Nov 30 - Dec 1: Cumberland Island and on to Florida

     Monday morning we took our time returning the rental car.  We made a run to the grocery store and did a few other errands first.  We set off close to noon and found the tide mostly against us as we headed back to the ICW.  Our destination wasn’t far - we were headed to Cumberland Island, which we’d been told was a must-see.  There are wild horses, and unspoiled beaches.  It’s a designated National Seashore, maintained by the National Park Service.  Though we cruised until nearly five o’clock, we didn’t quite make the anchorage where the Park Service has a dock.  We had chosen a winding river inland of the island, thinking we might be more apt to see some of those wild horses, or perhaps alligators or manatees.  We saw only marshland, and the extra time spent on this inner waterway kept us from our intended anchorage.   Dan spotted some oyster mounds and decided to drop the anchor in this waterway near them while it was still light enough to do some oystering.  

The oyster bed.

Sunset Brick Hill River

     He quickly launched the dinghy and rowed over to the oyster mound and easily gathered a bucketful.  Ten minutes later he had a small bowl of shucked meat and soon was frying them up.  He said later he felt like Henry Plummer in the book we’ve been reading - The Boy, Me, and the Cat - a narrative of a father and son’s trip down the Intracoastal Waterway in a 24 foot catboat in 1912.  Henry often mentions eating fried oysters in his book.  

     Tuesday we set off for the National Park dock.  On the way, we came into Kings Bay, where the USN has a submarine shipyard.  Patrol boats are out to keep gawkers and potential terrorists away, and we’ve read that sometimes they will even close the ICW if a submarine is traveling through.  Though we saw one at dock, the patrol boats did not have issues with us.  Shortly after we passed them by we came to the Cumberland Island anchorage and dock.

     Here we met people from Camden, Maine!  They had set off on their boat after we had.  Small world indeed.  Park rangers Steve and Donna gave us a brief history of Thomas and Lucy Carnegie (yes, those Carnegies) who came to this island back in the 1800s and purchased a house.  Thomas died shortly afterward, but Lucy developed quite a compound of buildings, eventually owning 90% of the island and a main manor that had fifty rooms.  Her complex required a live-in staff of 200.  While the big house was burned down in the 1950s, its stone walls are still there, and many of the outbuildings are still standing.  She left her Carnegie (US Steel) money in trust to her nine children, and when the last of them died, the land and its buildings when to the National Park Service.  The horses she had owned became ‘wild’ and their offspring now roam the island at will, grazing and foraging for their food.  (The NPS does not feed or care for them, they only count them once a year.)  We took the small guided tour through the ruins and then set off for a walk along the beach on the ocean side of the island.  

Dungeness Ruins

Wild horses on the path to the beach

Just some of the birds - mostly Forster's terns - on the beach.

      We got back to the boat about three and decided to push on for about ten more miles, which took us across the border into Florida waters.  Our last state before the Bahamas!   Again the current was against us so we anchored just after four across from Fernandina Beach.  This is a small town with a colorful waterfront situated between two very large pulp mills that sound like they will be running all night.  

Fernandina Beach, FL