East Coast Tour

     This trip is as good or better than either of us imagined it would be!  The museums, architecture, and hospitality of St. Augustine have been wonderful.  It is time to move on, though. 
     We are going to stop in Jacksonville, FL for long needed repairs. Our autopilot has not worked since our lightening experience. There is a company in JAX that works on our brand. Going to have it looked at to see if it is worth repairing or replacing. We will see, it would be very difficult to compete with St. Augustine for our favor!
     If we have a long wait on service or parts, we can get started sewing for our grandson. We have the honor of getting to make the crib set. We have had the fabric and notions on board since we left and of course we would like to remove excess "baggage". 
     We have had time to sew and have completed some of the parts. Hope to get the whole set finished and shipped to Jessica and Craig soon. 
     We moved inland on the St. John River while waiting on parts to be shipped from England for the autopilot. Did a little exploring while killing time.  Back towards JAX for July 4th. We found a Publix grocery store only 2 blocks off the river - so we got some more provisions! Looking forward to having a good spot to watch fireworks. And were we ever rewarded!!  The best fireworks show either of us has ever seen. Done in stereo - 2 barges with near simultaneous displays! Great!
  Then we got the autopilot fixed and recalibrated. We left Jacksonville that afternoon. Having that is gonna be nice!
     Today, off Jekyll Island, we were part of something pretty fantastic. We went exploring by dinghy just before sunset. We saw some boys scooping water from the river and splashing something white near the shore. We drove closer and asked what they were doing. They had been fishing and caught a southern stingray ( fairly large). While she was on their fishing line, she gave birth to four babies. After they got the stingray loose from the line, she was upside down in shallow water and couldn't get turned back over - enter DnA. We were able to get close in the dink and use our oars to get her flipped over so she could swim off!!  Incredible!  Sorry no pictures - the camera was back on the big boat.