May 15
This morning, we met Clyde at the condo, and went to fetch Linda's car from her daughter's house near Jacksonville. We took Linda's car back to St. Augustine, while Clyde went on to a friend's business where he had phone, internet, and fax access to take care of tying up loose ends before he returns to the Turks & Caicos.
We went to the marina first, planning to move the boat over to Clyde's slip. We parked in the marina parking lot and walked to the edge of the parking lot, overlooking the condo dock, to make sure the dredge was done and moved. As we got to where we could see, they had just finished dredging the slip next to Clyde's and were moving the barge. As they backed it out of the fairway, they hit the end of Clyde's finger pier snapping the end piling off. (The pilings are telephone poles, so it takes a good hit to break one.) We figured our chance at getting in Clyde's slip today just took a turn south, so we went to the marina office and said we would be spending another day there. I then walked out to Clyde's slip to talk to the dredge guys. The finger pier did not appear to be damaged, and the guys were already looking at the piling. They said "it's a contact sport" and assured me they would have the piling replaced by quitting time today.
We left and spent some time driving around getting the lay of the land. We found West Marine and stopped in to buy a couple of things. I have not organized my big shopping list yet, but we have a West Rewards certificate that expires today, so we bought just enough to cash it in. I got a feel for where A1A, US1, and Business 1 all fit together, and how traffic works crossing the Bridge of Lions, a draw bridge from Anastasia Island, where we are, to downtown St. Augustine.
Speaking of the Bridge of Lions, it is an interesting story itself. We have been hearing things about restrictions of boat traffic under the bridge for a couple of months now, on the radio in the Bahamas. Now we understand why. The bridge is very old and is literally falling apart. It is historically significant though, so rather than just replace it, they want to rebuild it to look exactly like it did when new. To do this, instead of simply closing it, which would result in car traffic having to detour about five miles to the next bridge south, they have built a whole new lift bridge right next to the old bridge, which is temporary. The traffic will move to the new bridge for four years while they rebuild the original bridge to look just like it did. Then they will tear down the temporary bridge. I would like to meet they guy who sold the city on this idea. It just doesn't seem like the inconvenience of a detour would have been that bad.
Late in the afternoon, Clyde called to say he had returned to the condo, and we walked up to meet him. We went to dinner at Hurricane Patty's, at the Oyster Creek Marina. As Clyde told us, it's a great place that locals go that you would never find if somebody didn't show you. It was all-you-can-eat shrimp night, and we enjoyed a pile of shrimp. At the waitress's suggestion, we ordered one more refill after we were full, and she brought us a to-go box. There was a band there, which was very good, and they had an open mic session going on. Apparently they do this every Monday, and local musicians come to join in.
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.
May 16
We spent the night on the boat again and met up with Clyde in the morning. We headed out to finish his boat shopping and make sure we knew where our other parts and service options were before he left. We first hit Marine Supply of St. Augustine. This is a huge warehouse store that serves marine repair professionals more than retail people like us. Nothing is priced on the shelf, and you have to hunt through the whole place to find what they have and what you want. In their defense, as I said they are primarily serving local professionals who know where things are. If you ask, they are very helpful and will tell you where to look, and if you want, they'll check the price of anything on the computer. Usually, their prices are better than West Marine, but they carry a different line of goods. They have more "parts", whereas West Marine carries more retail add-on kinds of things. We still didn't have our big list compiled, but Clyde was looking for some plumbing fittings to take back to Turks with him, so we helped him shop.
We then went back to the marina to move the boat. We needed to be out by 11:00 to avoid paying for another day. Barb & I went to get the boat, and Clyde went to his slip to take our lines when we got there. We quickly undid the power cords and the dock lines and were off. We moved over to the end of the condo dock and then again backed down the fairway and into the slip. We have a very good reason for backing in this time. One of the tasks to be accomplished here is to fix the fact that the wind generator doesn't pivot right. With the boat backed into a fixed dock, we can get to the generator without climbing the arch.
After securing the boat, we all went to West Marine so Clyde could return a chart he just bought there last week, but then found out it is not the latest edition. While there, we clarified the procedure for exchanging our lifetime warrantee Taylor Made fenders that blew out at Emerald Bay. It's as easy as bring in the old ones (13 years old) and get new ones. And, they have three of the kind we need on the shelf. (We only need two.)
We went back to the condo and Clyde packed to leave. I drove him to pick up a rental car which he will drive to Miami to catch his flight to the Turks & Caicos. When I got back to the condo, we got some clothes, our toiletries, and the laundry and "moved in" to the condo. About the only rule we have to adhere to here is that sleeping aboard your boat is not allowed. So we have to sleep in the condo, not the boat. Since it's a very, very nice condo, this just breaks our hearts.
We went out this evening and found a theatre that was showing Hoot. Hoot is a new movie that Jimmy Buffett had a large part in making. He and his daughter did the music, he was co-producer, and he had a small acting part. It is basically a kids movie, but it was fun to see. We have been hearing the soundtrack on Radio Margaritaville for a few weeks now.
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.
May 17
This morning, we took Clyde's car to the shop to get the A/C fixed. His good friend, JJ, owns a repair shop, and he is going to take care of the car. He also is going to get me our new batteries. Hopefully they can get me a deal, since the four batteries cost about $1700 retail. We went back to the condo and made a bunch of calls. I lined up a guy to come compound and wax the hull and topsides, in an effort to not get the brown ICW mustache that we got last year. We got a line on a guy who can repair the bent davits and left him a message. And we organized a shopping list and hit Marine Supply and West Marine. $500 later, we were back at the boat with a box and a couple bags of goodies.
Clyde left us a list of must-do places to eat and things to see while we are here. Tonight we had dinner at the A1A Ale House. I haven't had good local brew-pub beer in months, so it was a nice treat. The food was quite nice too. It brought back good memories of my early days in Houston when I spent a lot of time in local brew-pubs with some good friends.
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.
May 18 & 19
We spent two days working on the boat. There are a few large things on the to-do list, and lots of little things. We knocked out a lot of the little things, and got started on some of the big ones. We lowered the dinghy, dragged it around to the finger pier, and hauled it up on the finger pier. Some of the tasks is to fix it's water leak, fix the bow attachment to the davits. Since it was near low tide, we took the wind generator off it's pole, while standing on the dock. I replaced the water pump on the rear A/C so it worked again, and installed a valve to make it easier to "burp" the air out of the line whenever we forget to close the seacock before we get underway and get an airlock in the line. I found and fixed a fresh water leak that popped up while we were in Great Sale Cay. Turned out a clamp on one of the hoses to the swim platform shower broke, so the connection was spraying water. There were lots of other little things to boring to mention or remember.
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.
May 20 & 21
First thing Saturday morning Barb went shopping. She needed a few clothing items that couldn't be found in the Bahamas. She got back a little after noon. I hung around the condo and played on the computer while she shopped.
We decided we needed a little tourist time this weekend. Barb is going back to Texas on the 24th for ten days while I work on the boat, and St. Augustine is a town very rich in history and things to see. So, we took two days off from boat fixing and played tourist. The first thing we did was find a parking place. Parking in the historic area of St. Augustine is a challenge. We finally found a place at a meter on the street, several blocks away from where we wanted to be. We stopped between the parking space and the old fort and had lunch at Scarlet O'Hara's. From there we toured the old fort. Castillo de San Marcos is a large stone fort guarding the entrance to St. Augustine from the sea. It was built from coquina which is a fossilized shell rock excavated from Anastasia Island where the condo is. The fort has survived remarkably well over the years and has been nicely preserved as a museum by the National Park Service.
We then hopped aboard on of the many trams that cruise around the city. We spent over an hour listening to a funny tour guide and getting the background on the history of the city.
We continued our tourist trek Sunday. After breakfast at IHOP, we went to the Oldest Drugstore, which had been a stop on the tram tour. We were challenged to find a place to park again, but finally found a free space on the street a few blocks away. We walked to the drugstore, where we viewed lots of shelves of old drugs and remedies. These were not replicas, but rather, the real bottles with the original stuff in them. I'm guessing a hazmat team could have a field day here.
We then went to the San Sebastian Winery. We enjoyed a video and a short tour, and then sampled several of their wines. Of course we left with a few bottles.
From the winery, we headed to the St. Augustine lighthouse. The lighthouse is quite a story of dedication to restoration and preservation. We climbed to the top where we enjoyed a very nice breeze form the ocean. While on top, we noticed a tree full of large white birds in the distance. The volunteer at the lighthouse told us they were wood storks. They picked that tree because it was on the Alligator Farm. Since the alligators are below them, they don't have to worry about any predators climbing the tree to disturb their nests. Of course if a baby stork falls from it's nest, the alligators will get an unexpected appetizer.
Late in the afternoon, we headed north to Ponte Vedre Beach to visit Donna's mom for dinner. We enjoyed a nice dinner and visit with her and Donna's brother Ken. We got back to the condo about 22:00
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.
May 22
This morning we spent some time doing a few things on the boat, but our big plan is driving to Tampa. The wind generator distributor is in Tarpon Springs, which is in the Tampa/St. Pete area. I am going to rebuild the generator, so I need bearings and an oil seal. I want to replace the blades and will rebalance them, and then I'll have a spare set in case a seagull ever does go through the blender. I also need to get a control box for the solar panels I am installing. I had an overcharge control box that I bought with the wind generator, but never installed. I quickly determined that the wind generator was never going to overcharge the batteries, because just our refrigerator draws more electricity than the wind gen usually produces. Hotwire was good enough to take back the wind gen controller that I never installed, even though I bought it two years ago, and credit it towards the smart controller for the solar panels. John & Libby, who are Hotwire, are good people who used to be cruisers. We got everything we needed, except the bearings, and also enjoyed chatting with Libby for over an hour.
Hotwire was out of the bearings, but Libby gave me directions to the bearing supplier a few miles away, where they buy them. I went there and picked up four bearings. Two for now, and two for spares.
You might wonder why we drove three and a half hours to get these parts instead of having them shipped to us. Well, we also wanted to visit our friends Brian & Tammy. Brian & Tammy lived on Another Road until recently. They have temporarily (?) moved ashore while rebuilding the boat and the cruising kitty. They just returned from ten days in the Virgin Islands, and haven't really had time to unpack, but I convinced them they could party one more night. We met them at their apartment when they got home from work (I vaguely remember work). After a few happy hour beverages, we went out to The Conch Republic Grill for dinner. After to dinner, we returned to Brian & Tammy's apartment, where we spent the night.
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.
May 23
Since Brian & Tammy had to go to work (there's that word again), we got up at 06:30 with them and headed back to St. Augustine. We stopped along the way for breakfast at Cracker Barrel, a tradition we learned last summer while on the road with my brother and sister-in-law. We were back at the condo before noon.
We attacked fixing the dinghy this afternoon. One of the things that went wrong with the dinghy was that the D-ring on the inside of the bow, which I lifted it on the davits with, tore off months ago. Since then I have lifted it from the tow ring on the bow, but that necessitated wedging a pillow between the line and the tube of the dinghy so it didn't chafe the tube. Instead of re-gluing a new D-ring, I drilled through the hull and installed a U-bolt to clip the davit line to. The other problem with the dinghy has been water leaking in. Every morning I have to bail out a significant amount of water. I still am not sure where this water is coming from, but I turned the dinghy over and put sealant on every seam where the hypalon joins the fiberglass hull. I'll give it a couple days to cure and throw it in the water and see if it still leaks. I also removed the original painter which was badly frayed. We had replaced it with a spare dock line from the big boat, which we will leave, but had never taken the old one off.
We went out to dinner at the Gypsy Cab Company, which is just down the street from the condo. This place is on the list Clyde gave us of must-do places while we are here. As we entered, we were greeted with the smell of garlic. We later overheard a waitress telling another customer that garlic is a major ingredient in just about every dish served here. Can't go wrong with that. Dinner was very nice.
We were back at the condo pretty early, as Barb had to pack for her trip to Houston tomorrow. She will be there through June 5th, while I stay here and party - I mean work on the boat.
GPS N 29-53.684 W 081-17.636 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 4747.