St. Augustine to Amelia Island

Carol in new condo

5/4/12. We left Dunedin after spending 6 1/2 days at home establishing a new physician,working around the house and spending time with friends. We were able to spend time with our former neighbor, Carol Lindstrom, at her new Clearwater Beach condo and accompanied her to dinner in Dunedin after giving her a tour of our new place.

Our friend, Becky cooked a wonderful meal for 8 of us before Ken and Trinkie headed back to Michigan and Crystal and Bob headed for Sanibel Island and we departed for the next leg of our journey. We arrived in St. Augustine at 1500 after stopping in Plant City for a Strawberry shake. After unpacking, we bought groceries and added two more days to our car rental so we could tour St. A.

5/5/12. We spent the day walking around the historic section of town.

It was VERY hot and there were lots of tourists. Our impression was that it was very commercial. We did tour a Greek shrine and the Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine. Ron bought new shoes to help his aching feet and we had a mid-afternoon snack (tapas) and sangria. Church Saturday evening happened to be a first communion for the children of the parish. We returned to Walmart for some forgotten items where we saw two random acts of kindness. An elderly woman dropped some produce and a young woman scrambled to assist her. A few minutes later, a teen dropped a wadded up $5.00 bill, and another young woman tracked her down and returned it. Nice to see! We had dinner at the marina restaurant, Hurricane Patty's. Guess we left at the right time, since we heard later that there was a bar fight. Our marina, River's Edge was not so good. It lacked garbage cans, had huge mud flats when the tide went out and there were no other amenities other than a shower. A grizzled looking guy, who appeared homeless, sat on the porch all day and all evening. We found out later that he actually owned a small sailboat.

5/6/12. We spent the day preparing for a Monday am departure. Our evening meal was at Columbia Restaurant....very good!

5/7/12. After waiting for high tide (the only time you could get near the gas dock) we fueled up and got a pump out and departed for Palm Cove Marina in Jacksonville. It was a very nice marina with a pool and floating docks. We met a couple at the pool from California. Their boat is Island Girl.

5/8/12. Saw Island Girl as they passed us on the route to Amelia Island. They took several pictures of our boat.

We arrived at Fernandina Harbor Marina just after Island Girl pulled in.

5/9/12 Nice marina, and super nice downtown area with quaint shops.

5/10/12. Ron took a long bike ride and I shopped before meeting him for lunch at Cafe Karibo. We took the trolley tour of the historic district. It was a beautiful day before evening storms rolled in.