Here we are in Jacksonville!

"BigFoot" loves Mike's bike!
He won't stay off of it!

BigFoot and "LD" (aka Little Dog)
They seem to be getting along here....
 

Aarrgh!  We had a great time at the
Pirate Party!

The flipflops won out!
No Pirate boots here!

They start out young here
at Ortega Landing!

Pirate Party in full swing

Maybe this will be our Christmas Card
picture this year! 

Cheryl and Ed
S/V Slowdown

Good view of the pool and marina
Pool is always a fun spot!

Picture at Poe's Tavern
Thought it was very cool!

We're not located where we can get really good shots
of the sunsets - but this one was pretty good!

Whitey's Fish Camp - on the river

Fun place to be!

To all our biker friends - just so you know!

Cool sign!

Old boat makes a great decor

Shopping at the Farmers Market

Lots of vendors - good produce
and lots of "stuff"

At Harpoon Louie's
'57 Cadillac - another great ride!

 

Billy's Boat House
Jacksonville Beach

Nippers
Plan to check it out this weekend!

Cloudy and a bit rainy
Still a great day at the beach, right?

Beautiful sky

We’re in Jacksonville – Marina at Ortega Landing.  It’s on the Ortega River just off the St John’s River.  This is a great marina and “hurricane safe”.  That’s the biggie – although hurricanes don’t seem to be a problem so far this season.  Let’s hope it stays that way!  August and September are usually the months that are the most active so we’ll see.  Anyway, the marina is really nice – it has a great pool and several social gatherings for us cruisers.  Oh and the laundry is free!  It’s the little things that make it a fun place to be.  J  We’ve only been here a couple of weeks so we’re still trying to find our way around.

The first weekend we were here they had a Pirate Party.  It started out on Friday with a gathering and a potluck dinner.  Saturday night the dinner was supplied by the marina along with a great rum punch or “grog”!  It was held poolside and they even had a band.  Of course, there were pirate costumes – Mike came in third in the costume contest.  Now I might be a little biased but I think he should have won.  Just sayin’……..

Every Saturday there is a Farmer’s Market down at the bridge just a few miles away along the river – perfect for a scooter ride.  It’s a pretty nice market with lots of vendors and usually pretty good music!

One day we decided to go on a scooter ride and check things out.  We found a “dive” called Judy’s Pub – not in the best part of town – but it was an interesting place.  We also found the American Legion.  They have a pretty neat place with a pool and tiki bar.  We’ll probably be back to the Legion.  Not so sure about Judy’s.   Hmmm…..   When we go on scooter rides or to the market we usually end up at either the West Inn Cantina or Harpoon Louie’s. This is in an area called Avondale not far from the marina.  These are pretty nice local hangouts.  I would say we’re becoming regulars at both of them.  At least the servers remember our drinks when we walk in.  J

Anyway we’ve been just hanging most of the time.  It’s been so terribly hot here we don’t venture out much in the afternoon.  We heard on the weather the other day that this is the hottest August they’ve had here in three years.  Go figure!  We did take a shopping trip one day to the Home Depot.  We were in search of a “sun shade” for the sundeck.  We found a perfect one too!  Now we can sit out on our sundeck in the afternoon and not be so hot with the sun glaring down.  Of course the day Mike installed it - it rained all day!

We plan to check out Jacksonville Landing soon.  There are several restaurants/bars and shops there.  We can get there on the scooter but want to wait until it cools down a bit.  Hopefully soon! 

We took the car last weekend to check out the beaches of Jacksonville.  They’re about 15-20 miles away.  We had lunch at Billy’s Boathouse.  There’s a Nippers here too – copied after the one in the Bahamas.  We passed on it this time but will definitely be back.  We found the beach but of course, once we did – it began to rain.  So we ducked in Poe’s Tavern.  This place was pretty cool – its theme is Edgar Allen Poe.  Hence – Poe’s Tavern.  Decorated pretty cool!

We were told about Whitey’s Fish Camp so we decided to check it out.  It’s on Fleming Island about 20 miles away so we had to go by car.  Turned out to be a pretty neat place.  Had the best hushpuppies in a long time and great Mahi tacos!

We plan to stay here at Ortega through the month of September at least.  Then we’ll start working our way south back to the Keys. So I suppose there will be more places here to check out.  The marina is also having another gathering Labor Day Weekend.  Sounds like a good time.

Stay tuned!

Admiral “C”

A Short trip down the river (north) to Jacksonville

Our favorite little blues place "Blues Alley"
Had to make one last stop here before we left Sanford

One last sunset over Lake Monroe

Dinkin' and drinkin' with our buddies!

Having dinner at the Food Truck gathering

Ray's happy!  Dear Abbie can keep up now!

Saying goodbye to Marianne and friends

Lake Monroe - so peaceful in the mornings!

A view going down the river

Marsh - very beautiful

St Johns is very peaceful and serene

Waiting on the RR bridge to open

One of the stops along the river

Can't get enough of the beauty

River property

This car has no motor - we think he actually drives
the pontoon from the inside of the car!  LOL!

Bubba and friend - sawing timber!

This dock is for sale.  Any takers?

More beauty along the river

Signs of civilization - must be getting close!

Car ferry

River property at its finest!

The Ortega River Bascule Bridge
Granting us an opening
This bridge is 1920s antique and still operational

After spending a few days getting NautiNell ready to travel again we were off on another adventure.  We left Sanford Monday morning (August 4) at about 7:15!  Now that’s early for us!  The waters were calm, in fact, I don’t think we’d seen Lake Monroe so smooth.  Guess this happens early in the morning!  J

Anyway, we had a few showers off and on.  Just enough to cool things off a bit.  The southern part of the St Johns River is really the prettiest.  There are so many trees with the Spanish moss hanging down.  We saw several alligators – we lost count at over two dozen.  The ones earlier in the morning were huge!  Not so sure we would have wanted to see those from the Whaler!  They crossed right in front of us and were in no hurry.  We saw a few manatee playing around also.

By mid-afternoon we found ourselves at Lake George.  This is the part that I had been dreading.  It’s where we were inundated with those darn blind mosquitoes or “midges” as they are called around here on our trip south.  They were so bad that I had worried about us leaving Sanford since we had got there!  It turns out I had nothing to worry about this time.  We crossed the river which is about 10 miles long bug free!

By 4:00 p.m. we reached our spot for the night – about 10 miles north of Lake George. We wanted to continue to be bug free. J  I’d been happy to travel another 20 miles away but this would have to do.  We tied up to a FREE dock at Welaka.  We like FREE! The dock doesn’t have power but it is a nice secure place to be.  It has floating cement docks and the T-head worked as a breakwater.  When we first got here - there were two guys on the dock cutting up pilings with a chainsaw.  Lucky for us they didn't have many to cut up.  After that other than the families coming down to bait fish (netting) – it was a pretty quiet place.  We watched a few showers go by – missing us – yea!  We even had our crockpot dinner out on the sundeck.  Nice evening!  Turns out it was a pretty early evening for us as well – after all - we’d traveled 70 miles today.  That’s a long trip for us!

Tuesday morning we were up and ready to go.  Since we had made 70 miles yesterday – we only had about the 65 to go.  We had planned to stop in Green Cove Springs but opted to go the distance to Jacksonville.  After maneuvering our boat away from the dock which was no easy thing – we were on our way about 8:00 a.m.  The current was pushing us against the dock – we had tucked ourselves in rather tight.  Captain Mike got her our out away from the dock by keeping a line on the front and pivoting it around.  Worked like a charm. 

The day was hot and long but pretty much uneventful.  We like travel days like that – uneventful, that is.  As you get farther north the river widens and isn’t near as pretty.  We didn’t see any more gators but the seagulls came by to greet us.  As we approached Jacksonville we were greeted by several military choppers in the air – probably doing sorties.  We made it to the marina about 4:00.  It was another long day but it was good to be in a slip where we could be in our air conditioning. 

Now we’re ready for another adventure.  Oh and by the way – thanks to Ray and Linda, who helped in the maneuvering of our car last week – it’s already here waiting on us!  We’ll be checking out the marina and its surroundings for the next couple of months.  There’s a pirate gathering here at the marina this weekend.  Potluck and pirate costumes.  Just up our alley!  Sounds perfect!

Till next time!

Admiral “C”