St Auggies Spring Messabout click here to read or make an observation about this  article
by Michael Smith - St Augustine, Florida - USA

Here are some photos from our Spring St. Auggies Messabout:

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This is from when I first arrived at Lighthouse park and the boat ramp there... it's a cool place, right on the waters edge of the Salt Run area of St Augustine bay...

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Got the Sharpie Launched and then beached... there's a lot of small boats that beach here...

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I hung out for a while and talked to some of the passersby who asked me about the Sharpie and stuff and one of the guys who was a livaboard anchored there in Salt Run anchorage and was coming ashore in his dingy with a load of laundry...

since after waiting a while it looked like there wasn't going to be a huge crowd of participants I headed out to the anchorage at Anastasia Island Park where we had put the word out to muster at 1300...

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A couple yakkers were getting out as I was shoving off

 
Saw this double master as I motored out.. the wind was against me and I wanted to get to the anchorage early so I dropped the motor...

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As I continued the passage off my port side you can see parts of Downtown St Augustine...

It really was bad timing on my digicam going down and having to get by with a disposable... the picture quality has suffered... it's hard to make out with the poor resolution but if you are there you can see the huge cross that marks where the Spaniards landed and I do mean huge... you can see it for miles... you can also get a great view of the Castillo fort... St Augustine is loaded with history... It's a fantastic place to live and play in my humble opinion and it left me perplexed as to why the last two St Auggies Messabouts I've tried to launch have been so sparsely attended... oh well, maybe the fall one will have more comers :)

Here I had made it to the anchorage and threw my hook out and hung out to see who would show up... in front of me is Conch House Marina... some megabucks boats...

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You can see some of the channel markers and a real nice cruising Cat anchored over a ways... things are a lot closer than the rinky dink camera lens made them appear...

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A couple ladies paddled by in their yaks as a couple dolphins rolled... I just couldn't catch them dead on before they got too far away...

 
from this angle you can see the lighthouse and get an Idea how far the ride out to the anchorage at Anastasia Island is...

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Went ashore and tied off a line to a cedar tree.

 
Here's a veiw of the beach at the anchorage

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the other direction down the beach

 
I climbed up the dune... here's that veiw of Anastasia Island... old Florida... very little of that left that hasn't been destroyed by developers...

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here's the perspective from atop the dune.... I had this whole place to myself up there...acres and acres...

 
after a while a few other boaters showed up but nobody with the messabout...

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So I dug out my cooler and had some grub and watched the boats, birds and people for a while and then after a few hours of hanging, motoring and sailing around the area I made my way back to the ramp...

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I ran into Dave From down Chuluota way (Central Florida) and he had his Boat ,A Coronado I think...

If he sees this maybe he can elaborate on it... anyway by this time the tide was getting low and the wind was absolutely howling from the s-s-e, and he wasn't looking to anxious to put her in in those conditions... so we talked for quite a while there at the park as I broke down the Sharpie and got it ready for the road home...

a Bunch of people stopped by and commented on our boats and bent our ears for a while... all in all It was fun as usual and I hope as we continue to try to keep the spring and fall St Augustine Messabouts going it will eventually get up some attendance...

Thanks for helping us get the word out...Duckworks Rules

Mike

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