On September 6, 2013 we left the marina in Green Cove Springs and headed north to a marina on the Ortega River. It was a bitter sweet day.

Our amazing journey began in January 2013 when we purchased Double JJ a Great Harbour GH37. We have spent the last 8 months completing the retro-fit and watching the transformation of Double JJ into our awesome Great Harbour GH37 now named Twelve Stones.

Our move north to the Ortega River signifies the next chapter in our journey. Look out ICW (The Ditch) & Key West here we come.

We cannot begin to thank all the people who have helped us get to this next chapter in our journey. We have met some incredible people with incredible stories.

We are EXCITED and cant wait to get on The Ditch. 

17 Days On The Beautiful St. Johns River

8/20/13 - We arrived back at our home dock in Green Cove Springs, Florida after 17 days and 210 NM on the St. Johns River. We had an awesome trip. We finally made it all the way to Sanford, Florida and spent a week at Boat Tree Marina.  The Marina has a deli, beauty shop, pool, and poolside restaurant. Excellent staff at the marina.

Gerhard & Karen Munster fellow MTOA members live about 3 minutes from this marina. They were gracious port host, having us over for dinner & taking us grocery shopping. We enjoyed getting to know them both.


While at the dock we had some much needed electrical helm work done. While we already had what was suppose to be "new" electronics installed in April we later discovered this was not the case and have had to go to the expense of getting most of the stuff purchased and installed AGAIN. Hopefully that bad experience is behind us. With the new electronics the trip back north on the St. Johns came off without a hitch. YEA.


As always the St.Johns river is a beautiful and peaceful river.

Breathtaking Birds

 

 

Boat Tree Marina, Sanford, Florida

 

 



Boat Tree Marina, Sanford, Florida

 



 

Boat Tree Marina, Sanford, Florida

 



Proves you can see just about anything in the river!

 



Pool Time

 



At Blue Springs Entrance

ver.

This morning we left Blackwater Inn, Astor Fl. after being docked there for 4 days. Spent time with my sister & her husband and had a great time. They even loaned us one of their cars to use.
We are now docked at Hontoon Island State Park for the night. The park is only accessible by boat or ferry so once the ferry stops running at 7pm we have the island all to ourselves.
Tomorrow we leave for Sanford.

The St. Johns River...

 

Found a good floating dock on the way south.

Dingy ride to Parramores Restaurant for breakfast.

Ate with a squirrel.

 

View from our breakfast table at Parramores on the river.

Anchored off the St. Johns River

We spent our 1st night at Murphy Creek Conservation Park tied to the floating dock. The park which is only accessible by boat is home to bald eagles, deer, bobcats, foxes, & wild turkeys. We did see a turkey.

Today we left Murphy Creek and are now anchored near Astor. Took the dingy to Paramores Restaurant and met my sister and her husband for dinner. Life on the river is good.

Leaving the dock tomorrow.

Tomorrow we plan on leaving the dock and head south. Our goal is to actualy get to Sanford Fl. We have been at the dock for 23 days, way too long. We continue to have trouble wih our electronics. We finally located a good marine electronics guy. He has made 2 visits and has uncovered the bad job the previous electronics guy did in April. We feel confident this guy will get us on the right track.
Looking forward to a quiet anchor tomorrow night.

Our 11 day, 185 NM trip came to an end on 7/10 Wednesday when we docked back at our home marina in Green Cove Springs.  Our trip was cut short with the news that a tropical named storm was potentially headed our way. The storm never came but that is the way of the water. Better to be safe than sorry.

All in all our trip was awesome. We got to spend time with family which was the highlight of this trip. It seems for one reason or another we can't seem to make it beyond Hontoon State Park to Sanford. Twice now we have tried and only made it as far as Hontoon. But that's okay because we will head south, again, shortly.

We continue to meet boaters along the way that we have connected with on Active Captain. We even shared a cove one night with Tropical Sunset a 44' cat. As always the information we get from Active Captain and eboatcards has proven to be priceless.

Nature was certainly on display for our trip.