The Admiral personally came up with this weeks title. She was exceedingly proud of it!

After Magnolia’s short “Maintenance Availability” near Melbourne we continued north along the ICW to Cocoa Village, FL. This was one our favorite stops heading south in the fall and looked forward to visiting again. In addition it was a great location to meet Second Sally (Greg & Marie) before heading offshore at Port Canaveral.

As you might remember from 2013-11-05 Dealers, Enablers, “What is Possible”, All in 5 Years, Greg and Marie patiently trained and mentored us for this trip. It was going to be a real treat to sail with them from Canaveral, Magnolia to the St Mary’s River and Second Sally to the St Johns River in Jacksonville.

Port Canaveral is a huge shipping port as well as the base for many cruise ships so it was not surprising we quickly found a large ship making her way through the inlet. As Greg reminded us, “its just like the interstate, stay out of the way of the big trucks!” So off we went. Magnolia’s portion of the passage was expected to be 180nm and take us about 32-36 hours to arrive in St Mary’s/Fernandina Beach.

As usual the Admiral did a great job on maneuvering us through the traffic. The buildings off Magnolia port side the NASA Vehicle Assembly Build and Launch Pass.

It was a lovely day to be on the water the only problem there was no wind. Shockingly the prediction by the weather forecaster for the winds to “fill” later in the afternoon never materialized. It no better out here than on land! I did capture a lovely sunset with Second Sally in the distance. She would continue to move further north west to make her entrance to Jacksonville while Magnolia stayed further offshore to the east to make landfall as St Mary’s.

The Admiral and I took 3 hour watches through the night and I was lucky enough to enjoy a terrific sunrise.

The terrific thing about sailing into these historic inlets is we actually can imagine what mariners of yesteryear saw as they entered. Below is Fort Clinch as we passed upon entering St Mary’s inlet.

After arriving Fernandina Beach Marina and settling Magnolia was treating ourselves to a fine dinner out. In my case whole flounder, it did not stand a chance!

Annette had been to Fernandina Beach before but my first time. It is a lovely town with a very attractive water front.

It was not long after this picture was taken that we were both fast asleep.

Oh yes, the actual track of our trip below came in at 179.71 nm. I would say we were pretty close to our prediction.

Next stop, historic Cumberland Island!