Vero Beach, FL to Beaufort, SC

Hello! Once again its been a while! We've been busy! After getting into Vero we had a visitor! Papa Charlie flew to Vero to see us, we were thrilled to see him, the kids couldn't stop hugging him and it was great!We had lunch together and sat and talked and caught up on the last days in the Bahamas and all the news.We got a chance to see a little blue heron on the docks at Vero, always a beautiful sight. So this is what part of the intra-coastal looks like. I loved the palm trees in a stand together, many were falling down as well. They always remind me of The Lorax by Dr. Seuss.
In St Augustine we stopped for a couple of days to explore the town and in particular the Fort Castillos de San Marcos. This fort is interesting because it is built of coquina, a stone made of sand and shells compressed together. The stone is porous and is the reason why the fort was never in almost 300 years defeated, the cannon balls would either bounce off or embed themselves into the coquina instead of shattering it as it would other more brittle rock. The fort only ever changed hands by treaty negotiations.

The museum is a living history museum and so you will find local volunteers dressed in Spanish military garb and firing cannons, on Saturdays the English were there too and muskets get fired along with the cannon in a changing of the flag ceremony that they re-enact.
Needless to say the following weeks 'how to' writing assignment ended up being "how to fire a musket"!

Viva Espana!

We moved on to Fernandina Beach where there was the annual shrimp festival happening. It was just terrible to eat cajun shrimp, cajun crawdads and cajun fries. We were all just so unhappy!=) It was awesome!!!! Lots of local artists, lots of food, very hot!! Fun!

AAAAAARGH! The Fernandinans take piracy very seriously and many people were dressed up and there was much pirate regalia to be had.
The shrimp boats decorated too, for a special ceremony called the blessing of the fleet, a blessing for the boats and the fishermen to keep them safe at sea.

From Fernadina we went to Cumberland Island, a park with lots of trails, beaches wild horses and climbing trees!!


The live oaks are gorgeous with the Spanish moss and saw palmettos underneath.

Dakota and Alistair ever in the water! Spearing something!

Happiness is a great climbing tree! We spent over on hour in this one!

After Cumberland Island we decided to go off shore to skip Georgia. This is because Georgia is notoriously shallow and long and winding on the ICW.

We made two hops one around 70 miles to St Catherine's sound and then the next day another of 35 miles to Tybee Roads and Hilton Head. We ended up in Beaufort, SC and took a couple of days break there. Charles is here holding a king mackerel that we caught coming in to St Catherine's sound. The conditions were about 20 kts of wind and 5-7 ft seas, so we had had a long day and were tired but much rewarded by the catch!! We had caught one other but he bounced off the boat when we were hit by an unusually large wave, thank goodness we caught another!

We arrived in Beaufort around 5 PM, anchored, ate and went ashore for a short walk, while there we scored showers which were very appreciated! We've been here two days and have had a great time, the town has a free dock during the day so we have been able to take advantage and clean, work on projects and just enjoy the luxury of getting off and on a a whim. There is a wonderful playground here too that the kids have enjoyed. We met some nice folks sailing with their three kids and that has been fun for all, the kids played a lot today and we adults talked lots too.

Tomorrow we leave and head for Charleston for a couple of days. Wishing you all the best and happy mother's day all you fabulous moms!!

More photos, my camera went missing so these didn't make the above that Laurel penned, alas I did find it eventually so here are some more pics.

C.

The boys at the fort being pirates!

At the fort.

Firing the cannons

Leaving early out of Fernandina Beach.

Shrimp Boat

Papa Charlie!

Papa Charlie again!!

The boys drawing while the adults had a brew at A1A in St. Augustine.

Kids making friends in St. Augustine.

North Abacos, back to the U.S.

Where do I begin?! Its been so long since we've had any Internet and so a long time since we've blogged. We've been busy! After all the family left, we went back to Marsh Harbor to get a package and to re provision a bit, we encountered a ton of wind there but accomplished what we needed and left for Great Guana Cay. We ran into friends, Rob and Teena there, we met them initially at Marathon and then saw them at Green Turtle. We spent a nice time at Grabbers hanging out, swimming and catching up. They had cruised the Abacos and shared some great info on places to go with us.
We then rounded the Whale once and for all. The Whale is a cay that sticks out into the ocean and therefor one must go "outside" to get around. The way that the Abacos are laid out with Great Abaco and the chain of Cays creates a protected bay between with narrow opening to the ocean. Because the inlets are narrow they often are subject to fast currents and breaking waves, when there is strong N- NE weather they become quite treacherous and this is know locally as a rage. When listening to the weather the conditions are announced and rated for safe passage.

So once on the other side we spent about a month hopping from one uninhabited cay to another. Here are the highlights:


Powell cay was a favorite! A beautiful island with beaches all around. Great swimming and fishing! The first time we were there the kids and I scored on the ocean side beach combing for shells. Charles spent a lot of time fishing with great success, much to every ones delight! The kids fished as well and took much pride in their catches!

They caught grunts at a wreck there and barracuda on the flats. The flat fishing was fun using poppers and small buck tails brought in nice barracuda such as this one! They were then filleted, marinated and grilled. Only the small guys are edible, less than 5 pounds. At one point Charles hooked one from the beach and reeled him in right up onto the beach, this was pretty exciting all around. They are beautiful fish with black spot and a mouth full of sharp teeth. There are many a barracuda story amongst the cruising community!

Another great place is Allans-Pensacola Cay. This is two islands that are sort of side by side with a fairly protected harbor on one end. There is a path to the ocean side and on the day that we spent there we lucked out with winds from the west and therefor a flat calm beach on the ocean side! The water was crystal clear, warm and with a sandy bottom. We played and swam all day. Someone had also set up a swing an a tree from flotsam and the kids spent some time on this.

Not bad, eh?

We saw a ray swimming along the beach the kids followed it as far as they could. Later in the day we had just finished swimming and were thinking about packing up when we saw a small nurse shark patrolling up and down the beach. Soon after we saw a large reef shark doing the same and then another large nurse shark! This was very exciting as it always is to see any animal in its natural environment. The beauty is indescribable!

The kids had tons of fun playing all sorts of spearing games on the beaches. One in the dinghy spearing and one either towing the dinghy under swimming power or pretending to steer the outboard! GO, go go! They shout, the spear flies and they always get their catch! Turtles, sharks, rays, fish, anything goes and all is gotten in the world of play!

YAR!

Dakota landed this beauty, oh happiness is a fish on the hook! (or even better in the boat and on the grill!)

On April 15th Charles celebrated his 42nd birthday in Cooperstown on Great Abaco at a restaurant called Richie's. We had barbecued chicken and rice and peas. We then re provisioned as much as we could and moved on!

On of the things that we had to do a lot in the Abacos was dodge weather. There are still quite a few cold fronts (northerly winds usually around 20 mph with higher winds in squalls) around and we were constantly looking for good land protection and good holding for the anchor. One place we spent many a front was Crab Cay. Here there wasn't all that much to do on land but we went just for the front and then would move on to Powell mostly to enjoy the beaches and swimming while the weather was good.

Swimming off the boat! A real pleasure is that we spent so much time in the water. It warm enough to just hang out in!

Alistair with his catch, a little grunt! They are called this because out of water they actually grunt. They are pretty little fish that hang around wrecks and reefs.

We then proceeded to sail around the end of Great Abaco to a cay called Cave Cay. Mostly mangroves and infrequently visited is remains a wild and unspoiled place. We felt we could have appreciated it better had we had a dinghy with an outboard to really explore the area.

We left the next day for Great Sale Cay a good stop off for those travelling between the Abacos and the States. On the way we caught a great mutton snapper. This is a very tasty fish a sure favorite of ours, thus the grins!

The island has coral rock and beaches, sandy shores and flats. Something for everyone!

The kids could not resist a swim of the coral rock. Here we saw many fish swimming around the coral and also a small turtle!

Diving in!

An example of the coral rock, aptly named moon rock or the iron shore.

Alistair with the lady pirate on the beach.

Another mutton snapper succumbed to Charles' charm. They are called snapper because if you get your finger near its field of vision it will snap at you! Yikes!

He later was marinated, grilled and consumed with thanks.

Here are a few pics of a front coming through. This one had lots of lightening and rain, which we collected for drinking water. The lightening is intense, all around the boat.

We found a window to cross and it looked like another would not appear for two weeks so we grabbed it! We staged at Mangrove Cay in the middle of the Little Bahama Bank and left at 2 AM. The night was calm a beautiful, many shooting stars and our last sunrise in the Bahamas!

The day was hot so the kids were allowed to take off their life jackets and just wear their harnesses as long as they stayed clipped in. The harness had a line attached and we have lines and metal loops around the boat to clip into so that if the boat gets jogged or you loose your footing it keeps you on the boat!

The ocean swells were there but not too big and so the crossing was long but not bad at all.

The color of the water is awesome, Alistair described it as " so blue that it is purple" - its true!

We passed many man-of-war jellies. At one point we had a school of spinner dolphins surf the bow. These dolphins are smaller than bottle nosed and love to leap and jump. Pure joy!

Back home after 17 hours, we anchored in Jensen Beach, Florida and radioed our new friends, Steve and Sophia on Sea Fox, who had crossed the same day, to let them know we made it.

The next day we called family to catch up, Alistair smiles with joy as he talks to Manny (Micheline, Charles' mom).

We are now in Vero, doing laundry and getting groceries for a few days. Early next week we will start our journey north.....