Tolomato River, Florida

Last night was difficult -- the wind died during after midnight and, despite our shields, there were n-see-ums in the boat (and even a mosquito or two). We had either waited too long to put up our shields or they were ineffective against the almost invisible no-see-ums -- either way, we both slept fitfully and don't feel very refreshed this morning.

We pulled up anchor hoping we might make the 40 miles to St. Augustine but the current was against us an it soon became very clear that we weren't going to make it there unless we put in another very long day. Since neither of us was up for that, we picked an anchorage that would allow us to take most of the afternoon off to relax.

We were leaving pretty much at dead low tide, so the birds were out in force gorging themselves on the snails, crabs an other seafood (for them) exposed on the tidal mud. We saw our first roseate spoonbill, a big-billed bird that looks comical as it slashes its spoon back and forth through the water picking up food.

Birds at Breakfast:

Low tide turns the salt marsh into a bird "all-you-can-eat" buffet

Not sure what these are, but they came to breakfast

We startled this stork off the table

My favorite was the roseate spoonbill -- its bill really does look like a big spoon

You have to wonder what the birds n the right are thinking about that spoonbill :-) 

This blue heron preferred to eat alone.

We crossed the St. John's river this morning, the main connection between Jacksonville and the Ocean. Like Savannah, Jacksonville is a few miles inland from the ocean. We bypassed the city itself -- we have been there by car and had no particular need to revisit. Our route took us through Cabbage Swamp, a 12 mile man-made stretch of the Intercoastal lined on one side with nice homes,the other side being a swamp full of cabbage palms. Straight as an arrow, it was like driving down nice residential street that bordered a park.

Jacksonville in the distance

We arrived at our anchorage in the early afternoon, dropped the hook and took a swim. The current was strong so we mostly had to hang onto our safety lines.  I used the rest of the afternoon to catch up on my blogging -- I had fallen more than a week behind.

While I was on deck blogging, another southbound sailboat passed us  by -- the first in a long time. We have been pretty much "alone" heading south at this time of year -- most snowbird cruisers, the main users of the Intercoastal as a highway south,  wait till September to leave the Northeast -- we were far ahead of them.

The moon came up around dusk -- it was roughly a half moon and made My Weigh and our surroundings glow in the moonlight -- I couldn't resist taking a picture.