Canterbury Sails by Chasseur: St. Augustine

December 10 - 14, 2012 Monday - Friday

Last year we visited St. Augustine by car. We visited the Municipal Marina to talk with the Dock master and check out their facilities. We went to the St. Augustine Fort and looked out on the harbor, trying to imagine ourselves arriving here by boat. Well, here we were, bringing "Chasseur" into the harbor, hard to believe we actually did it. "Chasseur's" crew took a mooring ball, and hightailed into town for a walk down St. George Street. We had planned only to stay over night since we have visited St. Augustine twice over the last 2 years. We had some rain and high winds, but still had planned to move a little farther south for a visit with friends Duke and Ali Wellington. We woke to more rain and wind Wednesday morning, but not enough to stop us. As we rounded the mooring field, Terry called ahead to Marineland Marina just 17 nm south and doubled checked with the Dock master about their tide. We had been getting conflicting and confusing information on their tide table. The Dock master said we should wait. At high tide, it was only 8 feet in their channel (5 ft. at low), and we would not be making the channel at a good time. We turned back and picked up the mooring ball for another night. We left earlier Thursday morning, with the wind gusting 20 - 25+ kts from the north and the current swift, we were pushed down to Marineland in 2 hours with plenty of water waiting for us in the basin.
Before we reached the marina, we passed Duke and Ali's beautiful home on the ICW between markers red 68 and 70. We radioed ahead to let them know we were close, and there they were waiting for us in their pajamas on the deck as we cruised by. Terry blew his bugle to announce our arrival.
Duke and Ali picked us up from "Chasseur", and we had a lovely visit for 2 nights with them. Ali prepared a delicious flounder dinner for Suzanne's birthday on Friday. We enjoyed our visit.