It was with mixed emotions that we left the beautiful, fun and exciting State of Florida and entered the wide marshes of Georgia. We have been there so long and had experienced so many new things that it was difficult to break away. But Florida will remain with us and will soon capture other boaters’ hearts as we leave her further in our wake. As with any journey we must keep moving and our bow is pointing inexorably northward toward new adventure. Perhaps one day we will find ourselves in those now familiar waters again but for now we have put away the Florida charts and opened up the book that will take us through the next segment up to Norfolk, VA.
A quick backward glance at the Submarine Museum where we learned a good deal about the Silent Service.
This morning we were shoving off from St. Marys at 0815 with a bit of wind and current trying to hold us to the dock. It runs faster here than any place we have been. Thank goodness for floating docks.
We passed the Kings Bay Submarine Base. This is as close a look as you get from the water. It is restricted and the subs in residence are all hidden inside covered slips.
Today’s destination is St. Simon’s Island and we will pass much familiar real estate on the way. We can make good time as we have covered this ground by land many times and do not intend to spend much time on this leg.
Thunderstorms were threatening as we began but somehow we managed to avoid them though we did catch wind gusts up to 24mph!
As we entered Jekyll Creek which runs behind the island it was almost at low tide. Not a good proposition but you go with what you got. When we went under the bridge at Jekyll many memories flooded back. In 2008 when I crossed that bridge in the passenger seat of our van, I thought I would likely be dead before I reached the mainland 9 miles away. I had suffered a heart attack and Jan and Daisy were driving me to the hospital because I was too stubborn to call an ambulance and figured we could be moving in the direction of the hospital rather than dying in a motel room. I began to pray as we crossed that bridge. All I asked was to let me not die on Jan and let me do it in the ER. For a minute or two I thought I would not make it and so did little Daisy.
Usually she insisted on always being in someone’s lap when the vehicle was moving. But that night she got in the van, ran to the very back seat, jumped up there and never moved. That was a first for her. I have often speculated that dogs can smell death and she did not want to be blamed if anything happened on that trip. She was famous for avoiding blame. I am sort of glad we are skipping Jekyll. We have seen everything there is to see during dozens of seminars there. Here are some snapshots as we passed by.
Because of a full moon we had abnormally low tides. At one point I thought we were going to be stuck until a rising tide as the depth gauge went to 0.2 feet! But we never stopped. I will clean the strainers tonight.
Arriving at Morningstar in St. Simon’s there was a current running that would literally sweep a small boat away but Jan eased her right in and the dockhand got a line while I leaped off and caught another. Then Jan could work against those lines to walk the boat into the dock.
Nice place. We went to lunch on premises and took on fuel. Only 104 gallons burned since Georgetown on the St. Johns. Not bad. Not a Prius, but not bad.
An old friend stopped by to visit. Charlie Peeler, well known trial attorney from Albany, GA was coming to the island to meet his family and wanted to see the boat. He looks good and we had a grand reunion. Charlie is the son of my lifelong friend Jim Peeler and I remember the day he was born, gave him his first job in the law and have seen him produce three beautiful boys. Of course his gorgeous wife Melissa had something to do with that.
