Days 326

Fernandina Beach - Jekyll Harbor Marina, Jekyll Island GA

• Start 7:55 AM
• End 11:55 AM
• Underway 3:50 Hours
• Distance 35 Miles
• Total Miles on Trip 5116
• Av Speed 7.6 knots
• Weather Cloudy , 76 Degrees, Wind Knots 4 N

Happy Easter and Welcome to Georgia. After four months we are out of Florida.

What a cool trip this was! My initial thoughts for the trip, was to leave the intracoastal waterway, and run in the ocean. The weather predictions were perfect, but Peter (Tipsy Turtle) suggested that we stay on the intracoastal waterway (ICW). The channel out to the ocean is not well marked, and we would miss seeing Kings Bay Submarine Base.

Kings Bay is home to the U.S. Atlantic Fleet's home port for U.S. Navy Fleet ballistic missile nuclear submarines capable of being armed with Trident missile nuclear weapons. It was very cool to take our boat less than ½ mile from a submarine. It felt like we could run right up to the base, the only thing between us and the submarine pen, was a little old navy patrol boat. I am sure if we even started to turn out of the channel they would have stopped us very quickly and not very politely! I wanted Mark and Karen (Kay Dee) to try it, so I could video tape what happened, but they would not do it. Other than the submarine base, the ride to Jekyll Harbor was very dull and boring. It is very easy to understand why many people who boat up and down the east coast, take the ocean route and bypass Georgia. While the rivers and marshlands surrounding the rivers are beautiful, the rivers twist, turn, wind, and then twist and turn again. You can easily travel 3 miles to go one mile north.

Like most of the marina's we have been in recently Jekyll Harbor Marina had every slip full, both with long term slip holders and transient boaters like us. It has been somewhat difficult finding slips, and we are starting to plan our stops almost 3 weeks out. If we have delays or changes most marinas are very good about working with changes. Getting into our slip took a couple of tries, the slip was perpendicular to the 6 knot current, luckily the current was pushing us towards a finger pier instead of a boat. Had our slip been on the other side of the finger pier the current would have been pushing us into a boat.

We only had the one night here, not giving us much time to explore the area. We did take advantage of the loaner golf carts that the marina has to go explore the ocean side of the island. You can use the golf carts for 90 minutes so we did not have a lot of time. Mark & Karen (Kay Dee) joined us on our golf cart, while Jim & Norma (Dorothy Gale) waited for the next available cart. Jim & Norma were not able to catch up with us because the batteries died in the golf cart they got. While I am sure Jekyll Island has much more to offer than what we saw, I do not think I would come back.

Once back to the marina I started cooking Easter Dinner. Not knowing what we would find open and with room for six of us, Angel and I decided to host dinner on Nothing To Plunder. It is always a challenge to cook on the boat, especially when you have multiple dishes that need to go in the oven, and all we have is an easy bake oven. (Emeril Air Fyer). It does a great job, but only one dish at a time.

Our next stop, Brunswick GA, is only 9 miles up the ICW. We are heading there to get the best hamburger Mark & Karen found on their last Great Loop trip.