Good news, we are on the water again. The generator is working OK and the dinghy engine is no longer leaking. Yippee.

Today, we travelled/traveled south  on the St. John's River. The weather was much cooler than the 80s we have had for the last week. We also have had a very strong wind making it feel even colder. I started the day wearing shorts and sleeveless top and ended up with jeans and long sleeved shirt.  Gary said "there is no pleasing some people".

We saw an abundance of birds - American Wood Stork (was on endangered list but no longer),  Black Crowned Night Heron, Great Blue Heron, Common Egret, Anhinga, Bald Eagle, Cormorant, Kingfisher, Ibis and Coots. The storks were all roosting in a tree (maybe they were storking each other!!). OK, so that joke was for the birds!! Or, it was nothing to crow about!!

We passed a couple of men fishing. Between them they had eight fishing rods. My Dad would be envious as he likes to fish. Many, many years ago I played a joke on him when he and I went fishing. My boss at the time told me if I was his daughter he would have killed me if I had played the joke on him. My Dad nearly did kill me (only joking). He was very, very angry with me though. I will tell that story another time.

We are moored just up the river from where we saw the manatees. We are hoping that some of them will come this way in the morning. No such luck. We did see one but he never completely surfaced so all the photo shows is a shadow beneath the water.

For those of you who are interested our coordinates are N  28 degrees, 56 minutes w 81 degrees, 20 minutes. That may help you find where we are moored for the night.

We spent a pleasant day on the St John's. Not as much wild life to see but still very peaceful. I love to see the Cypress Trees in the water with their roots sticking out. Many of them are covered with Spanish Moss. The moss (it actually is not of the moss family, it is an epiphyte (feeds from nutrients in the air and water)) does not kill the trees, so they say. Well, it sure looks like it kills some trees. We have even seen it growing on telephone wires.

We spent three nights in Sanford. We had only planned on staying two nights but Gary wanted to stay in a place with good TV reception so that he could watch the Ravens beat the Patriots, which they did. Sanford was a quaint town with quite a few antique shops. Gary particularly liked the name of one of them!! Sanford is the first place we have seen parking spaces for electric cars only. They have their own battery  chargers next to the space for you to plug your car in. The local theatre/theater had a group from Maryland playing that night, at least I think they are from Maryland - The Fabulous Hub Caps. They are a great group playing music from the 50s, 60s and 70s with comedy thrown in. We have seen them twice so did not bother a third time. 

Sanford had a paddle steamer that was used for dinner cruises. I found it interesting that it had two paddles at the back to make turning easier.

We stayed the night an Hontoon Island State Park and rode our bicycles along the paths around the  island. Unfortunately, nothing exciting was spotted.

We arrived back at the Astor Marina 2 says ago and plan on leaving here after our mail has been forwarded by David. He plans on joining us in the Keys around the end of March. We are looking forward to that as he has never been on the boat with us.

The cat has found her land paws. At the last three places we have moored she has jumped off the boat and gone "walkabout". This morning, at the marina we could not find her so had to go looking for her. When we did find her she was on a boat 4 piers away noseying around (cos she's female!!!). She returned to our boat by leaping from boat to pier to boat. I am not sure it is a good thing she has found the courage to leave the boat as we now have to keep an extra eye on her.

The weather has been cooler the last couple of days - 60s which makes for nice sleeping weather.

Our plan is to leave here in a couple of days and go North on the St John's. We will return to the Intra Coastal Waterway and then make our way South to the Keys.

I thought you might like to see a picture of the blogger and the set-up Gary has made for me so the last photo is of moi, me, myself,  and I.