We often stop at Marineland Marina (20 miles south of St. Augustine), however decided this year, to stay for a week & rent a car to explore the area, including visiting St. Augustine by car, rather than boat.

We got in 3 great donut shops, including our small-chain Florida favorite, Parlour Doughnuts (not shown – eaten first).

All wasn’t driving & donuts – we’ve been having a diesel problem lately. While I wasn’t able to find a mechanic with time to look at our problem, I was able to find one who would e-mail me back & forth with ideas to help with a diagnosis. The answer ended up being simple science – between the elevation of the engines & tanks, the return lines (diesels have both supply & return hoses) would siphon back to their tanks overnight. Although taking several days to figure out, the solution took only an hour to re-connect the return hoses to their proper fittings to the tank bottoms – it appears they had been switched at some point.

In between engine work we explored the area including the St. Augustine Lighthouse & Maritime Museum. I walked up – Lori took the pictures.

This is a preserved piece of the original A1A within the Washington Oaks Garden State Park. My, how Florida has changed! We’ve seen the growth around Miami, Orlando & even Vero Beach, but were dumbfounded by the growth in “rural” areas such as Palm Coast, Flagler & St. Johns. Miles & miles of new developments interspaced with shopping plazas, medical offices, recreational areas & new public schools (120-million-dollar ones with huge campuses).

Marineland Marina’s neighbor is the Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience (part of the University of Florida). A researcher was checking on some specimens in one of their outdoor ponds.

A bleak beach day, but still beautiful & just across the street from the marina. Florida takes its sea turtle nesting extremely seriously. With nesting season beginning next month, thousands of volunteers will cover many of the beaches every dawn looking for the telltale signs of mother sea turtles which swam in overnight, crawling up into the dunes to excavate & lay her eggs. Every nest is tracked & marked off. Areas with multiple nests in the upcoming weeks are required to keep shore lights dimmed so when the baby turtles emerge, they march to the moonlight over the water, not to shore lights. Florida’s precautions are working as last year’s turtle nest count was the largest ever recorded.

Our visitors from the north, Tom & Linda. Lori hired Linda some 22 years ago at her old company … Linda is still trying to retire.

Who in the world brags about their DMV? Well, I do! After living in CT most of my life, it is always a shock when Florida makes it all so easy. Every visit takes just a few minutes with no wait, while most tasks are on-line. Oh, all of the fees are about 1/3 of CT’s. Recently one of our 2 boat registrations got lost in the mail, so I had to call. Minutes later taken care of with a replacement in the mail the next day.

In addition to our diesel issue, we had a bit of a panic with oil analysis testing of our engine oil (common to do with marine diesels). Our testing came back showing some serious issues … our mechanic suggested a duplicate set of testing and … completely normal. Hopefully just an anomaly with the testing company.

With our stomachs & freezer fuel of donuts, we’re off again, soon to be in Georgia. The weather has been amazing & we’re hoping it continues!

While we weren’t planning to cross back to Florida this soon, the windy cold fronts won. It cost us $400 to Bahamian Immigration just to extend our stay for (what ended up as) only 1 1/2 days. Leaving Spanish Wells we had hoped to head south to spend a week in the Exumas. Pass – several windy days forecasted including some with strong west winds (not much west protection available). Rock Sound for a week, then Exumas – worth it? In the end, we decided to head west to the Berry Islands as we haven’t explored there recently & it was at least in the direction of our eventual return to Florida. A bonus was that the Great Harbour Cay Marina offers nice protection & is reasonably priced so we could hide at during the cold front. Rather than zoom right to the marina, we (I) wanted to first spend a day or two exploring. As the forecast became more severe, we decided we’d better make marina reservation, but too late – now full with a waiting list 😦

On the way to the Berry Islands – look at that blue water! It’s been a while since I’ve caught a mahi, unfortunately I didn’t this time either – he escaped off the hook as I was attempting to net him – too bad as about 2 1/2′.

Fortunately his distant cousin did make it onto my grill (grouper fillet bought in Spanish Wells). Very calm seas before the cold front.

The Berry Islands are certainly geologically unique. The area surrounding them (white) is several thousands of feet deep. The interior areas (blues) are 2′ – 6′. The greenish areas are nearly awash at low tides

Not a fun 4 days (or nights trying to sleep) as the winds gusted over 35 knots with clocking around from NE, E, SE, S, SW, to W. We moved several times (at high tides as nearly everywhere is shallow) ending up anchoring off Cockroach Cay(!) which was just a little sliver of protection.

We considered next going to the marina (boats would probably be leaving) or perhaps spending a few days at a marina in Bimini as another cold front was arriving with gusts to 40 knots. But, why? Two perfect weather days were coming up, so we decided just to cross back. Day 1 anchored off Bimini, day 2 crossing to Stuart (first time using St. Lucie inlet and oh so much fun on a Saturday with locals zooming past). It didn’t seem the seas could calm down so quickly, but both days were perfect with the light winds directly behind us (always a plus). Later we were extra glad we had crossed, as reports from other cruisers throughout the Bahamas related that the cold front was particularly nasty of clocking winds with gusts to not 40, but 50 knots!

A Tornado Warning + was our welcome back to Florida! Fortunately, we were at a very protected slip in Fort Pierce where the wind was only really bad for a couple of hours. Couldn’t complain too much as we scored a few complimentary days of dockage & diesel at a discounted $3.06/gallon with our Safe Harbor Marina membership. A Publix grocery store within walking distance was a plus as well.

Crossing a week or two early means we don’t have to rush at all going north (don’t want any cold temps!). We’ll next be in Vero Beach for a (short) week with a rental car so we can exchange some things between our boat & our storage unit, get pizza, visit Publix more and ABC too!  Will perform engine maintenance & our usual northbound routine prep.