Remains of mansion Dungeness, Cumberland Is.
Ken on ocean beach, Cumberland Island
Pirates at the Shrimp Fest, Fernandina Beach
Apr 27 Fernandina Beach, Florida, was our “home” for a week, a surprise since we had just planned to spend 24 hours. Our engine did not start on Monday this week and we needed in the end to send out the starter to have it worked on -- again -- and we borrowed a generator to help keep the batteries charged for the last few days of the week. So one additional week in Florida while the weather continued to be perfect. Tough! Fernandina Beach is a large town, on Amelia Island, with great restaurants and shopping. They also had their biggest celebration of the year while we were there, the Shrimp Fest. By the time we left we were on first name basis with several of the locals and we had a front row seat for the Fest fireworks set off over the river where we had a mooring.
One thing we did this week was squeeze in additional time for reading. We have books we brought from home, some we traded with other cruisers (a favorite in that category is An Embarassment of Mangoes, about Canadian boaters who sail to the Bahamas and beyond), some we get from “take one/leave one” libraries at marinas and laundromats. We got a few new books too, mostly tied in with where we were at the time. A mystery based in Cape Fear, NC is one, and two autobiographies, Pat Conroy’s The River is Wide and the 1930s book Cross Creek based in rural Florida. Our down time on the boat is usually spent watching birds/people/boats with binoculars, or planning and executing “happy hour” or reading -- not necessarily in that order!
Apr 30 We took a side trip by dinghy (3.5 miles each way) to Cumberland Island. The Cumberland Island National Seashore maintains the grounds of an old estate, Dungeness, built in the mid 1880s, and several trails. You can also access miles of beautiful unbuilt ocean beach there.
May 3 This is our first full day in Georgia and the start of several where we will be careful of the shallow ICW here. We need to travel between the slack at the end of low tide and the slack at the end of high tide, before it starts getting low again. We passed the Georgia islands Cumberland Island, Jekyl Island, St. Simons Island, Sapelo Island, St. Catherine’s Island since leaving Fernandina Beach. There is no one on the Georgia ICW right now that we know, and in fact, very few boats traveling our speed and direction at all. The wildlife is the best -- dolphins, alligators, eagles, many birds that we can only guess at identifying, wild horses, sounds of sheep last night on a deserted island next to where we anchored (that we did not investigate!).
When we need extreme down time, at the end of a day spent in the fresh air, navigating shallow rivers and canals, we have our tunes. Our son Justin set up 500+ songs on an ipod for Ken before we left. The music is a combination of bluegrass (my suggestion), sea chanteys, female singers Ken likes, and lots of music Justin listens to and thought we’d like. It’s very eclectic and fun. We have added some Bahamian CDs to our mix of entertainment. KB, Ancient Man, Peanuts Taylor and Trez Hepburn are now brought out when we have enough energy for foot tapping and more energetic moves.
May 6 We crossed into South Carolina today and passed Daufuskie Island and anchored near Hilton Head Island. Last night we spent a night at a marina and after a short walk were in Thunderbolt, a suburb or Savannah. There was a great marine store there and a friendly restaurant, Tubby’s Tank House (don‘t you just love the name)! There have been thunderstorms the past two afternoons, just like in July at home.
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