Sunday, Nov 13, 2011 St Augustine mooring ball

  We dawdled around until 9am leaving only 1 boat in the anchorage, and it looked like they were planning on staying.  It was high tide and everything was flooded, the ICW impossible to discern without the markers.  I called St Augustine Municipal Marina to see what side of the Bridge of Lions our mooring balls would be.  I’d requested the south side to get us through the bridge, and they appointed us #16 and #17 on the south side.

  We debated whether to try to make the 11am opening of the bridge, and finally made a run for it, as well as a sailboat can make a run for it, although we did get the benefit of the current coming in from St Augustine Sound and went through the bridge with a large trawler.  Blue Planet went to the dock first and we headed to our mooring.  After lunch we headed into the marina to sign up, take showers, do laundry, and catch up on the internet, only to find the marina’s internet was defunct.

  Later we went out for supper at the A1A Ale House then walked around historic St Augustine, but were in for the night at 7:30.  We could hear partying all around us and the dinghy dock was full of late (?) revelers.

  Oh, waiting for Ken and to do the laundry, a mother manatee and baby were under one of the dock bridges.  We’d never seen them so close and they looked like 2 blobs, the mother huge, over 1000 pounds.  We were all gawking down at them, and would see the baby come up for air, but the mother didn’t move.  Much later I saw through the lounge window her flipping her tail and leaving.