Georgia on my mind

We were up and out of St Mary's around 8am our next destination being Brunswick GA just 32 miles away.  Not really sure why we planned a short day but here we are.  We have stayed at the Morning Star marina (St Simon Island) in the past but we have heard wonderful things about Brunswick Landing so we chose it for the night.  I guess we failed to plan properly today, being a Sunday, the town of Brunswick was completely shut down.  Dang, at least at Morning star they have a courtesy car.  Oh well, you would think that people who have been doing this cruising thing for almost a year and a half would have figured these things out, NOT! 
Tomorrow we will be heading to Kilkenny Creek 60 miles hopefully to anchor, this will also set us up to jump outside if the weather permits, this means traveling on the Atlantic ocean verses the ICW which is much faster as long as the wind and waves are minimal.  We shall see when the time comes.

I forgot to mention another reason for some of our looper friends to maybe consider St Mary's as a stop.  This is a great place to take a ferry to the Cumberland Island which is a must do thing!  Cumberland Island is where the wild horses are as well as a beautiful beach on the other side a very enjoyable walk, also there is an old mansion and a chapel where John Kennedy Jr got married. 
So for those who choose not to anchor you can get the ferry out of St Mary's.  For others its a great anchorage for a night or 2. 

I personally think the marshlands of Georgia are so beautiful, which is a good thing as there is plenty of it to see on the waterway, from Ga though the Carolina's.  I just can't seem to capture the beauty of the Marshes in a photo though, but I will keep tryin.

The not so good thing about Georgia is the huge tide swings, this sailboat on the inside of the dock is now sitting on the mud.  Sometimes its just to easy for the boat to find the bottom with shoaling due to the swift currents and extreme tides.  But thanks to helpful sites such as active captain   https://activecaptain.com/index.php
 the crusiers net
http://cruisersnet.net/
and of course trusty old Skipper Bob
www.skipperbob.net/
there is lots of great info out there to help with waterway warnings, alerts etc.

Standing on the waters edge,  in about 6 hours it will be filled in with water again.

Just a paddling away

Ahhh the end of another wonderful day on the water.

Traveling the east coast of Florida to Georgia

Since I lasted blogged we have been in Daytona, St Augustine, Jacksonville and now we are in St. Mary's Georgia.  Tomorrow if weather permits, we are hoping to get to St Simon's GA.  There are so many places we have not seen in GA even though we have traveled through this area twice before, but we are destination driven right now and we have 1500 miles to go.  We can spend more time when we come through in the fall.  Georgia is such a beautiful state and we particularly love the marshlands.

Sunset in St Augustine

Flamingo alert... click on photo to enlarge it's in the center

WOW he's far from home, Istanbul!

We thought it was a dead head but as we got closer ..... it's a Gator!



Brown Eyed Girl (from Ohio) and Passport (from MI)on our tail, we left them at St Augustine as they were staying one more night.  We may not see them again as we head home at a faster pace !  We have traveled on and off with them since Michigan they are about half looped now.

We are now in St Mary's GA we have been here once before and thought it a very nice town so we revisited.  The waterfront is very well done, they have many restaurants and small shops.  Very boater friendly and much more quaint than Fernandina Fl, though we like it there as well.

More of the waterfront, they had entertainment this evening and we didn't have to leave the boat. Live music with our cocktails.

SweetPea is at the end of this dock which is located on the waterfront. The docks in Georgia are loooong as their tides are BIG 8 foot tides in some areas. 

Yes he's real and he's got a girl friend inside there with him.  It's Spring!

Back in the US moving North

It was a great day for a crossing really could not of been any better. 

This was our buddy boat, No Snow they are from Ottawa, we first met Ron, Donna and Winnie in Stuart. They travelled over to the Bahama's a week ahead of us. And here we are 5-6 weeks later crossing back to the states with them.  Yup that's what cruising is all about, its amazing to me how you keep seeing the same boaters over and over. 

It was a beach day for sure 90 degrees

When we were rounding Peanut Island we came across these floating Tiki huts some with pool slides on them and large grills, I bet that they are a fun place to party!  The houseboat is actually a restaurant if you enlarge it (Click on any photo) you will see "they deliver"  

We spent the night actually 2 nights at Lake Park marina it was quite nice and the company even better,  we had never heard of this marina but it was where No Snow was  going so we tagged along.  The next day Ron had rented a car and took us along with them to US customs to check in.  At the customs office (which was located in the cruise ship terminal) we met up once again with most of the boats that had left the West End and crossed over the day before.  I must say. checking in was a little painful in that the officer was a bit of a d**k it was not a proud moment being an American amongst Canadians, British and New Zealanders.  Yes they have a job to do, but there was NO reason other than being in the power position to treat these people as poorly as he did.  They all had their papers, cruising permits, visas etc, there was just no reason for them to be treated so poorly, I felt badly.  But all is done, we are back and of course the officer had to bust us as well, but everyone was good to go. 

Ron and Donna we hope you have a great time visiting your friends on the west coast and have a save and fun trip back to Ottawa and we hope to see you again next winter.

Hmmm you just never know what you will see.  A flying dinghy?

The Juniper lighthouse

People and their owners a day on the water

What is that!

Hmmm .....OK?

The little tug,  I couldn't see a name on this one but there is a small tug up north further named TOOT TOOT!

They are back, while in the Bahamas we saw Sea Turtles, Sting Rays, Sharks, Flying fish and some very large fish jumping from the water like 4' long but we only saw 1 dolphin.

Yesterday on the way to Cocoa Beach Fl this guy put on quite a show.

Since we are back in Florida we stopped in Fort Pierce one of our favorite stops, If you can, plan on a Friday night and Saturday night stay here, They have entertainment starting on Friday and on Saturday the BEST farmers market.  The town is right off the Municipal Marina as is all the activities.  Also on Sunday they close down one of the streets in town and its Bike day, motorcycles are lined up on the street.

We are now at Cocoa Village Marina and will remain here for the Easter weekend along with us is Passport and Brown Eyed Girl.  Last year we made the mistake of traveling, the ICW was nusts!  Cocoa Village is a very nice and friendly marina located in the village with many small shops and alot of nice restaurants to chose from.  They also have a local theater and on Sunday we have tickets for Titanic the play.  Also this weekend is the surfing festival on Cocoa Beach.

Happy Easter everyone!  SweetPea we love you and will be home in a few weeks.

For my sailing friends

Sailboats are so pretty when their sails are up, gracefully sliding along.  More often than not though they are just motoring along.  It was a great day to be a sailor as most of them had wind in their sails.

They do make a pretty picture

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Back to where we began

Sunset at Great Sale Cay

This Hatteras 53 was purchased new in 1966 and after 46 years it is owned by the same person!  It logs a good many miles of cruising every year, aboard were 3 generations of family members.  Now that's a love affair!

We passed by New Plymouth once again on the way to Green Turtle Club its always nice to return to a place and be remembered.  When we went in for dinner all the wait staff were happy to see SweetPea has returned.  When you are on a boat you are remembered by your boat name.  But what was more incredible was when we got to West End on Grand Bahama Island we went to our assigned slip and the dock hand welcomed us back and then said, and your in the same slip as before.  Wow, he was right and that was 5 weeks ago.  Pretty amazing as this in a port of entry for check in so they are very very busy here.

This is the Bluff House side of Green Turtle I took this as we were leaving.   As I was taking the picture we got a call on the radio from Randy on Black Tickle, we were looking all over for him, he must see us and be nearby,  looking looking hm mm maybe he someplace in the Bluff House marina.  Silly me, look whose in the center in the photo.  Duh!

We are going to miss the Bahama Blues.

I took this photo of another boat while we were anchored at Great Sale Cay.   It  illustrates perfectly how 2 people can enjoy their own private time, in their own private space.  Even on a boat.  (click to enlarge)

Well we have gone full circle, and are now in the West End waiting for a good weather day to cross the Gulf stream and enter back into the states.  Right now it looks like it may be Monday.

Hopetown to Little Harbor

Jim looking out to the Atlantic Ocean

The Atlantic side of Hopetown

A beautiful church and the Atlantic Ocean is the view

This is the Castle in the Air, if you have read the books about a teacher from Indiana, Evan W Cottman who moved to the Out Islands of the Abacos in 1945 at age 45 and became the doctor.  He built this home on Marsh Harbor.  Quite an interesting story.

Sea turtles in Little Harbor these things were huge, the shells were 16x12 their heads were the size of a large fist.

The entrance to Little Harbor

Petes Pub is another must visit beach pub, they all have their own favor, some have dollar bills stapled to the walls,ceilings and what- not, others are known for sweeping views or activities they may have for boaters.  They all have their own speciality drinks which all include a mixture of rums. 
Petes Pub has one of the best drinks of all, not to fruity and a bit more rum.  Petes also has shirts stapled to the walls and ceilings that people write there names and or boat names on.  Jim gave up one of his most favorite tee's from our homeport and tacked it up in an open spot.  So if you go to Petes and see Jims shirt hanging in the rafters be sure to add your name if you don't want to give up one of your own.

Jim's shirt the orange one ...Obviously!

Where do we go from here?  We have now been in the Abacos for more than 4 weeks and have seen all we wanted too here for this trip.  We had originally planned 4-6 weeks and had planned on going to the Exumas, but, we feel in order to do the Exumas justice we would need more time, so we will save that trip for another time. According to this photo Block Island is 1059 miles from here, and Nantucket is 1200+ miles from here... as the crow flies.  Unfortunately it is more than 1800 miles the way we will be traveling!

So for us it is now time to turn the pointy end north and head home.  We are now in ManOWar Cay and are heading back to the West End of Grand Bahama Island to wait on a good day for a crossing back to the states, hopefully we will not have to wait too long for a weather window to cross.  We have thoroughly enjoyed our time in the Abaco Out Islands, the weather has been wonderful and the waters beautiful and the people pleasant but it is now time to move on.