Jekyll Island, GA

Jekyll Island is our second stop in Georgia.  Many loopers hurry through Georgia and the only reason I can think of is the tides are tricky along with the ever-present potential of running aground.  Rhonda and I are determined to take our time enjoying this beautiful part of the Atlantic coastline.  The entire coastline of Georgia is a series of "barrier islands," many of which are still in their primitive state.  Here's a good summary of those islands and some explanation for the extreme tide variance that we found on the island today at the museum.

Off of the top of my head, some of the island names are Tybee, Skidaway, Ossabaw, Wassau, Sapelo, St. Catherines, St. Simons, Jekyll, and Cumberland.  We lived at Belle Island (an interior island) from 1984 to 1987 and as I noted previously, our younger son, Scott, was born in Savannah.  I'll never forget when we arrived in Savannah from Shreveport, LA.  Rhonda was very pregnant with Scott and we had rented a house on Whitmarsh Island while we built our home at Belle Island.  We drove right through downtown Savannah  on St. Patrick's Day totally unaware that Savannah has the second largest celebration in the country, second only to New York. At the time, we still owned our first boat, a 16-foot Newman bowrider ski boat and traversed these waterways many times.  Shrimping and crabbing were favorite times also.  Anyhow, we have some great memories in coastal Georgia and look forward to some reminders of those days.

We decided to stay 3 days at Jekyll for 2 reasons.  Easter Sunday was our second day and we didn't want to be traveling that day.  Then the marina offered us a third day free for staying 2 days.  It's hard to turn down a free day plus the weather was a little bit iffy with thunderstorms forecast to be scattered throughout the day (they never showed up).  Anyhow, it's been a very pleasant 3 days and we've come to love Jekyll Island.  Now if everyone reading this blog would donate lots of money to us, we would consider living here.  Contact me for details on the PayPal account or for an address if you prefer to send cash.

Here's a brief history of the island - my version but will be sort of close.  In 1742, William Horton was charged with establishing a military post to protect Fort Frederica.  He later established his home on the island and Horton House is still part of the remains on display from those early years.  The island changed hands over the years and the real history for which it is known today began in the late 1800s when a plan was devised to make memberships available to 100 of the super rich men of the day to a very exclusive Jekyll Island Club.  Names such as Rockefeller, Goodyear, Morgan, Pulitzer, Vanderbilt, Gould, and Astor are a few that responded to this opportunity to be part of a super seclusive and exclusive winter getaway to a subtropical climate retreat.  Some had their own mansions built on the island which they referred to as "cottages."  To promote social interaction, none of them were built with kitchens and members dined together at the Jekyll Island Club.  By WWII, the members controlled 1/6 of the WORLD's wealth.  By the depression years, the exclusive club had seen its heyday and the state of Georgia bought the island in 1947 for a paltry sum of $675,000.  OK, here are lots of pics to give you an idea of the splendor these families enjoyed here.  First some of the "cottages."

All of these are uninhabited today but have been restored for visitors and tourism.  However, the Crane Cottage has rooms for rent and has meals available for lunch and dinner.  Rhonda and I ate there and it was outstanding.  Crane built Crane toilets and seems to have been a bit obsessed with that theme.  There are 17 bathrooms in his cottage! Apparently the Crane Cottage caused some dissension among the members as it was much larger and a bit more extravagant than the others.  I guess some things never change, huh?  Here are some pics.

One of the members, Henry Hyde, was very selective about who he wished to be around so he built the Sans Souci to house six friends of his choice.  Members with children or mistresses were excluded of course!

And if you think the cottages are nice, take a look at the Jekyll Island Club.

A few shots of the inside of the club.

A side porch, pool and grounds.

One point of interest was that some of the walkways around the club were not bricked but were made of wooden timbers driven upright in the ground.

So, you get the idea.  Also, two significant events occurred here.  Several of the members gathered to develop a proposal for the Federal Reserve System.  Their draft was not the final version, but the one adopted contained many of their ideas.  Also, the first transatlantic phone call was made from here. 

A museum is housed in the old stable.  Here's a shot of the rafters, definitely built to withstand time.

Faith Chapel is take-your-breath-away beautiful but they would not allow pictures to be taken inside.

Many of the live oak tree branches are so long and large that they rest on the ground.

There is lots of other activity here today within the historic district.  Lots of shops, a sea turtle foundation, bookstore, commissary, glass shop, bikes for rent, etc..  The island also has miles and miles of bike and walking trails, pretty much around the entire island and throughout parts of the interior.  There's an airport, campground, water park, golf courses, convention center, and a really nicely developed beachfront that extends for miles with nice trails, restrooms, pavilions, volleyball courts, and a pretty beach to go with all of that.

On the north end of the island, the beach is designated as "Driftwood Beach" for obvious reasons.

There was a wedding being held down the beach about a 1/4 mile away and this part of the wedding party had parked too far away and was hurrying to make "I Do" in time!

Rhonda found a pretty good-sized living whelk (sea snail) in some of the tidal pools at Driftwood Beach.

And we ended one of the days with a nice low-country shrimp boil at Sea Jay's Restaurant.  Been a long time since we've had that - very, very good.

So, it's time to move on, but not very far.  Got to play the wait-for-rising-tide to get out of here, then we need to refuel in Brunswick, backtrack a few miles to get back on the ICW, and then run about 25 miles north to Darien, GA.  The town is about 7 miles off of the ICW but other cruisers have great comments about their stop there, AND the town has a free floating dock with power for 2 days. It's really good to be in Georgia again.

Hello Georgia! Jacksonville to Jekyll Island

If you have never spent any time in coastal Georgia, YOU SHOULD!  Absolutely beautiful and so much history.  However, there is one drawback - sand gnats or "no-seeums" as they are also called.  They can annoy the dickens out of you.  We lived south of Savannah from 1984 to 1987 and we never really got used to them.  Our younger son, Scott, was born here so we have some great memories in this area but I'll cover all of that when we stop in Kilkenny, GA in a few days. However, I guess we should get out of FL first as far as the blog goes.  

We had an immediate concern when we pulled out of Harbortown and into the ICW.  We had lost our hydraulic steering!  You can maneuver the boat of course with just the engines but that's primarily used for docking, very slow speeds, getting in/out of tight spots, etc., but not for cruising speeds all day long.  About the time I was considering heading back to Harbortown, I realized I had inadvertently left the autopilot/hydraulic steering unit on all night (maybe 2 nights) and decided it was probably a loss of fluid or pressure or both.  Sure enough, a quick check showed only 5 PSI and we need 20.  A bicycle tire pump and a few minutes later and we were back in business.

We had a large container ship pass in front of us where the ICW and St. Johns River intersect.  It was from Majuro, a large coral atoll in the Marshall Islands of the Pacific Ocean.

Then a NAVY blimp running the coastline southbound.  Sorry about the pic, best I could do from such a distance.

Then we picked up some company running northbound just ahead of us.  They stopped at Amelia Island shortly thereafter.  Having company will become more and more common with spring and milder temps as more cruisers begin their trek northbound.

Fernandina Beach is the last FL town heading north out of the state.  We had planned to stop here but need to move on.

Lots of activity with the shrimp fleet and shipping industry.

Monrovia is the capital city of the west African nation of Liberia.  I just think the home ports on all of the ships are interesting.

And before we left Fernandina, we managed to get our culture for the day.  (That's a joke for those of you from Rio Linda.)

Entering GA waters, you have to plan more than in FL.  The tides are about 7 feet twice a day.  With so much current movement, the waterways tend to change in some areas over time and shoaling becomes a concern for deep-draft boats.  We are usually very cautious and we'll do most of our travel through GA on a rising tide and at high tide.  High tide is all you can ask for and rising tide at least gives you a good shot at getting off of the bottom if you do run aground.  If those don't work for you, then there's always TowBoat US to come pull you off, but we obviously prefer not to have to make that call.  We planned our day to leave JAX right after low tide and to arrive St. Marys, GA at exactly high tide.  Arrival/departure from a location is also easier at slack tide with the absence of the swift current movement during those times.  Here's St. Marys and sure enough, perfect arrival time with no tidal current at all.

One of the main tourist attractions in this area is Cumberland Island.  If you're interested, Google it and read tons of history there. The island is accessible by boat only and there are several tour boats leaving St Marys daily to the island.  We could have anchored there and taken the dinghy over but we really enjoy seeing the coastal towns also.

We docked at Lang's Marina.  Mr. Lang's name is on several waterfront establishments - the marina, Lang's Restaurant, Lang's Seafood, etc.. 

Mr. Lang has lived in St. Marys all of his 85 years.  We did not meet him, but we did enjoy our conversation with "Nat" who runs the marina, also a life-long resident of St. Marys at age 82.  He and Mr. Lang have been life-long friends.  Nat says he still "feels pretty good" and attributes his years and health to staying busy.  He works 7 days a week, 365 days a year.  "Never missed a day of work" and says if he needs to see a doctor he goes on his lunch break!  I asked him what he likes about St. Marys - "It's just peaceful here."  And it is.  Note the cigarette in his hand.  He smokes a lot.  I'd love to be a fly on the wall when his doctor recommends that he should quit smoking!

We loved talking with him for another reason also - he is "geechee" and speaks "gullah."  The names refer to descendants of slaves in SC and GA.  We visited a museum in town later in the day and they had actual pages from a gullah Bible.  Reading this page from the Book of Luke will give you a good sense of the language.

The city was like many others we have visited recently.  Here's the main town square.

Lots of churches.  Our favorite was the Presbyterian Church.

There was a cemetery, much like what we saw in Palatka, but not nearly as many infant deaths.

Here's one of the oldest tombstones we found, from 1815, Captain James Baird, a native of Scotland, age 46.  We suspect there were much older tombstones - those that were laying flat over the gravesites had weathered over the years so much that you could not read them.  On a few that were readable, we found lengthy and moving eulogies.

As always, interesting signs that make you wonder.  Interesting wording on line 2 - "no living beings after dark."  And a line for those that want to go there and dig a grave without permission!  Oh yeah, don't abuse the water service. 

A typical street in St. Marys has beautiful old homes, live oaks, moss hanging from the trees, etc.  And many of the older homes have signs in the front yard noting the date of construction and the owner (bottom left corner).

The Cumberland Island Museum was very interesting, documenting the history of the island.  In addition to the Geechee Bible previously noted,  the modes of transportation displayed were pretty cool.  These were the real thing, not replicas.

There were displays of clothing, cooking utensils, tools, boats, etc. (typical museum stuff), and navigation instruments have clearly progressed over time as well.

Things have changed just a little bit over the years and our boat is minimally equipped!  Chartplotters, depthfinders, autopilots, and just dial in google earth if you want to see a satellite view before you arrive.

We had some ice cream at one of the local shops and headed over to the city park, also right on the waterfront.

And if you've never seen it before, here's Georgia's marsh mud exposed at low tide - it's serious stuff!

More of St. Marys waterfront, just a really nice coastal town.

Time to move on for Jekyll Island.  On the way, we passed King's Bay, home to a fleet of Navy submarines.  We did not see any docked as we passed by, but there was no doubt that we did not want to intrude on their area.  You can decide which shot is most convincing.

A typical stretch through Georgia's coastal waters is vast areas of marshland as far as you can see.

And back to Cumberland Island - the family that purchased and developed the island before it became a national park raised horses and willed that they be allowed to roam free on the island forever. We were fortunate to catch some of those in the marshland and beach areas on the northern tip of the island as we passed by.

We had more company on the way from St. Marys to Jekyll - 4 sailboats and a powerboat.  Here's "Carolina" headed for Little River, SC.

And a 55' Selene, I believe from RI or Maine.

We docked shortly thereafter at Jekyll Island Marina for Easter weekend.  I'll cover the details of Jekyll in the next blog but would like to note what a wonderful Easter Sunday we had.  We normally walk or ride our bikes to church, but in this case all of the churches were about 4 miles away so Rhonda called the Baptist church on Friday before we arrived to see if we could catch a ride with someone.  Jeff and Iris Shadrick were gracious enough to do that and then invited us to lunch that they had already planned with about 15 others from the church in one of the member's home.  What a wonderful group of folks.  Here's the church building.

After a very special Easter Sunday, we were blessed with an awesome sunset to end the day.  God's creation is so beautiful and we are truly blessed to be able to enjoy it in so many ways on this trip.

We'll have more pics and details about Jekyll Island later, gonna be here for 3 days.