osh hitt

We actually moved. What a feeling. For the first time in 7 years the Southern Wind has exited the canal tucked away in Palm Coast and entered waters not new, but hardly familiar to her. The cheers of neighbors and the sounding of horns filled the small corner canal where she had been staying since her last move. Her engines running with a healthy rumble and sun shining bright, she turned and left her home for a new adventure, the next chapter of her life… as well as ours.

A quick partial shot of the port side engine

I have been waiting for this moment for the last 9 months. 10 if you count the month I spent finishing a college semester and a phlebotomy externship, as well as getting SCUBA lessons with my dad before I left. All good things. Now don’t get me wrong because I have no idea where I got this from, but originally I was under the impression that we would be leaving on this voyage on May 5. So when I got here to Florida, I thought I would be leaving in approximately 5 to 7 days, after we simply painted the hull… that is, until I laid eyes on the boat for the first time. I knew then she was gonna need a lot of work, but some girls are worth working for. A few of us had confidence in this one since the beginning and today it truly paid off for the first time.

Captain Ryan and his wife Morgan were an amazing team as he piloted us toward St Augustine, the oldest city in America. The sun was shining and we were cruising along at a healthy pace toward Matanzas inlet along the St Johns River and although things were going really well so far, Oh Sh#@ still seemed to be the word of the day for everyone as we ran around frantically, checking every room and bilge of the boat every ten minutes. We were motoring along towards Matanzas when we notice what looked like a big cloud of smoke off in the distance, although there was no scent. We soon realized that it was a huge front of fog headed directly at us. That’s how thick this fog was. This was no ordinary fog, this was pirate fog straight from St Augustine. That’s what I heard anyway. Well, sure enough, zero visibility and temperatures dropped in minutes as we were engulfed in a thick cloud layer on a boat we have never yet piloted and we are nearing Matanzas inlet (the same place that Art’s boat was stuck a while back.) Uh oh. Fortunately we were being accompanied by TowboatUS (the same company as pulled the Conch Pearl out also) and they were depth sounding in front of us since that waterway is indeed so sketchy at times. Alas, even with their assistance, the southern wind seemed to find her way to ground for a few minutes. Not bad, all went well, but it was horrifying watching our epoxy job get tested that early on. Once we were out of the Matanzas inlet, the TowboatUS drivers wished us well and proceeded to turn around and go home, leaving us on our own to navigate the rest of the route in this thick fog. We were accompanied by small school of dolphins, perhaps four total. They played and swam along with us for about 45 minutes as we made our way up and the fog eventually cleared, leaving a beautiful sunset as we neared the 312 bridge, which has approximately 67 feet of clearance. No problem! Ours is 66! Wait, we might have a foot of clearance between the top of our mast and the bottom of that bridge with all the cars on it? Nice. Aren’t the wind instruments mounted atop the mast? Oh Sh#@.

Everything got reeeal quiet as we passed under the bridge. We all stared up at the top of the mast from the bow as it cast a small shadow along the beams of the underside of the bridge. Cars drove overhead. Ryan slowed the engines and we coasted carefully under for what may have been the scariest 10 seconds of my life as infinitesimal amounts of outlandish scenarios resulting in utter devastation temporarily squelched other thought. We passed through the other side safely and all took a sigh of relief as our hearts started beating again. Finally we motored in to St Augustine Marine Center docking area and we docked for the night, implementing our first set of watch duties. A lot has happened in the last 24 hours. I can’t wait for Monday morning.