Ortega River to Sisters Creek to Jekyll Island

Day #510; Loop Miles to Date = 5,638

After 2 weeks respite at Ortega River Marina, we continued our trek northward. Ortega River is a great stop for a lot of reasons...for those of you doing trip planning, put this one on your radar for a nice friendly, quiet, convenient stop...and they have great Wi-Fi!

On Tuesday, we were just transiting the St Johns River back to the free dock at Sisters Creek on the other side of Jacksonville. An easy day, once again passing by downtown Jacksonville, and past the port activity.

 

Once again, we had to wait for a train to cross the FEC Bridge in downtown JAX. In the downtown skyline in the background, you can see the Wells Fargo Building on the right side. Our Sister-in-Law Donna works here and saw us on the way by!

Nice looking Coast Guard Boat at the pier in JAX.

This is our 3rd stop here at Sisters Creek. This free dock is offered by the city of JAX. On this night, we had the whole place to ourselves. A very serene evening enjoyed here.

On Wednesday (Happy Birthday to Sandy!) we had a longish day (55miles) to travel up to Jekyll Island. It was yet another gorgeous day to be on the water. A nice breeze, mid-70's, and hardly any traffic on the waterways. We exited Florida for the last time on this trip, but are hoping that the weather we had today is following us as we go north.



The degaussing facility at the Kings Bay Submarine Base. Simply put, they drive the subs into this station to reduce the magnetic signature that the subs acquire after a period of use.

A shrimper working the channel just off the ICW.

A large dredge operation in process just off the Submarine Base.

We passed by Cumberland Island for the 3rd time, and this is the 1st time that we have seen any of the wild horses that populate the island. We wish we could have gotten closer, but this was the best we could do. It was great to see them grazing so peacefully.

And now just for grins, an assortment of channel markers that we encountered on our cruise to Jekyll Island. We see many different shapes and sizes...these just happen to be a few that we saw today...

 

This can buoy was just after we turned northwest after transiting St Andrews Sound. It is leaning this far over because of the strong current at this particular time. And yes...we were going into the current at this point...fortunately only for a few miles. It was running about 2.5 knots against us...it definitely felt like we were driving uphill.

Stay tuned for a bonus posting of some pictures of our sunset from Wednesday night...