Lay over in St Augustine

It has been a change for us being land lubbers now for the last week and more. Having both daughters around and Josh has been nice. Or should we say them having us around actually. Invading their home and changing there pace for a few weeks. The first day we got to Josh and Leslie's place Jeannie and I just kicked back and did nothing as they both had to work. Andrea flew in on Monday night and the 3 of us went to pick her up at the Jacksonville airport later Monday night. Randy was dropped off and he went in to meet Andrea and get her bags. Well in that process as Andrea's bag was on the baggage carousal she told Randy there that one is my bag. So I picked it up and off we went with her carry on bag and the bigger bag. Well as we were leaving the terminal with both bags going to the waiting car. A young girl came up saying sir, I think you have my bag. I looked so dumbfounded as Andrea told me to get that bag. Heck I had no idea that it was not hers. Well what are the chances of having 2 bags looking the same and both with a pink tag for ID on them. The young girls dad was there and he kind of laughed at what happened as he had seen Andrea's name on the one that was still on the turn style. So back in we went and got that one and MAKING sure it was hers. The week that Andrea was at Leslie's and Josh's was filled with shopping and the 3 women doing their thing as Josh worked and I went to the boat a few days to do projects. One thing was measuring for a make shift table so when we have guests over we can have meals and drinks. We never thought of having friends that we meet along the way over for drink and snacks. But hey we are newbies to this. Our large table sits in our basement so a make due one is being made. The other project was running heavier wire for the solar panels and a new style of controller. One that gives the panels more of a boost and uses more energy from them. Just more boat dollars. Being out on the new mooring balls that St Augustine has now requires one to either use there dingy which many do, or to take the water taxi. But the water taxi only runs till 4 pm so you need to make sure your not wanting to go back out after 4pm. So we just leave our dingy in the pile with the rest. One of the nights when Andrea was here we all went down to Ormond Beach to have dinner with Jeannie's sister, Jeanette whom we met at Chile's restaurant.
That is always a good time seeing her and catching up on the latest. As usually it involves a shopping trip over in the mall after we eat. I know Jeannie has really enjoyed having both daughter's in one place as it does not get to happen that often now that everyone has there own life and work schedules. Lots of laughs were heard as Andrea was her ole self coming back home from Ormond beach. We were all laughing in tears. The first week went bye fast as we were all on the go doing things, then it came time for Andrea to go back home. So we all went back to the airport to see her off and yes we all had tears. But the good thing is next time we see her she will have her 2nd son Cruz as she is due the end of January as Jeannie will be flying home to be with her at that time. Having access to a car has been a blessing as we need to provision for the trip over to the Bahama's. So after we dropped of Andrea we stopped to BJ's which is a wholesale store and we stocked up on a few things. The kids eyes were big when we started picking out things and there car was what you call full. Yes we have more to get still. Having been to the kids home a lot over the years, there neighbor 's Rob & Tina always seem to feed us one meal at least when we visit.
Well to show them our gratitude we accepted a day to baby sit their daughter Audrey who is not one yet. I think it was a lets see who can wear who out day. Well Audrey won as she did not want to nap as all she wanted was to play which we loved doing with her. This was the first year in 16 years that we have had Thanks giving with Leslie. We were all very blessed to be here. Josh did a deep fried turkey and as usual it is always good. It was just the 4 of us eating dinner that day. We have been eating left overs the last few days which is always better 2nd time around. Having gotten most of our supplies here in St Augustine we are pretty close to being set to cross over to the Bahamas now. Once we leave the kids on Saturday we will be heading out Sunday for Vero Beach and then to Lake Worth to set and wait for a weather window. We have enjoyed St Augustine Municipal Marina. They have really fixed it up quite nicely, and the staff is very helpful. So until spring of 2o11 we are out of here, and on to the next part of our journey!

We are still out here.

Arriving in Charleston we decided to take a slip for a couple of days as we had planned on walking the town and needed fuel and water. We have heard so much about Charleston that we wanted to spend a few days here looking around. Having had met Tom and Chris on Polar Pacer prior to stopping here. They knew quite a lot about the city from last year so we had a guided tour basically from them. Seeing a lot of the old homes and mansions as we also took a tour of the slave market. Which proved to be very interesting and educational to both of us. The last few months have been like a living history lesson for us both. As there is so much to see as we would love to spend more time at each place we stop. But the cold weather we know will soon come. Seeing the ICW at 6 KTS gives you time to look as we have seen so much along the way. As oh yea I live in the pink house. Actually we have seen many pink house’s As we have gotten further south we are now starting to see more and more boats heading south. Yes as the veterans’ that have done this before have told us it will be like a parade at times. We now run into other boats that we have seen in the past as we all seem to hop scotch along at different times. One thing is that we did not figure on is staying in more marina’s then we had planed on, It sure blows the budget .It is easy to get into the habit but hey, it is our first time doing this. What is interesting is seeing boats along the way that are just left and abandon. Most are stripped of anything good as I was sure looking. As we were told they have been there last year even, but not all of them. Some were new. What is interesting is to see the landscape change ever so slowly as we get further south and the climate change. Over the miles we have traveled on the ICW we have seen so many beautiful boats and some huge ones traveling the waterway. The further south we get the bigger the tides are starting to become. As I will say I have been so tempted to want to jump out in the ocean to make some miles but as we listen to the weather on the vhf it has been out of the north so much but to strong of winds for us to feel comfortable. As I do not want Jeannie to feel threatened. So I have conceded to doing the ICW as we talked about it when we first started out on this venture. As all the veterans tell us you have to do it once. To experience it. The thing that is the hardest I think is setting and waiting for a weather window to jump out and head south as in like doing a 18 hour run down the coast in the Atlantic. I know we will get our chance as we kind of had it ruff in the first time in the Atlantic coming out of New York. As we have moved on and did the Georgia ICW. Many have told us we will only do that state once as the ICW is so shallow Well knock on wood we never ran aground in Georgia but we have a total of 3 times so far and was in states north of Georgia. One of the times we decide to wait for the tide to come back in as it was just about low tide anyway.That happened when we were trying to help our friends Tom & Chris on Polar Pacer as he got sucked onto a sand bar by the current as we had anchored in a different spot and I had gotten in the dink to try and push his bow around but he ended up calling Tow Boat Us. Getting back to Georgia. It has sooo much swamp land that we traveled through. This part of the ICW we did pay attention to the tides as in Georgia it is 10 feet. Some of the places we had to go through only showed that it had 1 foot of water at low tide. So as the logical thing is to do it at high tide. But not all do as you will hear on the VHF someone running aground. Georgia is by no means a straight shot down the ICW. But we did it in 5 days. In the days we did manage to go through Georgia we hit the coldest of the year and we had 2 days that it was 41 and 40 inside when we woke up. It was dang cold as Jeannie looked like a mole with only her nose sticking out of the covers.
One thing we have learned is that having a schedule on a boat is not wise. So many variables’ come into play in trying we only went 25 miles and found a hole to anchor in and waited till the next day for high tide and would run as far as we dared to before finding a hole again to anchor in.
The guide books that we have are great at telling you where these are and most have plenty of room for many boats. What is something I have not figured out is why the higher tides in Georgia and not in other places. Once we got anchored in the middle of the day it was interesting to stand on top of the boat and watch the mast weave in and out of where we had been or where to keep one. But we have only one left and that is getting to Saint Augustine to see our daughter and son in law.
What we have been doing is we knew our daily mileage average and as it started to drop the closer we got to Saint Augustine it gave us time to stay a few places for a couple of days each. One of the places was Jekyll Island.

There we spent some time walking around the island and had a guy stop and pick us and Tom & Chris up and gave us a ride to the older part of the island where the mansions were. This was a history lesson as well.
It is sure amazing to see where the money was in the early years on the century. Once again we left the camera back at the boat as we keep kicking ourselves for leaving it. Ah yea we will learn eventually. Ya think! The other place that we stopped at and spent some time was Cumberland Island National sea shore. There we finally did take our camera. Hurrah! Here on that island we managed to take a tour with a park ranger and that proved a wise decision. Some of this island is still in the hands of the past owners of the homes and mansions’ that are still on the island,

It is also one of the islands where wild horses roam. We had asked if they monitor how many are on the island and they told us they let nature do it all. But will step in only if needed. There are only a few types of animals on the island as deer, wild boar, and armadillos which we did manage to see a few of. They could care less if your around. Them as they went on their way looking for food. The horse we seen kept there distance but I was suppressed how close you could get as Tom of Polar Pacer tried. Once we left Cumberland Island went to Fernandina Fl and stayed at the city marina to wash and top op our fuel and water and do a pump out. We wanted to be pumped out and have a receipt of it as Florida is tough on over board discharge we hear. The other thing that was on our list to do is to get set up for customs when we come back into the country in the spring.
Fernandina we heard was a very easy place to do all the paper work and it proved to be true. So we are now set to come back into the states in the spring as all we need to do is a phone call and tell them where we are located. At this point we were only 2 days away from Saint Augustine and seeing the kids, Hura!

The last night we spent on anchor before arriving in Saint Augustine was at pine Island, along with Polar Pacer and Snook, a couple out of MD on a Baba 30 that we have met. As there were 9 other boats in the anchorage that night, It was a beautiful night as I could see the light house at Saint Augustine once it got dark out . As we got closer to Saint Augustine things started to look familiar but was rather interesting seeing it from the water this time. It was a nice feeling knowing that we have come this far and that this is a leg of our journey that we were looking forward to. We arrived on the 14th of Nov in St Augustine and will be staying with the kids for 2 weeks as our youngest flies in Monday night for a week to be with us all. Just a note from Jeannie now. We have learned along the way, that multi boat potlucks are a part of the cruising scene, and we love it! Sometimes it is just drinks before our separate dinners or after dinner drinks. It is a life style we find very enjoyable. Every boater we have met along the way has been very friendly! Now we are on land in St Augustine! On our arrival at Leslie & Josh's home I twirled around and exclaimed "I am on land and in a home"! I probably will get antsy and want to get back on the ICW, but for now I am enjoying my family!

Warmer Weather

Well as we get further into the cruising life we are sure learning a lot. One thing is the tides and how to use them to your favor. When we came down the Hudson River we never really gave it much thought to look when the max current was to be. We just got up at day light and took off. So by the time we got to the Delaware River we were a bit more educated and thanks to others teaching us. Simple Pleasure and Mutual Fun headed out and up the Delaware in a head wind but with the tide we made great time. It was like riding the top of a wave all the way up the Delaware River. It was amazing to look at the speed we were doing on the gps and still having a head wind. We had to wait till just after 10 am to leave so we had max current going in our favor and went all the way up to Reedy island which is just before going into the C&D canal.
That connects the Delaware Bay and the Chesapeake Bay to each other. It is 14 miles long and 3/4 of the way down it is a town called Chesapeake City. A quaint little town and one that goes back in time. It is very interesting to see some of the small houses which have been kept up and the whole town was interesting wandering through it. We were lucky enough to get a free space on the city dock along with Simple pleasure for a night. The c&d canal is a main freighter canal that many huge ships pass through. We were very happy not to come into contact with any large ships passing on the canal. But we seen a few go by as we sat on the city dock watching. As we left Chesapeake City headed for Annapolis the weather was not the best. We had rain and winds out of the north which pushed us down the Chesapeake which it did. It was one of those days that your glad it is over but have to give our autopilot a lot of credit. I would look back as Simple Pleasure was following us and we both were wallowing through the waves and running around 9 kts. That did a lot of the work till it got to ruff that it could not handle it. The waves were on our stern most of the way and for the first time ever with this boat we had a wave come up the rear and flooded the cockpit floor. Tis what you wear rubber boots for right! As we got closer to Annapolis the rain had lighten up some. Arriving in Annapolis we had friends Marv and Roni that we were meeting up with as they were staying in a condo and it had a slip available so we rented the slip for 7 days right in spa creek. It made it nice as we had friends also coming to stay aboard Mutual Fun. John and Bev from our old marina stayed 3 nights with us and what a great time we had. The whole week was busy as we had many nights out with Marv,Roni,John,Bev and Mutual Fun going to different restaurants and eating out.
We had some other friends that I had met last year out in Annapolis and over the internet that we had a chance to see as well. Dave and Dona that has been working on a boat and will be cruising next year also. We were doing well on our budget till going to the boat show as we ended up buying a new main sail as ours was 20 years old and lost it shape. The 6 of us and Simple Pleasure ended up going to a cruisers party one night that was put on by a local yacht club while at the show. Their we met many more that were heading south and this time it felt different as we were a part of the cruisers now and had experienced a few things getting there.

After leaving the Annapolis we headed south down the Chesapeake towards Norfolk as it is very interesting seeing all the different places one could spend time here on the Chesapeake just sailing around and anchoring. Oh the other big thing one notices is the presence of the military when out in this part of the country. Jeannie and I do not know how many airshows we had while on the Chesapeake.
But it is was very cool. Ah the high light of this leg of the trip was the day we left Deltaville after seeing some other friends that were from Michigan, Mike and Kathy. We were around the Solomon Island area and on the vhf radio the navy was telling us of boats in the area of the bombing range to divert course towards shore. Well the navy had a patrol boat out making sure we did. About 45 min later we started hearing and seeing a lot of fighter jets and what a show. Then they disappeared but could still hear the roar of them going by and the water started exploding as they were dropping bombs at a target out in the range. Just our tax dollars at work. Getting into Norfolk we had sailed all the way and as we were entering the harbor and with navy ships coming in and as well. I went to start the engine and yikes, nothing, we had lost power to the starter and what it was is had a coolant leak onto some connections which shorted out the wires for the start system. So some quick thinking and a few checks and way it turned over. We knew there was a lot of military in the Norfolk area but did not know it was the largest navel base in the world. As well as many ship building companies. Where the ICW starts is called hospital point in Norfolk. That was one of our places we anchored along with about 15 other boats heading south.


The day we left hospital point and into the ICW, we got stopped by the navy as we were traveling with Simple Pleasure and some how they made it past but a new navy ship was being pushed out by tugs and the boys in the inflatable with big guns came over and told us we had to stop NOW! I asked if we could just slowly get buy and they said stop the boat now, OK OK. So we happened to be right next to a dock with a couple standing there and we got out lines and tossed it to them while we waited about 20 min for the ship to get by. After we got the Ok to proceed we then headed down the ICW and had a choice to make. Weather to take the Virgina cut route or the Dismal swamp route. So hearing so much about the swamp route off we went to it.
It is a long canal that is cut out of the swamp and is about 6 feet deep and has a lock on each end so the depth is controlled all of the time. We have heard stories of thumping logs and so on and it was true, we thumped something but nothing hard. Over half way through the canal there is a welcome center.
On one side it is a rest stop for cars and the other side is the canal. So we had a lot of people coming down and asking questions and wanting to talk. The dock has room for around 4 boats but what you do is raft off of one of the boats on the dock. So we rafted off a Catalina 30 and then we had a catamaran named Polar Pacer from Toronto raft off of us in all I think that night we had like 10 boats there. From there we took off and headed to Elizabeth city NC. Which was a nice stop over for 3 days.
Here we met up with many others that we have met along the way as now we are starting to be in a group as you can see that everyone is heading south. Just a slow progression. It is a nice way to see the east coast at 6 kts.

The night before we got to River Dunes marina we were anchored with polar pacer up a creek and the next morning we went to pull the anchor and it would not come up. Polar Pacer stuck around giving us a hand as they tried to hook on to the anchor and pull it backwards to break it free with now luck. We work over 1 1/2 hours getting it up and even called Tow Boat US for help. Well just before they got to us we got it up. Have no idea what we were stuck on either as it came up clean and no mud. River Dunes marina is one that is very new only 3rd season and it is the nicest we have ever stayed in. It is a treat for us both as the shower had 5 heads in it and only $1.25 per boat foot for cost.

Long Awaited Update

Wow we have so much to cover here. It is not that we did not want to post but getting a good wifi signal has been our issue. This posting Jeannie has things also that she will post as well. We finally finished up the Hudson river and I have to say that it is very breath taking and to see all the different places that we have read about and that you hear about in your lifetime. Just looking back at the whole Hudson River is sometime to really appreciate. There is so much transition one sees going down the Hudson River. Seeing Bannerman Castle and West Point Bannerman was one that was very run down and falling apart but they now have a trust set up to restore it back to how it was built.

Then getting to go down the Hudson in a sailboat is a plus in my book. It is like every turn there is something new and mountains on each side. As we got about half way down the Hudson you start seeing tankers and tugs with barges going up and down the river. Talking to them was interesting on the radio as all were very nice and they told us where they wanted us on the river so they could pass us. The river is very wide and the current runs both ways because of the tide going in and out. When were done for the day we just usually looked for a spot to just pull off to the side as there are not many anchorages with a lot of protection. Some of the places we have stayed were very interesting and some were just oh hum, Jeannie had a niece that we stopped to see for a couple of days and spent time with Linda, her husband, Mark, and their daughter Amanda, in Thiells, NY. We got a slip for 2 nights at Haverstraw Marina. Mark picked us up and took us to their home. What a very nice home, so comfy and cozy and a beautiful big deck off the back. Both nights after Linda got home we would have cocktails on the deck, and Mark and Amanda would come along shortly. They treated us to dinner out the 1st night and then again for pizza the next night! I was able to do laundry and their neighbor, Scott was kind enough to see that we got to the grocery store! Linda cut Randy’s hair and fine tuned mine a little bit. The morning we left, Mark went and got fresh bagels for all of us to have for breakfast. At this point I want to say, Amanda, you are a very sweet young lady and continue to have fun in Volleyball! Just a last comment. Being on the Atlantic ocean has not been my favorite this far in our journey! We were caught in monstrous waves, and 25 kt wind and it was not pretty! I do have to say that the trip on the sea to Cape May was almost enough to forget the bad trip earlier, but not totally. I would never ever have done this without Capt Randy at the helm, as I was not much help during the night we braved the waters!
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Approaching New York is pretty awesome and going past it was something. When we got closer to the down town district the VHF radio was abuzz with coast guard security. As we had heard of a helicopter going down some place around the river. But something else we did not know was of the big UN meeting. As the East river was shut down and only letting certin ships through and then with a coast guard escort. Having neither one of us being to NY it was quite a site for us to see. Especially from the river looking back at it. As one of the things we all think about was the Twin towers, Well we were not sure where it was but long behold we got some pictures of the new tower going up. It was quite a site to see. As we were traveling down the river and trying to see everything you needed to watch the ferries going back and forth and tour boats. Then came the statue of Liberty. Ellis Island and the Battery. Seeing all of that and trying to read up on some of the history of different things was great. Something I hated in school. As we past all of that and our leg of the trip on the Hudson river coming to a end. Our Next leg was the Atlantic Ocean. We had to go down to Sandy Hook NJ and leave from there. That is the opening to the Atlantic in New York harbor, There were tankers and freighter anchored all over the place waiting transit or to be taken up river. Something we noticed was the freighters on the great lakes were bigger then the ones in NY harbor.
The trip on the Atlantic was to be 120 miles which is to Cape May NJ. Then that lets us go up the Delaware bay. Well not having internet to look at the weather we had to rely on our friend Bill back in Mi. We would call him and he would do our leg work for us and give us daily reports. Along with them and listening to NOAA on our VHF. We made the decision to go the next morning after we arrived in Sandy Hook. So Noaa told us that it was to be 5 to 10 Kts winds out of the south then switching east in the early morning. So we thought that is the time to go, and we did. Well we had so much and the wind came up to 15 kts. We pounded into the waves for about 30 miles and decided to pull into a port. That was Manasquan Inlet. There we sat for 2 days awaiting a wind direction change. Once again or weather man in Mi and NOAA, told us that winds were to shift to the north and once again 5 to 10 Kts, Well it ended up we had 25 kts out of the north and what a ride we had. We were both VERY glad to get into the next port as we had left at 2 am that morning. Jeannie was a real trooper as we both hugged each other once we dropped the anchor . As I was in need of much sleep. As our friend Bob that use to be our slip mate back in Mi called NOAA Not overly accurate assumption. Bob is so right. At that inlet which was Barnegat Inlet we met up with Simple Pleasure once again as we had met them in Buffalo when we took our mast down. As the weather pattern was not looking good, for the next few days. MutualFun had agreed to go out and see what the waves were like the next day. Well it was only less then a mile out in the Atlantic that we decided to turn around and come back in and rethink things. Well thanks to simple Pleasure and there idea we took the NJ Inter Coastal Waterway with them the next 2 days traveling the NJ- ICW. That was very interesting also. We draw 5 ft and lots of the depth was 6 feet. When we started out in this leg of the ICW we had to wait for high tide so it gave us a extra 3 feet just so we could make it past a few spots. We just kept thinking oh baby come on do not run aground. Which we never did. Our only night we spent anchoring on the New Jersey ICW we spent the night listening to 30 kt winds howling all night. The next morning once again we had to wait till high tide to make it past a few stretches. Simple Pleasure said why not you go first as you draw more and if you get stuck we can get to you, So off we went twisting and turning through the saw grass and praying for deep water. We made it finally to Atlantic City NJ on our 2nd day. There we got a slip at the aquarium marina which was just inside of the inlet to the Atlantic. The next morning it was a sign to leave as all the sailboats were heading out so Mutualfun followed suit. We pulled out just a little after 8 am to light North winds and gently rolling seas. The waves would pick you up and gently and down you would go. Much different then lake Michigan but it was a very nice ride down to Cape May NJ. We knew that we had a small weather window to get to Cape May so we arrived around 3 pm and anchored off the coast guard station. There you could hear the cadence of the young recruits as they were training. We knew that the weather was going to turn bad the next few days as once we anchored it was not long that many other sailboats were starting to stack up around us as the winds were to be 30 to 40 kts during the night. So between Simple Pleasure and MutualFun we decided to get a slip in a marina just past the first 55 foot bridge in the Cape May channel. Now when you have 53 feet of mast sticking up and a bridge clearance of 55 feet with the tide on the low end of 3 feet. It still gave me an uneasy feeling.

It was the Miss Chris Marina we stayed at, It is where the whale watching boats come out of. People come by the bus loads to board the boats and go out about 12 miles in search for whales. It is here we will leave for the next leg of the trip up the Delaware bay and through the C & D canal which joins the Delaware Bay and the Chesapeake Bay to each other.