Day 299, Thursday April 17th, another blustery day for sure

Day 299, Thursday April 17^th, another blustery day 

We spent another interesting night at anchor.  Wind was less here off of Cumberland Island then in the Bell Creek marsh but the combination of wind and current made for an uneasy night up on a number of occasions to check our position.  We are both up at dawn to look around and listen to the Chris Parker show.   Chris’s weather forecast is not too good with the weather window of Monday and Tuesday looking like it might close and the 1 in 10 chance that a low off of Bermuda may develop enough that it gets a name.  A named storm in April is unheard off.

Anchor wander the effect of wind and current
a picture from the chart plotter

Around 8:00 we notice that Windward is raising their anchor.   At first we think just to reposition but it quickly becomes apparent that they are out of here.  We call then on the radio and get a very tired sounding Ian on the radio.  He explains that they had spent another sleepless night with Windward sailing about her anchor and have had enough.  They are off to Jacksonville in search of a dock to tie up to.  They plan on putting Windward on the hard in the Jacksonville area so will check out the some marines and boat yards, put her to bed for the season and move on to the land portion of their retirement.  We very much enjoyed meeting and cruising with Lynn and Ian and look forward to the next time our paths cross.

After Lynn and Ian’s departure we start planning our day, which consist of do we move or stay and if we stay can we leave the boat.  Our original plan was to spend the day exploring Cumberland Island with Jazzebelle swinging on the hook.  With the current winds and no expectations of the wind to decrease we do not feel we can leave the boat, the question now becomes if we move where do we go.  While we are having these discussions Sarah G ups anchors and heads out.  Ham calls on the radio to report that he has made the decision to head into St Mary’s to take a slip at the local marina, Langs Marina, until this weather passes.  This is the closest marina but would require a move backwards of about 5 miles, something we are not prepared to do yet.

We now consider moving north along the ICW, we will be fighting the wind but if we ride the tides we decide it might be doable.  We start looking at the route we would be taking, via charts and a software on Garmin Bluechart called Active Captain.  Active Captain, we have been told, is a must for people traveling the ICW.  It is a site where people add warnings and comments about the route, areas of shoaling, services available, anchorages etc..  Looking at the active captain we have one sound (open to the Atlantic) to cross which has comments about being very bad in high north winds.  This coupled with a radio report from a boat that just crossed it, 5’ confused waved and broken jelly jars makes us drop the idea of moving north.  We speak with Aftica, a boat at anchor with us who we had meet last summer in the north channel and then south at Conception Island.  They have been sitting here for a couple of days already and will not be moving today.

Another 2 hours swinging on the hook followed by a call from Sarah G that the marina has room and how nice it is to be tied to a dock and we make the decision to head into St Mary’s.  We up anchor around 11, have a quick motor trip over to St Mary’s and our tied up at the dock by 1:30 pm.  Sarah G is beside us along with Momba.  We had said good bye to Momba on Wednesday morning with the thought we might not see Bruce again, Bruce’s response to our goodbye was that we would see him down the trail again and here we are 2 days later tied up beside him.

George and Dawson on the dock

Just after we dock a boat from Sarnia pulls in, Heritage, they are making their way back north as well after 2 seasons in the Bahamas.  Julie quickly plays the do you know game and figures out who they know in common and where they did their high school.   The boat is owned by George and Jackie.  Around 5 o’clock Ham and Peter stop by to ask us to join them for supper at the Marina restaurant, they head up and we join them in about 30 mins, as Julie has started doing our taxes so has to get to a point where she can stop.  We meet Ham and Peter and both of us order the all you can eat shrimp, lots of shrimp that just kept coming.  We eat an awful lot of shrimp and head back to the boat around 8:30 very full.

Quick game of Kings Cribbage a coffee and we are off to bed for what we hope will be a very peaceful night tied to the dock.

Cheers

Dawson and Julie