A couple of pages are new at the top of the post, Passage Food that can help in planning. It's not a list for crossing the Atlantic, but we are outside for 3 or 4 days and it helps to have a base list for grab n go food when you're rocking and rolling. Also a gardens to visit page with a list of relatively nearby gardens close to the coast. Check out these two new pages under construction. The list will definitely grow as I remember and add exemplary public botanical gardens. The other pages are organized and updated as we travel.
A few things that make St. Augustine a fun spot to visit.
The trolleys, and there are many of them, have drivers who tell the history of the city. It is the city of lights at Christmas, the city of churches - Flagler wanted many denominations and had beautiful churches built or restored. The town sort of has a European flare with fountains and spanish architecture.
Carriages carry people around the historic town.
The Fort plan and it's shape today. It was actively manned as a fort through the second world war. It became a tourist site about 1945.
The fort is one of the sites right on the inlet used to protect the city from the French and British capture from 1565. It is a National Park so the rangers speak at programs throughout the day. This fort is one the oldest standing because it was built of coquina, a mixture of shells and calcium that over the years of settling create a special kind of rock. They were cut into squares to build the walls. This material could withstand cannon balls because it absorbed the shock and did not fall away nor crash through.
Inside the courtyard.
In conjunction with favorable wind, tide and current we left about 8:30 am. I was at the helm as I started to back out. The current was so strong it pinned us against the dock. I couldn't move. All the lines were off of the dock and posts and I couldn't move. With turns and bow thruster slowly we motored out of the slip without hitting any boats. But it was close. We waited a few minutes for the 9 am opening of the bridge and headed out.
It was very rocky out of the inlet because the wind was going against an outgoing tide and current lifting up the whitcapped waves. I with my transderm patch behind my ear continue to have absolutely no seasickness. We put up the jib in a nice northeast wind about 12 k and settled in with the auto pilot to follow the course.
Here is the lighthouse on Amelia Island just as we turn south for Fort Pierce, a 30 hour ride at 6k. Again we planned the hours in order to arrive at the Fort Pierce Inlet with an
in -going tide and current.
You can see the swells and whitecaps.
Here's our Navionics route south for about 165 miles - the white circles. The red was the showing the current at about 2 k going into the Fort Pierce Inlet. The bottom shows the ebb and flow of the tides and where we are in the cycle. Another indicator that we are headed south is the sea temperature. It went from 71 to 77 degrees in 30 hours. Nice.
As the sunset here is one of many fishing boats we passed going south. These fishing boats have flocks of sea birds following them. We watched flocks of pelicans sitting on the water. Never seen so many at once. (but not in this picture.)
Strange picture but it is the moon on the jib sheet in the middle of the night.
Coming in the Fort Pierce Inlet with a rocky breakwater to block the northwind waves on the north side. See the colorful umbrellas. Temperature is 75. Lots of Florida sunshine.
The other side of the inlet. Nice silhouetted palms.
For the first time ever a rigid inflatable Coast Guard boat came up along side in the middle of the inlet, Drew at the helm, me just watching the buoys. Drew slowed right down. Many boaters had told us of how they had been boarded and answered their questions. Boat to boat they asked us where we came from, where are we headed, and how many were on board. They never boarded us. Very courteous and that was it.
We continued into the protected waterway and motored into Harbortown Marina, nicely protected from wind and wakes behind these mangroves.
View from our table at the marina restaurant. We had conk fritters, peel and eat shrimp, seared tuna spring roll and artichoke hearts filled with crab. sooo good.
Lots more pelicans down here. Hadn't seen one until we got this far south.
Mazu at my feet at the restaurant, patient girl.
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One of the better pictures I've taken.
THE NEXT DAY, Saturday
We slept til 8:30 and then did the usual chores, find the dog park, walk the dog, hose down the boat from all the salt of the trip, inside the pulleys, the in-mast furling gear, etc.
And then, we, yes we, took a really long walk from the Marina to the beach, 6 miles round trip and here's what we saw:
Man throwing fishing net into the water.
On the way back we heard music floating in the air, drank margaritas at this great watering hole, Mazu along, A good band that plays 2-5 PM, close harmony blue grass and country. At Little Jim's Bait and Tackle --Mostly beer, wine served and a crowd appreciative of well played music.
This bait shop is very near the US Navy Seals Museum. The wall was full of Navy Seal signs.
No colorful sunset tonight. We went home to read, do this blog, fix my phone so the pictures would send to my computer. That's why the blog was delayed: 30 hours sailing outside, and the glitches getting all these pictures downloaded. If we had followed the ICW waterway it would have taken us 5 days and no sail.
Tomorrow we explore the town. Really want to show a nearby Heathcote Botanical garden. https://www.heathcotebotanicalgardens.org/
Next Friday we leave with Mazu on the plane for Boston, leaving the boat with a long "fix this" list for Whiticar Boat Works for 2 months.
All in all everything is working pretty well. Tomorrow we will take down the jib because we can see it needs resewing. When coming about, running the jib through the slot without the stay sail up causes it to get stuck and pull on a stay -- thus it became frayed and ragged.
I am hoping to go swimming in the ocean. There is a triangular pool here - we'll see.
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