We departed Palatka at 8:15 am after, yes we need to do it, a pump out. Beautiful blue sky over Palatka with a park on the left, church and the beginnings of downtown on the right. The St. Johns River has continued to get narrower as we head upstream. In the Jacksonville area it was several miles wide, but by the time we reached Palatka (58 miles) it was down to a half mile. After the 48 miles to Astor today the river is now down to 3-400 feet wide. Near the end of today's trip we crossed Lake George, which is about 10 by 5 miles. The lake is shallow (about 15' for most of the way), and it could get very nasty in a stiff breeze. However, we were blessed with a light breeze for the whole day. 
This osprey was on the jetty as we left the lake at the south end. Unlike the Intracoastal Waterway, today most of the channel markers on the St. Johns River had osprey nests on them. I guess that there are not enough tall, isolated dead trees around here for the nests. Anyway, we saw LOTS of ospreys today. While we were slowly going past this osprey, the Admiral was standing on the aft end of the fly bridge playing osprey calls on her iPad... This osprey cocked his head at several different angles in response to the calls. This was really quite the scene... No, not the reaction of the osprey. I mean watching the Admiral point the iPad at the osprey...
In one of the more remote areas we saw this small ferry, which was maneuvered by an outboard powered rowboat on the other side. It looked more like an unofficial "do-it-yourself" operation.
Continuing with the theme of "odd sights", we saw this Casita travel trailer that was painted to look like Lego blocks. Fortunately that theme does not seem to have caught on with boat owners -at least not yet.
We got back to more normal sights as we approached our destination of Astor. This lovely old home was one of several along the water in town. Of course, some of the areas must have absolutely no zoning given the mix of shacks, mobile homes and beautiful mansions...
This picture shows Lucky Us at her dock at the Blackwater Inn (restaurant and marina). The "green stuff" in the foreground is water hyacinth that seems to be quite invasive around here. We will need to check the strainers on our raw water inlets since this plant breaks loose and pieces are impossible to avoid as they are floating everywhere.
This is a little different view with just the bow of Lucky Us and the waterfront side of the Blackwater Inn. We went to dinner here, and we both had the "Catch of the Day", which was broiled triggerfish. Wow, chalk up another excellent meal. This is the first time on our adventure that our check at dinner also included the cost of the transient slip for the night. Well, the place does seem a little laid back...
Tomorrow we are going an additional 40 miles south on the St. Johns River to the town of Sanford. Ever heard of George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin??? Yup, that's the place. Depending upon water levels, we could go further south, but at that point we will have gone about 170 miles up river from the Atlantic Ocean on the St. Johns River. We plan to have a more leisurely cruise back down the river and hopefully check out some of the interesting spots that we have seen (and NO, the Lego trailer is not one of them!).
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