Day 106 onward to Jekyll Island, Georgia

We left Fernandina Beach on Amelia Island, FL at 8:30 am bound for Jekyll Island, Georgia. Yes, after 87 days in Florida, we finally left and entered he Peach state of Georgia. As usual, it was not quite that simple. I docked and undocked three times each today. As we left the marina, we went to the other end of the dock for a pump out. Then we went to a commercial fuel dock for 436 gallons of diesel fuel. Their price was nearly $0.50 per gallon cheaper than most marinas, and we were able to sign a form stating that we were leaving Florida so that they could waive the 7% sales tax. Thus, we saved a lot of money! Then, we set off north to Georgia just a few miles away.

Fort Clinch at the North end of Amelia Island protected the channel out into the Atlantic. The fort was very large, and as you can see in the picture below, their cannons had a clear shot all of the way across the harbor.

You can see the white spots in the ends of the barrels where they have been filled with cement. We went part way out the channel to get these pictures, and when we turned around to go back to the IntraCoastal Waterway, we were immediately "surrounded" by four 25 foot Coast Guard boats. It turned out that they were divided into pairs, and they were training on how to overtake and stop a vessel. It was quite a show with machine guns manned, etc. Fortunately they were chasing each other and not us, but it was still a relief when they all waved... A short distance further up river, we passed a nuclear submarine base, which had more (and larger) patrol boats coming and going everywhere. They were dredging the channel into the base, and at one point we had to go VERY close to one of the docks to avoid the dredge. We went slow and followed all of the channel markers, but it was still a little unnerving... However, just for good measure, I did walk out on the fly bridge and looked up, smiled and waved just in case there were any spy satellites going over.

We arrived at Jekyll Harbor Marina about 2:00 pm after our trip of 33 miles. The last 2/3 of the trip were in coastal salt marsh with virtually no signs of civilization. It was one of the nicest part of our whole trip so far. Scenic, remote, beautiful weather, etc. Jekyll Island is remote, but it has long been a vacation destination. In spite of this, it has very few homes and hotels. So, it has retained a lot of its original charm. The marina has a very nice pool and whirlpool, which accounts for the 'happy face" on the Admiral.

Low key is the operative word(s) around here.

Here is the view of the marina office, restaurant and pool from our dock. Everything is tucked back in the trees, but there are still lovely views from the restaurant and pool. Very nicely done!

We will be here for three nights as they have a Summer Special of three nights for the price of two. We are about 0.8 miles from the beach and a little over a mile from the old downtown so we plan to start exploring tomorrow.

This was just after sunset tonight taken from Lucky Us. You can see the highway bridge from the mainland on the right. Yup, the beauty of this place seems quite extraordinary...