Pillow Overboard: Cocoa Beach to St Augustine

On the way to Cocoa Beach the wind took one of the pillows I made last summer overboard. We worked quickly, bringing in the jib and turning the boat around. Ben pulled up along side and from the transom steps I was able to rescue the swimming pillow. Good thing too, because if we couldn't rescue the pillow in the flat, calm waterway, under power and only the jib, it would not be a good sign.




Sunday morning, leaving Cocoa Beach there was a fog advisory, and visibility was down to less than a quarter of a mile. We used the chart plotter and radar, and kept a sharp look out until the fog started to lift around 9 am. It is a little unnerving to see a bridge appear out of nowhere, but we were both impressed at how useful the radar was, we were able to match up the marks on the chart plotter to the marks on the radar, and then as they appeared, to the marks in the real world. Once the fog cleared, it was a mostly uneventful, although long, day. We stopped for gas and filled up the water tanks (free water!), but other than that went from about 7:15 am until anchoring in Daytona after sunset at 7:00 pm, making 65 ICW miles.




In Cocoa Beach we slept in (until 7!) but since then, in Daytona and St Augustine we have been up and underway for the sunrise. From Daytona, St Augustine was an easy 54 ICW miles, so we were moored just north of the Bridge of Lions after the 3 pm opening, which gave us a few hours to enjoy the town of St Augustine. We had high hopes of making it to the Castillo de San Marcos, but we settled for viewing it from the boat, and headed to a Irish Pub to get out of the sun for a few hours. We also took advantage of the showers at the St Augustine Municipal Marina and ate dinner out at a Spanish Tapas restaurant, The Tastings. Dinner was ok - the calamari was excellent, but didn't compare to the braised lamb sandwiches Ben made for lunch (score another one for the pressure cooker). The restaurant was down a cute little alley with a brick road. After dinner we got ice cream cones a few doors down at a coffee shop and ice cream store. The barista described the mint chocolate chip ice cream as the best mint chocolate chip ice cream they've ever had, so we both went with that. We each had a scoop on a waffle cone, which we enjoyed as we walked along the water, past Whisper, to the dingy dock at the marina.




Yesterday we headed to Fernandina Beach, making it another 61 ICW miles. The good news is that one of the guidebooks picks back up right around the Jacksonville/Fernandina Beach/Georgia border area. It is our best guidebook, so although we have done very well finding anchorages and mooring balls so far, it will now get a little bit easier.

Tonight we are anchored at the Two Way Fishing Camp Marina, a few miles up a little river from ICW mile mark 660 - so about 57 ICW miles. Not too bad when you consider some how the current was against us all day today, and we didn't get up until 7:30 because we were up at 4 am tightening up the lines on the mooring ball which the shifting currents were banging against the boat. We opted to dock tonight and are glad to have the heaters pumping, and all for only $45, including the electric!

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