Rendezvous in Jacksonville – Tides & Currents and a Rescue!

We could have easily stayed in St. Augustine on our mooring ball a few more days.. perhaps even weeks. But we had an exciting rendezvous planned up in Jacksonville with dear friends.

So.. we untied from the ball and continued our northward cruise.

First, our video recap of this segment:

First Stop: Pine Island Anchorage

Our rendezvous point was about 35 nautical miles up ahead – a lengthy cruising day.

Especially as we’re entering areas where we have to watch the tides and currents more closely.  Pushing against a strong current can greatly impact your cruising speed and fuel consumption.

So we selected a nice anchorage just about 11 miles north of St. Augustine for the night so we could tackle most of our entry to Jacksonville on a flood.

Besides, it was the peak night of the Perseid Meteor shower, and we wanted to up our odds of some star gazing.

Pine Island is an oxbow off the ICW that actually once was part of the Intracoastal – it’s now too shoaled in for passage. But there’s usually plenty of depth if you pick your way in for anchoring.

We were in the middle of a new moon, which means tidal swings are ranging in the 7′ range. We set ourselves in about 10′ of depth upon arrival and at low tide our depth gauge (reading from the keel) was flirting with 1.5′! Our biggest tide swing yet. We’ll have to get used this going north.

It was a lovely lovely anchorage – delightfully secluded, quiet, tranquil and great paddle boarding.

And we did catch a few shooting stars.

Second & Third Stop: Rendezvous at Sisters Creek, Mill Creek

The cruise north from here would be mostly in a tighter canal-like passage with long spans of no-wake zones – which meant slow going. We also wanted to time our crossing under the Pablo Creek Bridge to be as close to minimal currents as possible – as there are reported rapids through this narrow crossing.

It was an uneventful but beautiful cruising day, and we nailed the timing of the bridge.

And as we exited the ICW onto the St. Johns River – there was s/v Kathryn, who’s crew had just set anchor after their several day passage down from the Savannah area.

We met Ann and Elliott through this blog actually, many years ago – and our friendship has deepened over the years. They got the itch to sail about the same time we pursued finding Y-Not – so this was a long awaited rendezvous finally manifesting. We planned to explore Jacksonville together until they needed to head back home.

After a shared lunch together we all opted to move on up to Mill Creek – and more tranquil anchorage. It was only 4 miles, and all of us failed to take the currents into account seriously.

Our normal cruising speed of 7-8 knots dropped to 4-5. And even up on plane we could only achieve 9 knots (we usually can top out at 17 knots with the engines full out). And poor Kathryn was only making a .5 knot headway!

At one point, we though she’d have a 8 hr cruise ahead of her.

Thankfully, the currents dropped and we all made it into the anchorage before sundown – us ahead of them, with dinner ready.

Forth Stop: Downtown Jacksonville

We all wanted to check out downtown Jacksonville before arriving to our reserved marina stay. There are three free options – a municipal marina by the football stadium (slips are free, but power is $8/day), dockage at Jacksonville Landing and anchoring out by the hospitals.

We planned our passage with the correct current flows this time to ride the flood into town – with Kathryn leading out a couple hours ahead of us. We caught up with them to anchor in the lee of a small island to ride out a rain squall and then continued on.

We passed on the marina – as we couldn’t make contact with our friends as they were facilitating getting the bridge raised. We tried approaching Jacksonville Landing but between sloshy water and non-restored docks after past hurricane seasons – we all decided to just anchor out.

Which turned out to be lovely. Our friends Sean & Louise had written about this anchorage before, and how they even had a sheriff visit welcoming them to the area.  There are two free docks for dinghy access here – one right under the I-95 bridge to get ashore in the Five Points area (preferred quaint area for dining) and Jacksonville Landing.

We spent a couple days here, going ashore to wander downtown, visit the science museum and meet up with Patreons.

And we so enjoyed the sound of a city from out on the water.

Last Stop: Marina at Ortega Landing

We actually looked at a boat docked at Ortega Landing back in 2016, and have heard nearly legendary things about it ever since from other cruisers. It was on our must stop list and Ann & Elliott cheerfully went along with the idea of us both booking a weekly stay here together.

For one, we needed to do something about our failing house battery bank and needed some dock time to handle that.

It was just a few miles up river from our current location so we all pulled our anchors and headed over – first having to cross the very narrow half closed Ortega River bridge. And then, we were in our slips and settled in.

With loaner bikes from the marina, we were quick to get out exploring together. Dining out in nearby Avondale with patrons, visiting Chamberlins epic book store and so much more. Our visit even coincided with the marina’s monthly party – this time a Pirate Party. Super fun.

A week went by in a blink of the eye and soon it was time to push Kathryn off the docks and back towards Georgia.

We however ended up extending our stay. That’s how much we liked it.

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This post actually is our last official Great Loop stop in our 2018 cruising season. We are now technically off the Great Loop path and on a side trip.  We’ll resume the loop (slooooooooowly) next spring after spending the winter on our boat.

Great Loop Log (8/23/2018)

• Distance: 709.8 nm
• Stops: 48
• Marina Nights: 396
• Anchored / Moored Nights: 45
• Bridges : 134
• Locks: 0

Other Travel Posts in this Great Loop Travel Series:

• Florida ICW (2018):
  • Having a BALL in St. Augustine, Florida
  • Oh No!! Bridge Closed — And Exploring Marineland, Florida
  • One Week Turns to Five in New Smyrna Beach, Florida
  • Cruising the Space Coast — Melbourne to New Smyrna Beach
  • Ft. Pierce to Melbourne with Mom Aboard!
  • Two Months in Ft. Pierce, Florida — Causeway Cove Marina, Tackling Boat Projects & Enjoying City Life’
  • Continuing North up the ICW — Boca Raton to Ft. Pierce & the MTOA Southern Rendezvous
  • Leaving Miami in the Rear View — Heading North up the ICW!
  • Leaving Miami and Resuming our Great Loop Cruising Season for 2018!
  • Miami the Hard Way — Boat Haul Out, Repairs & Living On the Hard
• The Keys (2017):
  • Arriving to the Keys — Pre-Irma Marathon
  • Hurricane Irma Evacuation and Return to Marathon, FL
  • Saying Good-Bye to Marathon — In Search of a Protected Anchorage
  • A Challenging Departure from The Keys — A Tropical Storm & A Bump in the Water
• South to the Keys:
  • The Great Loop: South to the Keys (Part 1) — Ft. Myers to Naples
  • The Great Loop: South to the Keys (Part 2) — Naples to Marco Island
  • The Great Loop: South to the Keys (Part 3) — Cruising Ten Thousand Islands
  • The Great Loop: South to the Keys (Part 4) — Everglades National Park — Little Shark River & Cape Sable
• Sometimes Nomads Need to Grow Some Barnacles (Two Months in Fort Myers)
• Starting the Great Loop — First Adventure: Punta Gorda, FL to Fort Myers, FL

View all our Great Loop Posts
on our Interactive Map!

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Current Update

I write this from Ortega Landing in Jacksonville. Our choice to be here has been quite fortunate this hurricane season – with both Florence and Michael walloping the coasts around us. But we’ve had not much at all here.

Presuming the weather forecasts hold, we’re aiming to drop our lines later this week and start heading UP the St Johns River to Sanford. We’ve had several requests to meet-up – since it’ll be a short visit, we’re contemplating hosting an official meet up there. If you’re interested, so let us know in the comments (or be in touch) and we’ll be sure to update you if anything comes together later this month or early November.

Our two months in Jacksonville have been amazing & busy and filled of adventures, meet-us, visits from friends and boat projects. We ended up fixing our battery problem by diving into installing lithium batteries and a new inverter.  We’ll get things caught up as soon as we can on those projects.

Until then.. see ya on down up the river!