The St. John's River

Cruising the St. John's River is a side trip recommended by many for viewing old Florida and its wildlife. That sounded good to us so we left St. Augustine and traveled to Jacksonville, the first big city on the St. John's River, about eighteen miles off the ICW. Famous for banking and insurance, it's a huge city in area (third largest in the USA) and has a free dock for boaters so, of course, you know that's our first choice for the night.  The place was jumping and crowded with people and boats but, luckily, a boat was leaving and we shimmied into their spot.  We were serenaded by the music well into the night and the water finally calmed when the boats left.

Jackson Landing from Tony M

Jacksonville at night

Jackson Landing with St. Patrick's leftovers

The St. John's River runs north to south so we would now be traveling south.  Our first stop would be at Outback Crab Shack up Six Mile Creek where we would spend the night on their 1000 foot beautiful dock, again for free.  They only ask that you buy a meal-make my day!  This place was busy until sunset when all the boats went home.  We settled into a peaceful night with some critter scratching on our hull.  Welcome to Gator Country!

Tony M on 1000' dock at Outback Crab Shack

Baby gator at Outback Crab Shack-he loved the potato we fed him!

The beginning of  the St. John's is wide and shallow-very much as wide as our lakes in CT,but here it is the river where we stayed in the channel and motored through.  We stayed at the town dock in Welaka, again for free and showers and bathrooms were even provided.  We found their best restaurant ShrimpsRus (no joke) and were pleasantly surprised with the homecooked quality.  We explored the wooden boat museum of Richard Speas who made wooden boats from glued pieces of wood and we learned of his amazing life. (He and his wife took their five children on their refurbished boat and motored from Michigan to Florida in 1962- Match that,  June Cleaver!)While in Welaka we discovered Buddy's ear infection had returned so we somehow needed to get him off to a vet.  Holly Bluff Marina, the only marina in the state of Florida with a courtesy van and with their vet recommendation Holly Bluff was our next stop.  More medication was the ticket for Buddy and the van enabled  us to stock up on groceries. How I miss a car!

One of the many Speas-made boats on display

Speas made these vases from scraps to supplement his retirement!

The next morning we left there and rounded the corner to spend a couple of nights at Hontoon State Park with its own little ferry bringing campers and hikers to this little island.  We took the three mile round trip hike up to the shellmound (It think its the highest point in FL-only kidding) where I twisted my ankle and hobbled the last mile (all better now).

Hontoon State Park

Hontoon State Park- different kind of foliage

Blue heron visiting us at dinner time

Lots of snowbirds are seen trying to fly in these!

While there we dinghed to Blue Springs Park, famous for its spring water, making this section of water crystal clear, unlike the murky brown water of the rest of the St. John's.  The park was crawling with people - many  with beach chairs, blankets and coolers, making a day of it, enjoying a swim in the clear water.

Blue Springs State Natural Feature

Hard to believe a million gallon flows from here every day

From here we retraced our stops back to Jacksonville and spent another night on their dock at Jacksonville Landing.  The wind and current are rocking us quite a bit now so we should sleep like babies tonight!
As long as the weather and tides hold out, we should be off to Fernandino Beach tomorrow- our last stop in Florida.

Livestock on the St. John's

Spanish moss of many trees

All different kinds of docks

Before the St. John's River

We enjoyed our short stay in Ft. Pierce with its great Saturday Farmers' Market, its pet friendly parks and meeting up with the homeless guy we used to chat with.  His favorite line, "I may be homeless but I'm not stupid" poured from his lips again!  We repeat it often just because ....

Thank you, Dick Jones

We had heard about Jones' Fruit Dock in North Vero Beach, owned by 96 year old Dick Jones, who offers dockage at his ancient dock on the Indian River for $20 ($3.00 for power and very sulfur smelling water) and knew we had to check out this institution. The Jones family grew citrus for generations and many of their neighbors sold their land to developers, except for Dick Jones.  He is giving his land to the state of FL as a preservation and conservation area.   Dick was in the hospital but a neighbor helped us tie up to the dock and showed us where to leave the $20.  The country road was pleasant to walk on and even had a watering station for dogs. Now that's totally different from what we've encountered in southern Florida!

Jones' Fruit Dock

No sulfur for the dogs!

We were sorry we didn't meet Dick Jones and sign his logbook but we needed to move on.  We settled in to a free town dock in Cocoa, Fl next to a park for Buddy.  Cocoa is a cute town with restaurants and ice cream shops. Many folks walk by the boat to fish or chat, among those were two firemen killing time on their duty who warned us about the "types of folks" who hang out at the park at night.  We locked our doors that night and didn't hear any one rustling about...something to consider...

Cocoa park with lots of folks enjoying the day

Cocoa is close to the Kennedy Space Center and we debated about visiting it.  We opted to skip it for now because Pete has been there and we needed to rent a car from somewhere to get there.  It sounded like it was developing into a hassle so we promised to visit it another time when we have access to a car.
That night we anchored in Rockhouse Creek with a catamaran who recognized us from Ft. Myers.  Buddy had an island to romp on and we had plenty of noseeums-those hungry little devils! It was a peaceful night and we were off the next day to the Matanzas Rver where Fort Matanzas stands.  It was constructed in 1740 by the Spanish to protect the southern water access to St. Ausustine.  We tried to tour it with Buddy but again, no dags allowed so we went back to the boat and observed it from there.  That night we dragged anchor so at 3 AM we were up with engine running and dropping anchor closer to the fort.  Always something added to our adventure...

Fort Matanzas

Fort Matanzas is only 12 miles from St. Augustine so we arrived early in the day, giving us plenty of time to explore the city with Buddy before tackling it without him.  St. Augustine is the oldest continually occupied city settled by Europeans in the United States and retains that European atmosphere with its architecture and narrow streets.  We did the tourist bus ride to Castillo de San Marcos National Monument, a Spanish fort built in 1695 that changed hands often between the French, Spanish and English. Of course we had to visit the oldest wooden school house complete with student with a real Dunce cap...those were the good old days!
St. Augustine is a beautiful stop that shouldn't be missed. 

moats and bridges

Lots of cannons!

Cobblestone narrow streets

Flagler College

Beautiful architecture of Flagler College

 Henry Flagler is a BIG name in Florida.  He earned his money with the Rockefeller's with Standard Oil and began investing in tourism in Florida in the late 1880's.  He built the Ponce de Leon Hotel with heat and bathrooms and charged $90 a night ($2000 in today's money) and patrons had to pay for four months...I guess that left many folks out.  Now the hotel is home to Flagler College- an absolutely beautiful campus... lucky students!

Oldest wooden school-of course we HAD to visit this

Ponce de Leon landed here

We visited the Ponce de Leon Archeological Park in search of the Fountain of Youth. I'm sure your not surprised to learn there were many other people there looking for it too.  We did find little white paper cups with smelly Florida water there that is said to be the water Ponce de Leon found.  He thought this water was special because the Indians he met here were seven feet tall and had muscles to fill out their frames.  He
figured the wa
ter was the ticket to looking like that.  I had a cup...I'll let you know what happens!

Florida work ethic:  "Open when we get here-Closed when we leave"

 

Good Bye Maratrhon--Hello Florida's East Coast

Challenging marine facilities but still had a major attraction for boaters

We had originally planned to stay two weeks in Marathon, decided on staying two more weeks and, because of high winds, ended up staying another week--five weeks of perfect weather isn't too hard to take but we needed to start our trek home to be home by June. So we said farewell to Sombrero Dockside Marina and the great folks we spent time with.

Sunset in Boot Key Harbor-why folks stay here!

Burrowing owls we met on our daily walk

Lunch with Ray and Linda (Summertime)

Saying Goodbye to Sheila on Twin Spirit

We exited Boot Key Harbor via Knights Passage (with strong currents) and carefully stayed in the channel as anywhere outside the channel is EXTREMELY shallow.  The Florida Keys are beautiful but they are limiting in your freedom to go anywhere you want to go.  We spent the first night anchored in Tarpon Basin in Key Largo where we found a ten foot beach we could land the dinghy to walk Buddy.  Boaters are not welcomed by the property owners-previous generations of boaters have developed a reputation and now we are paying the price for it.  At least we found something there!

Florida Keys - Birds walk outside channel area

Boca Chita Key National Park is supposed to be a great stop in Biscayne Bay but we discovered they do not allow boaters with dogs there even if the dogs stay onboard--again caused by previous irresponsible boaters so we continued on.  We arrived in Miami but we had no desire to tour it so we opted to anchor in the Miami Marine Stadium, an oval harbor where boats raced before Hurricane Andrew.  Now it's a great anchorage with the view of Miami out our transom-we were in heaven.  What we did see was a little sea plane (looked like a lawn mower engine) trying to stay up in the air---our afternoon entertainment!  And we found a nice sandy beach for Buddy to chase a stick and stand in the water and do his barking act!

Bleacher remains

Miami from Tony M

It did fly!

Buddy and Pete in Miami Marine Stadium

Moving north from Miami can be challenging because of the many bridges you need to go under traveling on the Intercoastal Waterway.  We can clear 14 1/2 feet if the radar and antennas are down so we could make it under many of them. If you can't make it under, then the bridge operators will open them according to their scheduled time,  either on the hour and half hour or on the quarter and three quarter of an hour and not at any other time.  We had our introduction to their rigidity when we approached the first bridge, the Venetian  Causeway Bridge, at 8:02 AM. We were told we had to wait until 8:30 because we were not directly in front of the bridge at 8:00 AM, even though Pete had radioed at 7:40 AM to announce we were coming and the bridgekeeper could clearly see us...I think PMS definitely played a role n this!  Anyway the other bridgekeepers were reasonable and we finally made it to Ft, Lauderdale where we stayed at Las Olas Municipal Marina.  When we called to get our slip assignment, we were told they were closed from 12 to 1 for lunch(all employees eat at the same time?) so, o f course, we arrived at 12:30.   Pete somehow got us into the slip with 6 inches on either side of the boat without their help and when they returned from lunch at 1:30, we did get a more suitable slip.  I want to be a city worker when I grow up!

What a culture shock Ft. Lauderdale was for us!  After coming from the quiet, laid back anchorages, the hustle and bustle of Ft. Lauderdale was daunting.  Spring Week added to the frenzy-the beach and bars were packed with hardbodies-fun to watch until we read the signs that no dogs were allowed, neither on the beach nor on the sidewalks.  We were able to connect with Bill and Laura (Monkey Girl) for dinner and Laura brought me to the grocery store Wednesday.  Great to see you folks!

Bill and Laura

We thought Miami was full of huge mansions and yachts but Ft.  Lauderdale seemed to have even bigger mansions and bigger yachts.   I know there is a recession going on but this place doesn't seem to be affected-there's still plenty of money here.

Who can own this?

and this?

How much shrink wrap do you suppose this took?

Anyway, onward from Ft. Lauderdale....again we were dealing with the bridges and watching this bank of black clouds following us.  Well, they finally caught up with us and spanked us from behind with winds up to 60 miles an hour and blinding rain.  The white knuckle ride lasted about a long thirty minutes and made for a memorable birthday celebration when it was over!

Small world stories:

1.  As we were entering the St. Lucie Inlet, Pete observed a boat coming toward us that was like the boat that Charles and Erika are buying.  Wait a minute, it is the boat Charles and Erika are buying and it's on its way to Ft. Lauderdale.  We briefly spoke to the captain, trying to explain  who we are.

2.  Erika was talking to Pete on the phone while riding in the van provided by the marina in SC with other mariners .  After she hung up the phone, one of the fellow riders asked if she was talking to Pete Wilson---he's Pete from the boat BlueYonder whom we spent some time with on the Loop.  They are tied up three boats from Charles and Erika.

The world is shrinking....

Right now we are in Ft. Pierce for the night.  We had spent a month here so we feel comfortable with the area.  It's nice not to have to familiarize yourself with a new area for a change-we knew where the park for Buddy was (pet friendly!) and a good restaurant was...ah, the little things...

We understand you're enjoying some warmer weather and the snow is melting...you've earned that!