St. Augustine for several days!!

Just to update our itinerary, we left Titusville (still soggy) on Monday and made it to Daytona.  Docked in the same marina as on the way down.  (Do not bother with the pizza and/or greek salad from Stavros recommended by the dockmaster.)  Monday evening we learned that the bridge at St. Augustine closed at 8 pm Monday and will not re-open until 8 am on Saturday.  Ken learned a big lesson about reviewing the notices to mariners (and Gay learned there was such a thing) as we could have easily made it through the bridge by cutting the extra days we spent in Palm Beach and Ft. Pierce.   What was surprising is that ever since we left Palm Beach, the Coast Guard had been broadcasting many notices of severe shoaling at St. Augustine, but never once in their broadcasts did they mention the bridge closure.  The only bascule bridge manager that mentioned it was one mile from St. Augustine.  Of course, we only had ourselves to blame, but we soon discovered we were not the only ones in the dark.  As we approached the marina at St. Augustine, a furious j-boat captain came rushing at us in his dinghy ranting about the bridge closure (he was supposed to have his boat pulled on the other side of the bridge and he had a plane ticket home on Friday).  The bridge's location prevented not only prevented us from proceeding up the ICW, it also prevented us from getting out the inlet.  So, no where to go (unless we wanted to go back to Titusville or Fort Pierce and out to the ocean--and by the time we got there and back up here, it would have been Saturday anyway).

Once I saw St. Augustine, I got over my chagrin and decided to enjoy the town.  The municipal marina is awesome (although I feel a little like a zoo animal with all the people standing at the entrance to the docks and looking at the boats).  They put us in one of the gigantic luxury boat slips so we had no problems docking in spite of the current (and no bow thruster).  The marina facilities are superb (still not River Dunes) and the town itself is amazing.  If we had to get stuck someplace, this was the place.  Great restaurants, interesting people, great shopping, good climate.  Beaches.  Definitely Aspen by the sea.  On Yelp there were 40 4 star restaurants within three-tenths of a mile from the marina.  We at dinner last night at a tapas place, The Tasting Room.  Definitely better than anything close to a marina we have seen.

Today, Wednesday, we spent time doing all the things you do when you stay in a marina for a while--sleeping in, working on the boat, doing laundry, walking, and taking a dinghy ride out to the ocean.