St. Augustine

Raydiance (center) on mooring in St. Augustine

St. Augustine from our mooring

St. Augustine has to be one of my favorite places so far. On a windy Sunday (the 25th) we picked up a mooring ball in the field south of the Bridge of Lions.  When we were with the Hans in Key Biscayne, Susan showed me the method she used for picking up the mooring line using a grapple hook attached to a floating line. This is the first time I had a chance to use it and I am here to testify that it is far superior to dangling over the bow with a fully extended boat hook.  My poor bent boat hook will attest to that also! 

 After going ashore by dinghy, we took the tram around town to acquaint ourselves with the area.  We ended up being the last two people on the last tram of the day and we had a great time joking with the driver.  Then it was on to dinner at the A1A Ale Works.  Put it on your list and be sure to order the cheese soup. Wonderful!!

Breakfast had to start at Sara's for crepes.

 The next day we donned hiking shoes and walked all over the historic part of town-Castillo de San Marcos, the Lightner Museum which at one time was a hotel owned by Henry Flagler, Flagler College which also at one time was a Flagler Hotel, and of course the not so old shops!

View from top of Castillo de San Marcos

Long gun demonstration outside of fort.  Glad we were moored on the other side of the bridge!

Castillo de San Marcos from the ICW

 The Lightner Museum is reminiscent of House on the Rock but classier.  It has numerous unrelated exhibits including a room of old music machines which were demonstrated while we were there.  Lunch was at Café Alcazar which is located on the floor of the hotel’s old swimming pool.  

Sorry, friends, I couldn't figure out how to liberate all these buttons.

Lunch on the swimming pool floor

Two heads are better than one!

This disgusting shrunken head fascinated me.

Flagler College

Lightner Museum

Henry Flagler, a partner in Standard Oil who built the railroad all the way down the east coast to Key West, built two hotels in St. Augustine.  One is now Flagler College and the other is the Lightner Museum.  He also had a third hotel which, according the the trolley driver, he swindled from the original owner.  

Other interesting sights were the old city wall and the oldest wooden schoolhouse in the US.

Plaque at the old city gate

Tom by the old city gate.  The pillars and  wall are made of coquina which is a "cement" made of sand, shells, lime and water.   The walls of the Castillo were also made of this.

Oldest wooden schoolhouse.  The horse is Sarah's school's mascot.  I am doing a separate blog for her class,so Jefferson (the horse) is occasionally in the pictures.  As you can imagine,  Tom is thrilled to hold the little horse as people pass by with questioning looks!

The day ended with dinner at Harry's  on the Bayfront.  Another yum.  Thank heavens we are walking a lot!  Still may need weight watchers upon return.

Hutchison Island to St. Augustine

Hutchison Island.  Greg and Kate's condo is highrise on right and Godfrey's condo is highrise on left.  Very handy!

On Friday, March 15^th, we left Soveral Harbor in Jupiter before 8 a.m. and scooted right next door to Sovereign Marine (efficient and economical) where we had Raydiance pulled to change zincs and powerwash the bottom.  We were back in the water headed for Nettles Island Marina on Jenson Beach in just over an hour.  Our Tenn-Tom traveling buddies, Kate and Greg Pfleger aboard Grianan, have a condo on Hutchison Island right across from the marina we chose to stay in (which unknown to us was their home-away-from-home marina).  We got in touch with them and had cocktails at their condo and dinner at the marina.  We were joined by their good friends, Bob and Jan Keebler, who were great fun. Both couples are very knowledgeable about boating along the east coast so we picked  up many tips from them.  Earlier in the day, we had lunch with Janet Douglas’s cousin and her husband, Sharon and  Ron Godfrey.  The week prior, Ron had been inducted into the ACC Basketball Hall of Fame.  Very interesting people.  The next day was St. Patrick’s Day and Kate invited us to join them and the Keeblers for a home-cooked corned beef dinner.  YUM!  During the day, a specialist from Mastery Engines, Ron List, came over and worked on the throttles and instruments.  He spent a warm day crawling around the bilge leaving us with throttles that synchronize  and gauges that don’t jump all over the place.  It’s wonderful!!!  This man helped write the original programs so he really knew his stuff.  Tom had made contact with him through the Miami Boat Show.  While the guys were doing mechanical repairs, I was getting a long overdue hair cut and color.  Tom is still holding out.  I’m beginning to think he is serious about growing a ponytail!

Ron and Sharon Godfrey at Nettles Island

Dinner at marina with Bob, Jan, Greg and Kate



We hadn’t anchored in quite a while so after leaving Nettles we choose a quiet spot behind Pine Island to spend the night before reaching Melbourne on the 19^th.  We were joined there by Rich, Missy and Bobby Ray.   The next day we journeyed to Cocoa—a beautiful day and a short hop of about 20 miles.  Cocoa Village Marina is a definite must stop.  Great facilities at the marina and a fun town to browse.   On Wednesday we took a day trip through the Port Canaveral Canal and Lock.  We were planning to go out on the ocean for a short run, but the winds had other plans.  On the return trip through the lock, which had a lift of maybe a foot, a class on a field trip was our audience.

                                                             Captain Bobby at the helm

                                              Missy and Rich soaking up sun on the foredeck

                                                Linda and Rich along Port Canaveral Canal

  Murals on side of parking garage along Port Canaveral Canal--gorgeous!

  I forgot to mention that we were boarded by pirates.

                                                                   field trip at the lock

                                                                                                                          

Arriving back at Cocoa, Linda and Rich redeemed themselves against Bobby and Tom in a final game of Pitch--this following two prior dredgings.  We rented a car and Tom drove the “e’s” back to Melbourne.  A much too short visit, but they plan to be with us again going into New York.  

On Thursday, we drove over to the Kennedy Space Center and spent the day in awe of what has been accomplished in that program.  We highly recommend this stop—only about 20 miles from Cocoa.  One exhibit displayed the banks of computers used during the Apollo missions and the comment was made that our iphones have contain more technology than those computers.  Truly put the accomplishments of the space program back then in perspective.

                                                             Engine of Saturn 5 rocket     

                                                             Engines on Saturn 5 rocket

                                          Command module-I never realized how small this was.      

                                                                           Moon buggy

launch pad

Coming back to the marina, we were delighted to find we had been joined by several loopers—some of whom we hadn’t seen since the Tenn-Tom.  Naturally this called for Docktails.

On Friday, the 23^rd,  we headed to New Smyrna Beach fifty two miles north.  This marina is run by the city  close to downtown.  They had a fine farmers’ market on Saturday which I took advantage of to stock up on fresh produce.   Saturday we moved in heavy rain and lots of week-end boat traffic to Palm Coast Marina (44 miles)  Then on to St. Augustine on Sunday.   St. Augustine was so special that it deserves its own separate post.  That will be next!

Florida Gold Coast

Our return from Nassau went very smoothly.  We left Nassau around 9 a.m. and  ran slowly until about 1 a.m. at which time we anchored just off the Banks near Bimini and slept for five hours. Along the way, Tom caught another dolphin fish, so we will enjoy mahi-mahi soon.  This time no fish story, but as you can see he did measure it since we had a difference of opinion on the size of the last one!

It IS over 2 feet long!

Returning to US waters, we notified customs of our arrival and cleared without problem.  However, they informed us we had to appear in person to clear immigration.  This meant a trip to downtown Miami which proved to be a 2 bus, peoplemover, taxi expedition.  We would never have made it without Greg's directions. Having gone through this fiasco, we applied for the local boaters option which allows you to clear both customs and immigration by phone.  We should be able to use this in Canada.

The yellow quarentine flag must be flown until customs and immigration are cleared.

Since we were in downtown Miami we decided to take in the Miami boat show.  It is a monster.  We only had time to see the exhibits in the convention center.  Wish we had been able to have the time to view the in-water sites.

Lighthouse Key Biscayne

Arriving in Key Biscayne 33 hours after leaving Nassau, we anchored near the Key Biscayne Yacht Club.  That evening we dinghyed to KBYC where we were met by Bob Duthie (our slip neighbor at Kenlake Marina) and his friend, Greg Han. Greg and his wife, Susan, graciously invited us to join them for dinner that evening at their home.  All of them are gold loopers, so many stories were exchanged.

Tom, Mavis and Bob Duthie, Susan and Greg Han 

Greg was able to get us a slip at KBYC where we stayed for two nights.  It was very windy on the bay, so we were grateful to be in calm waters.  While there, Tom was cleaning the swim platform one day when this fellow came for a visit.  Apparently manatees love the fresh water!  He was so ugly that he was cute.

South Beach

Since we had become experts at public transportation, we headed off to Miami Beach- a beautiful beach with lots of people and lots of condos.  Fun place to visit.  The picture to the right shows Linda by one of the lifeguard stands.  The yellow flag is a water condition medium caution and the purple one is warning of sea critters like man-o-war.  We just walked the beach and took in the sights.  Tom especially seemed to enjoy the sights!

And now we are in the land of condos, big $$$ homes, and even bigger $$$$$ boats.  We are constantly amazed at the number and size of both.  Many of the yachts are flying Cayman Island flags.  Think maybe there is a little money hidden there??

 

After Key Biscayne, we spent two nights at Coral Ridge Yacht Club in Lauderdale.  This gave us time to go to Port Everglades to have "interviews" for the local boater option.   We never were interviewed but again we had to appear in person to hand over our passports.  We left Coral Ridge Monday, Feb. 27th and went on up the ICW to Lighthouse Point where we kept the boat at "Joe's" while we went on our dive trip to Bonaire.  We found Joe's through a contact on the AGLCA forum, Ronnie Babin, who not only found the dock, but took us to the Miami airport. Way above and beyond!  Joe is quite a story!  His home and dock were beautiful and when asked what he did, he first told us, "I steal boats."  Seeing our reaction, he clarified that he and his group of ex-military buddies "liberated" boats that had been impounded by Central and South American governments.  We didn't ask too many questions, but judging by the house and dock, the jobs must pay well.  He had a lot of security around his property so we felt Raydiance was in very good hands.  When we returned from our dive trip, we resupplied (again with Ronnie's help) and left Joe's dock on March 12th heading to Jupiter.  We stayed at Soveral Marina (actually in North Palm Beach) which I would highly recommend.  On Wednesday we took in a Cardinals' spring training game.  A beautiful day, seats in the shade behind home plate,  all good except the Cardinals lost 4-3.  It was great fun to experience the small stadium and crowd of about 6,000.

David Freese hits a single bringing in a run.