ($40 total and they picked me up at the marina - how do you beat that!). So I was surprised to find myself driving a small Ford SUV - perfect as we bought a dock box on Craig's list back at the end of November but the plan was to pick it up in St. Augustine by boat (about a day's travel down the ICW) but instead I was able to meet the person selling it half way and just picked it up. Perfect :-)

Tomorrow: Marialice arrives.

Friday, December 30: Back in Jacksonville

......well, at least one of us! I returned to the boat yesterday after spending a great 3 weeks in California. Christmas was fun with Rebecca joining us in Encinitas at Matt and Wendy's place. A good time was had by all! Steve has made serious progress with his arm - he has actually been able to sleep in a bed for the last week and hasn't had to get up at night to heat his arm to keep it from cramping up. The physical therapist group here work on his arm every day to break down the scar tissue that built up from the surgery and lack of use of the arm. Most days it sounds like torture to me as the therapist cranks on his arm to get the motion back. But he's doing great -- which is why he is still in CA. I came back for the Gator Bowl as Marialice is going to join me here in Jacksonville for the game. I'm thinking both teams (Ohio State and Florida) are kind of mediocre this year so it should be a great game, right?? Well, it'll at least be the first bowl game I've ever been to so should be fun! Marialice is making one of her famous "I'll be there a day and then dive back to Ohio" trips but the 2 days she's here will be enjoyable. Friday January 6th, I'll go back to Encinitas, Steve will finish up his therapy on Jan 13. Then it's off for a cross country drive back to Jacksonville. Matt and Wendy will be moving soon after (to Cherry Point NC) and will drive their other car to the East coast. Sounded like a win-win to me :-) Anyway, that's the plan. I'll put a few pictures up tomorrow or so just so Steve doesn't think I'm laying around not doing anything :-)

Monday November 28: Back to Jacksonville - Stuffed Just Like the Turkey

What a great time at Terri and Scott's (near Bradenton, FL)! It was a 3 1/2 hour drive (who made Florida so big???) but pleasant enough on some freeway and some back roads. The theme for the trip was: food :-) But of course it WAS Thanksgiving ...... Terri pulled out all of the stops and made everything you would expect - and everything was great!

On Friday, Steph went to the pool and Terri, Scott, Steve and I went for a drive to Anna Marie Island to the pier for lunch. We had gone there when we came by boat last January and really enjoyed it. Scored a table right by the windows - great food and fun. It was a really nice day (unlike when we were there in Jan - 3rd picture - when the wind was howling and COLD).

More football Saturday - I stayed back while Steph, Terri, Scott and Steve went to the beach. Again a very nice day with a warm breeze and sunshine. One last stop for a sandwich at the Pita Place for lunch. Steve also made scalloped oysters again - this time using my mom's recipe. Really good .....

Anyway, we're at the boat for a couple of days and will then fly to Cleveland, stay a week, fly to California, stay 3 weeks and then back here to Jacksonville on Dec. 29th. By then, we'll be more than ready to be back on the boat and start heading for Marathon in the Keys. I'll start the blog back up after we return in late December. In the meantime, we wish everyone a Merry Christmas!

Wednesday November 23: Jacksonville, FL

Steve always manages to get great sunset pictures and the night before last was no exception. Yesterday was the last day of our travels for a while: destination -Jacksonville. What a problem with the tides and currents though. I didn't feel comfortable traveling at low tide after the mud incident the day before so we decided we needed to leave bright and early, anchor for about 4 hours somewhere near the St. John's River (which would have 3.8 kt currents AGAINST us as we traveled the 21 miles upstream to Jacksonville) and then leave at 2 pm in order to be at the marina by 5:30. Off we went - waving goodbye to Mary and Lance in Amanzi on our way out. It was really nice to see them again - we may be able to catch up one last time before leaving for Cleveland next week. The third picture is just an example of the factories that are along the ICW - not in Georgia anymore with it's nothing but marshes!

The white pelicans ARE around! Guess we weren't far enough south yet - and they must like being south as much as we do :-) Regardless, it was a very calm and uneventful 3 hours down to the junction with the St. John's River.

We anchored for 4 hours waiting for the ebb current to change but even at 2 pm it wasn't really ever in our favor for much of the 21 miles up the St. John's River. It, by the way, is one of the few rivers in the US that flows north. Of course the Cuyahoga flows north also but apparently there aren't very many others that do. Passed container ships being unloaded again - lots of shipping in the area. We timed how long it took to unload one container: 1 minute! Those crane operators are GOOD!

See Jacksonville from the water? Of course not - it's covered by rain clouds! Some of the tall buildings did appear every so often but the rain didn't last too long and no thunder involved so all was well. By the time we went through downtown, the rain had quit but boy was it getting dark fast - how much farther to the marina??? One bridge was listed on the charts at having a clearance of 9 feet so of course I'm on the radio calling the bridge operator - no response. The sun is blinding - can't hardly make out the bridge but I continued to call. Turns out the bridge is under repair but they leave 1/2 of it open so boats can still get through. Seemed pretty narrow but we made it.

Now find our dock with the sun almost down. Steve did a great job spotting the correct pier and dock - in and tied up by 5:45. Long, long day it seemed.

So today it was pick up a rental car and visit where we "live" in Green Cove Springs to pick up our mail. Second time we've been here in 3 years :-) We even have a fish tank! And finally - we thought of Matt as Steve spotted this parrot on a surfboard in a yard. Mmmmm ... maybe Matt and Wendy need one of these for THEIR yard? Christmas is coming....

Off tomorrow for Terri and Scott's for Thanksgiving. Looking forward to it ... back to blogging next week!

Monday November 21: Old Ferandina, FL :-)

It was an early start yesterday from the anchorage as we wanted to make it in early to St. Simons Island (about 4 hours away). Our first anchoring out since Steve broke his arm went well and he was able to handle the final securing of the anchor well. Again a peaceful quiet day - this is an island that seems to be someones little piece of paradise :-)

We're still traveling through the mud marshes of Georgia - it's really amazing how much water must go in and out of the inlets to the ocean twice each day. Makes me wonder what affect the moon has on my body if it can affect the oceans the way it does .... Many birds along the waterway during low tide including a couple of white pelicans. While there were huge flocks of these birds as we traveled down the rivers last year, there are very few around the coast. Most fun today: traveling down the Little Mud River. I was just glad it wasn't named the Little Rock River! Shallow but no issues hitting bottom.

Once through that stretch, the river widened up nicely and stayed this way through the marshes until we arrived at our marina. Apparently the cormorants like to stand on the markers with wings open trying to get dry!

The marina here is very nice - made it here in time for lunch and Steve finally was able to have oysters on the half shell. We thought this boat was a bit over the edge: 4 300 horsepower outboards!!

And as advertised, blueberry muffins and a paper delivered to the boat about 6:30 am. The best part was the headlines :-) It didn't really occur to me that we were probably in Jaguar country so it was fun having the Browns finally win one at the end - although it seemed until the very last play that we were indeed going to loose. What were they thinking throwing the ball instead of giving it to the runner that already had shown he was almost unstoppable? No matter - it worked for me!

Up this morning, take the loaner car for breakfast and a quick look at the pier on the island. I love how they keep the seagulls off of the lights! But the tide is going out (the water was up to the rocks at tide) and we need to get going: more Georgia mud today.

First was the passage through Jekyll Creek at almost low tide (not the best plan :-) ) but little did we know that we were following a sailboat that draws 6' 8" of water to our measly 3' 8"! If he can make it, so can we. Of course that's when I heard him call his friends to say he was sitting on bottom. Yikes. I passed him and asked if he wanted us to pull him but he just said it would be nice if I went ahead and could find the deeper water. So I did and he was able to power off the mud and follow us out of the creek. Finally - wide open water again - but lots of sand bars. This is the north end of Cumberland Island.

Aahh - relaxing again with wide rivers and no wind ..... until the mud got me. Rule number 1: you can't always trust the chart plotter to lead the way! As you can see by the track, we hit mud, backed off, hit mud again, backed off again, finally turned around and then went the way everyone else did - over the marsh! Of course the marsh really wasn't there - who knew? So we did all of this when it seemed like it was the boat freeway - so many watching us flounder around in the mud. Oh well .... at least the tide was coming in so worst case: we would have waited for it to float us off.

So we are safely tied to a dock on Amelia Island close to Lance and Mary (Amanzi from Baltimore). They will be here a week getting stuff ready to head to the Bahamas. For us, Jacksonville for a month or so of downtime.

Saturday November 19: Most of the way through Georgia!

We're anchored in the New Teakettle Creek tonight as the run to a marina was just not a reasonable distance and there is NOTHING in this part of Georgia! We should make it into Florida sometime Monday. The anchorage is very quiet and peaceful - the sunset started out nice and just continued to improve :-) The tide will drop and raise 7 feet by morning so it's important that we are in the center of the creek - would hate to swing into shallow water when the now outgoing tide switches to incoming and the boat swings with it 180 degrees.

The travel days have been nice enough - sometimes cool, windy and others sunny and warm. As we approached the Savannah River, I noticed something over the tree tops: very large container ship. We were crossing the main channel so it seemed like he should get to go first!

Thanksgiving is everywhere of course but it's notable that this turkey is surrounded by blooming flowers :-) The live oaks are everywhere I guess. We had used a courtesy car from the marina last night to go to Walmart for a few things and came to a road that had a height restriction: it was due to a large limb from a live oak tree stretching way across the road!

When I first saw this shrimp boat in this picture from a distance, I couldn't figure out what it was - airplane? half sunken ship? But just a shrimp boat with arms and nets out sitting off in the marshes in a small creek.

The birds were again following us again. It must be the open water.We have passed 4 very large sounds/inlets that can produce some nasty waves if the tide and winds are opposite each other. Fortunately that's not been the case for us.

The last 3 days have been a combined 150 miles. Tomorrow we'll go only 30 - get in early and see if the Browns can do anything! (It's a marina that brings you blueberry muffins and a newspaper in the morning - almost as good as it gets!)