Boating with Sunset Delight: 2020: Ga to Jacksonville Florida

5 November 2020

Depart: St Simons GA Anchorage 8:22

Arrive: Jacksonville, FL Free Dock at Sister's Creek 3:00

Distance: 54 nm

Conditions: Overcast, Rain, 65 degrees

We anticipated rough seas on the ocean, so today was an ICW travel day. The clouds were fascinating throughout the day. Dark storm clouds surrounded pockets of white puffy clouds and, on occasion, clear blue sky.

Vortex - like a scifi movie

Layer Cake

Our route took us through St. Andrew's Sound where we found some rough seas. Clark spoke to Tom on "Viator" who told us ahead of time to expect a rough ride through this stretch of the ICW.

Lighthouse at St. Andrew's Sound

Lighthouse in distance, waves in foreground

After our bouncy ride through the sound, things calmed down for the rest of the day.

We passed the "Cabin Bluff" resort consisting of over 3000 acres on the Cumberland River. It is considered to be the oldest hunting club in America. History of the site can be found here.

Cabin Bluff Resort

Along the waterway we passed a sight that caused the following conversation.

Ev: "What are those Clark?"

CW: "Telephone poles! Ground wire on top and two hots below."

Ev: "Telephone poles? Don't you mean electric poles?"

CW: "Yes. Electric Poles."

Sadly, this is a typical exchange between the two of us where he says one thing and means something else, and I am supposed to know what he intended instead of what he said!

Continuing on, we passed the Kings Bay Base / Naval Submarine Base. We got to see a submarine at the dock!

US Coast Guard

Submarine with Guard Boat on Duty

Submarine

A degaussing station is on site to remove any remnant magnetic field.

Degaussing Station

Close up of degaussing station

Having passed through / by Georgia quickly, we arrived in Florida today. Scenery as we traveled by Amelia Island and through Fernandina Beach definitely made me feel that I had arrived in the sunshine state.

Colorful buildings

We saw one aid to navigation that looked like a giant bird house,

Range Marker and more
including bird habitat

passed a smelly mill,

and saw the typical fishing vessel.

"Three Cees" fishing vessel

Since we did not need fuel today, we passed by this dock where we have obtained lower-priced fuel in the past.

Fuel dock in Fernandina Beach

Clark thought the spaceship-shaped water tower here was interesting.

As we approached Jacksonville, our destination for the night, we heard our friend Tom on "Viator" talking on the VHF radio to the captain of a sailboat about available space at the Sisters Creek free dock. He told him that there was just enough dock space for one boat to dock there. Then Tom called us with the expectation that we were somewhere close and advised us, given the lack of dock space, to plan to raft up with his boat for the night.

This turned out to be ideal as we could stay distant but still have a convenient way to talk, which we did, for a good long time. The only tricky part was tying up as we had wind and current. Wind pushing us rapidly into "Viator" and current rushing us past them. Mary and Tom grabbed our lines. It took a while to get things lined up before we finally settled on our line setup.

While we talked the afternoon away, we saw the sun get lower and lower.