Facing the Gulf Stream -the Banks to St. Augustine

Leaving the anchorage near the Lily Bank at sunrise.

After a very comfortable night anchored in the middle of nowhere, we had a hearty breakfast and weighed anchor at 7 am. There wasn't a breath of air and the waters were glassy for the first 6 hours of the trip. When we left the bank I had plotted a slight zig zag course that would take us over to the center of the stream west of the rhumb line to St. Augustine and then we would head more northerly than the course to St. A for around 80 -100 miles before turning to the northwest to move out of the stream and head for St. A Inlet. It took a little doing to convince Pete that going and extra 10 miles or so would actually save us time, but he finally bought into it. It took a LONG time to finally reach the axis of the stream, but after making 7 + knots for hours we immediately shot up to 9 and then 10 knots by following the axis of the stream.

We didn't ride it as long as planned because the wind shifted from SE to S and then SW and freshened quite a bit, so we angled back NW more and drove on through the night with the main up, still doing 9 knots for much of the time. Daylight had us still 7 hours from St. Augustine, but that would get us in around 1 or 1:30 pm and the tide would be going in at the inlet, so we were fine with that.

Unfortunately no one had mentioned a series of small squalls that we would encounter as the wind made its way from SW to NW Tuesday morning. John picked them up on his Satellite Weather Program and we got sails down before they hit and rode them out without too much difficulty, but after a long night, no one really wanted to face even a little adversity! All had quieted down by the time we entered St. Augustine Inlet and we made it through smoothly. Everyone took a slip at Camachee Cove Yacht Harbor and here we sit with our yellow "Q" (quarantine) flags up waiting to take a road trip to Jacksonville tomorrow to go through customs. Nobody had any big plans to go out dancing tonight, so it's no big deal. ~~~_/)~~~M&D

What would an ocean voyage be without a little entertainment.

These guys didn't stay as long as our first experience with dolphins, but they were very playful and loved riding the bow wake. I loved they way their bodies sparkled in the crystal clear waters.

Later in the day we had another visitor, he made the rounds between all three boats, but Dan put out food and water for him, so we had him visiting for quite a while. I think he is a seaside sparrow.

Andiamo before the storms and after!

At least being quarantined didn't keep us from taking showers ashore!