March 2, 2013 Day 295

St. Augustine Municipal Marina
St. Augustine, FL
Total miles to date: 4979.8

Our trolley ride

Today was dedicated to touring St. Augustine and Chuck and Becky arrived around 10:00 to join us! We started by riding one of the narrated “hop on-hop off” trolley rides around the historic area.  St. Augustine, founded in 1565, is the oldest continuously occupied European settlement in the country.  The trolley makes over 22 stops, but we stayed on the ride for many of them and listened to the history (such as the Fountain of Youth, the oldest jail, the oldest house (1704), and the Castillo de San Marcos).  

Memorial Presbyterian Church

Interior of church

Flagler College



We did get off the trolley at the Memorial Presbyterian Church, built by Henry Flagler in 1890 as a memorial to his daughter who died giving birth.  Flagler was a founding partner of the Standard Oil Trust.  The architecture of the church is a Venetian Renaissance style, with a Byzantine dome. There are 92 stained glass windows which contain the Apostles Creed.  We plan to attend church services there tomorrow morning.

From there, we walked to the elegant former Ponce de Leon Hotel built in 1887 by Henry Flagler, which is now home to Flagler College. We then walked to the San Sebastian Winery, where we had lunch and then participated in a wine tasting.  We resumed the trolley ride through the city and came back to the marina.

Dinner with Chuck and Becky at Amici's

After relaxing on the boat for a few hours (and getting warm –this was a cold, windy day!), we drove to Amici’s for dinner and had good Italian food.  We came back to the historic area and walked down Aviles Street and then found ice cream.  We ended the evening by relaxing on the boat after a fun day touring this historic city.

March 1, 2013 Day 294

St. Augustine Municipal Marina
St. Augustine, FL
Total miles to date: 4979.8



We had 58 miles to travel so we left our anchorage at 8:15 and headed north on the ICW on a chilly, partly cloudy day.  We passed Daytona, Ormond Beach, Flagler Beach, and the lovely Palm Coast.  Florida’s east coast seems to be flying by us.  We just can’t stop in every port (a good reason to return next year!).  We were in the Indian River, entered the Halifax River, and then the Mantanzas River.  The channel for the ICW was very narrow in places, and again with shoaling.  We saw a variety of homes, condominiums, and hotels. We passed under many bridges but only needed to have three open for us. 



This sailboat was anchored in the narrow channel
and we had to get past him!

Very little room to get through the L.B. Knox Bridge
with the work barge taking up much of the space

Upscale Condos at  Palm Coast

The Bridge of Lions
Our marina in St. Augustine is on the south side of the bridge

Carried Away docked in St. Augustine

We arrived in St. Augustine at 3:40 and docked in a very strong current at the marina. After we docked, checked in, and picked up our mail, we had dinner on board and started looking through all the tourist brochures we have collected!  We plan to stay here three nights and see as much as we can this weekend. We are happy to have Bill’s brother Chuck and his wife Becky return for a visit tomorrow.  (They traveled with us from Traverse City, MI to Chicago in September, so it is good to have them back if only for the weekend.)

February 28, 2013 Day 293

At anchor
Seabreeze, FL
Total miles to date: 4921.8

The focus this morning was to complete the work on the generator by getting it all put back together.  Success!  Bill was exhausted and declared the human body is not meant to be twisted into a pretzel to reach difficult places on the boat!

We were able to leave New Smyrna Beach by 1:30 and just traveled 13 miles today to an anchorage near Daytona.  We left the Indian River and soon passed the Ponce de Leon Inlet to the ocean.  The historic 175 ft. red Ponce Inlet Lighthouse commands attention!  We fought a strong current most of the trip today. There is quite a bit of shoaling in places and we had to pay close attention to stay in the narrow channel.  We also saw three raccoons wandering along the shore today – that was a surprise!

Leaving New Smyrna Beach





Typical scenery on the ICW today

Ponce de Leon Lighthouse

Port Orange - and look how shallow it is just outside our channel!

This boat literally left us in its wake!

Next, we passed Port Orange, complete with many condos that line the ocean front.  We passed under the bridge that takes the well-known A1A highway across the ICW.

We chose an anchorage near Seabreeze, south of Daytona. We grilled marinated flank steak to accompany our baked potatoes and sautéed fresh green beans, and salad for dinner.  After dinner we listened to our granddaughter Ashley play The Entertainer on the piano. She learned it in five days!

Tomorrow we will go to St. Augustine and stay for three nights. We are excited about touring this historic city! 

February 27, 2013 Day 292

New Smyrna Beach Municipal Marina
New Smyrna Beach, FL

Total miles to date: 4908.6

Today is Bill’s birthday!  We were finally able to celebrate by going out for dinner at the Dolphin View Restaurant, next to the marina.  Then we came back to the boat and had birthday cake. 

Prior to that, he spent most of the day in the engine room fixing the generator.  The culprit was a broken impeller on the water pump as he expected.  He spent an inordinate amount of time just getting to the broken part.  So many things had to be removed to gain access.  He will finish up tomorrow morning so we can leave by noon.

 
Joyce took the local transportation - a four person modified golf cart - to the grocery store (for birthday cake!). The service is free – you just call them and they pick you up!

A very playful dolphin stayed just beyond our boat quite a while this afternoon and Joyce tried to take pictures with some success.

Here he is!

Our children called Bill by conference call from Texas and Colorado to say Happy Birthday as we were walking back from the restaurant. He enjoyed talking to them and our grandchildren at the same time! 

February 26, 2013 Day 291

New Smyrna Beach Municipal Marina
New Smyrna Beach, FL
Total miles to date: 4908.6

At 7:30 this morning we pulled up our anchor and made the decision to go to a marina.  With thunderstorms forecast and without a functioning generator, we could not easily stay at anchor.  Fortunately, New Smyrna Beach was only 17 miles away and they had room for us.

We arrived here at 10:00 just as the rain began and in a 17 mph wind.  It rained off and on all day and the storms did not develop, but we are still happy to be tied to a dock!

Bill could not work on the generator until the engine room was cool enough, so the maintenance will continue tomorrow as we stay here another day.  Joyce worked on laundry, prepared dinner, and made reservations for our three day weekend in St. Augustine. 

February 25, 2013 Day 290

At Anchor
Mosquito Lagoon near Canaveral National Seashore

Total miles to date: 4891.5

We made preparations to leave Cocoa Village Marina this morning after our week long stay.  Joyce took the rental car back while Bill got the boat ready. We left at 11:30 saying we would be back next year.

We traveled north up the ICW and the Indian River, past Titusville on the west and the Space Shuttle hangar (Vehicle assembly building) at the Kennedy Space Center to the east. 

Soon we entered the mile long Haulover Canal, a narrow cut from the Indian River to Mosquito Lagoon. We saw countless number of people fishing from the shore, and most of them stopped long enough to wave to us. This area is a slow speed/minimum wake zone to protect the manatees, so we took our time passing through it.

We left the canal and headed into Mosquito Lagoon and arrived at our chosen anchorage near red marker 24 at 4:00.  We had seen many dolphins today while we were underway and were not disappointed when we stopped as they continued to entertain us!

The rain we had escaped for two days finally caught up with us before dinner, but fortunately stopped two hours later.  Speaking of dinner, the generator stopped working just as Joyce was cooking dinner – and it had not sounded right when we first turned it on.  So, Bill went to the engine room to check things out and discovered the water pump was not working.  He will try and fix it tomorrow while we are still anchored.  If not, we will have to find a marina. We need to charge the “house batteries”!  Our dinner became one of sandwiches since cooking on the stove/oven was no longer an option. And we could not cook on the grill because it was raining.  It was not the evening we had planned, but we managed!

February 24, 2013 Day 289

Cocoa Village Marina
Cocoa, FL
Total miles to date: 4856.5

From Dr. Seuss, “One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish”

“Today was good. Today was fun.  Tomorrow is another one.”

Epcot was fun!  We had not been in several years, so it was good to go back and to experience the new features and attractions that have been added.  Even the weather, which had a 50% chance of storms, was good!  The forecast must have kept people away because we never experienced any long lines!

Shortly after we arrived we met Bill’s brother, Chuck and our sister-in-law Becky and spent the entire day with them. 

We loved the new attraction, Soarin’, and used the fast pass to ride it fairly quickly.  We rode almost every ride in the park!  It was really neat to watch the O' Canada attraction and see some of the places we had been last summer on the Loop! We enjoyed dinner and lively entertainment at the German Biergarten Restaurant. 

Germany in the World Showcase

Chuck and Becky

Our favorite!

We stayed for the nightly fireworks and then said good bye to Chuck and Becky and arrived back at Carried Away around 11:30.  (Chuck and Becky will join us on Saturday in St. Augustine.) 

We have more Epcot photos that we will try to post soon!