Sunday, September 23, 2007

Traveling the ICW to Seafarer's Marina, Jacksonville, FL

We had been traveling via the ICW for many days and it was getting very close to June 1st, which is the beginning of hurricane season. We had not found a place that we wanted to settle and traveling up the ICW was just too SLOW for us to make progress. The weather outside the ICW (in the Atlantic) was very unsettled with northern winds, so it was not a good idea for us to go outside and sail north. So we decided to go to a marina in Jacksonville, Florida, rent a car and drive up the coast to check out all the marina's along the way and decide where we wanted to settle. We would then wait for a weather window, head out the St. John's River outlet and hit the Atlantic to sail north to our new home. So off we go to Seafarer's Marina. Below are pictures we took along the way. We don't recall where all of these were taken, so just enjoy the view!!!!



There were houses along the rivers and beautiful landscape.








This is Daytona Beach, Florida.












More landscape and channel markers to the left. You have to stay inside of these.



















































One day we had a storm chasing us, every corner we turned, it got closer.








Local Shrimp boat.







A calm day.









Finally, the anchor is down and the Captain is happy.










Ciao for now, next stop Seafarer's Marina, what an experience that was! See ya, Mike and Kim on Ka'imi




New Video

Click here for a video of Mike at the bow of the boat while we are motoring along to Venezuela. The video is courtesy of Ken and Roberta, Second Wind, and you are hearing their voices. You can also hear Kim at the end saying "I concur" on the VHF radio.

If you haven't already noticed below the Video box at the bottom are two sites where you can go to read about other boats that are cruising. Click on 'List All' in the Sailing & Cruising Homepages box, or click on 'List' in The Cruising Yact Site Ring.

Enjoy, Mike and Kim on Ka'imi

Vero Beach to Cocoa Beach, Florida

Sorry it's been a long time since updates but this working thing keeps getting in the way!! Anyway we left off in leaving Jensen Beach heading for Vero Beach. The trip was uneventful and hot! Unfortunately we did not get the camera out for this portion of the trip and the only picture we took at Vero Beach was this one of our friends Steve and Ann on Tai Ann, they also have a cat Ponce, but we didn't get the camera out for that either. I found this other picture on the internet.

We spent five days at Vero Beach and had a great time. There was a free bus that took you to grocery stores, West Marine and a Mall. We managed to spend a little money provisioning the boat, buying a cell phone (we are in the US now you know) and a new pet. This is Polly our new parrot. He is very friendly and has a large vocabulary, although some might call him a potty mouth we enjoy his insults. If you want to hear what Polly says click on the link but - not if you are easily offended. To get back to the blog just click the back button on your browser. http://www.prankplace.com/polly.htm. He looks so innocent too.

We left Vero Beach rather reluctantly, because we were having a great time but we needed to move on and headed over to Cocoa Beach for an overnighter. We traveled for several more days stopping to eat and sleep when we had enough travel for the day. We finally decided to find a spot to leave the boat so that we could find a place to stay. We wanted to get out into the ocean and sail as time was passing and hurricane season start was a few days away. So it was the day before Memorial Day Weekend and we decided to go up the St. John River towards Jacksonville and stay at the Seafarer's marina. We would rent a car and travel up the coast to find our marina. Well that was the plan anyway, what really happened is in the Seafarer's Marina update.

Cheers Mike and Kim on Ka'imi
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