June 3 and 4, 2013 - Day 8

Sunday, June 2; Monday, June 3; and Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Sunday was another “kick-back” day – we decided in the beginning of our journey that we would most likely not travel on the weekends simply to avoid any heavy weekend boating traffic.   So we took an easy day today – Ron did a little fishing but didn’t even get a bite.  I stayed boatside – some storms in the area negated trips in the dingy, but we sure enjoyed the thunder and lightening show! 

Pulled the dinghy for the first time today - worked great!

 

Lots of little ones EVERYWHERE 

There are many small villages along the river

 

On Monday, we decided to cruise in Spirit Journey up the St. John’s River (which is actually ‘down’ the river heading southbound from our Turkey Island anchorage but like Ron’s and my good ‘Mars/Venus’ moments, the ‘opposite thinking’ prevails). 

 

 

 

We travelled another two hours to get to a creek named Salt Springs Creek.  We anchored out in the lake and took the dingy in.  Ron had been told that were lots of manatees throughout this somewhat untouched area, and while we didn’t see any manatees during this creek’s (6 mile one way) dingy ride, we did see turtles over two foot in length, some red-crested ducks, herons, water hyacinths, and other flora and fauna.  We also passed several families in rented pontoon boats doing a little fishing, some other bass fisherman (some were spear fishing and some were using bow and arrows), and canoeists.   After this creek diversion trip, we headed back to the boat and decided to return to the Turkey Island anchorage – it was a beautiful anchorage.

 

On Tuesday…we left anchorage and decided to head back down the St. John’s River (which is actually ‘up’ heading north back toward Jacksonville).    Captaining from the flybridge:  we had lunch (see my ‘plate windshield’ which helps protect lunch items like chips and Cheetos from blowing away) and after circumventing some nasty-looking clouds, our luck didn’t quite hold and we cruised for about 8 miles in our first official ‘rainstorm’!  With thunder!  And, with lightening!  Now, it wasn’t quite like The Deadliest Catch episodes, but nevertheless I felt like I should put on a life jacket, even though Ron smiled at this line of thinking.  Yes, it would have made me feel better if our center windshield wiper would have worked properly!  Ron was great, and the auto-pilot was great, and we made it into the Green Cove Springs area to anchor. 

 

Unfortunately, I didn’t tighten a hatch window tight enough and some rain ran in and managed to wet quite a few books we had on the shelf.  But the fortunate flip side is:   the storms that have passed through have cooled the temps and decreased humidity, and we might actually sleep without the air-conditioning tonight!   Learned technique of the day:   lightly wet a small towel, and throw it in the freezer (for 15 – 20 minutes). Take out and place around your neck for some ‘cool’ relief.  By-the-way, “Happy Birthday” to grandson, Ben, today (he spent part of his special day at Driver’s Ed we’re told) !!!