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Georgia on our mind

...all men--kings & serfs alike--are slaves to other men & to circumstance--save alone, the pilot--who comes at no man's back and call, obeys no man's orders & scorns all men's suggestions. The king would do this thing, & would do that: but a cramped treasury overmasters him in the one case & a seditious people in the other. The Senator must hob-nob with canaille whom he despises, & banker, priest & statesman trim their actions by the breeze of the world's will & the world's opinion. It is a strange study,--a singular phenomenon, if you please, that the only real, independent & genuine gentlemen in the world go quietly up and down the... river, asking no homage of any one, seeking no popularity, no notoriety, & not caring a damn whether school keeps or not. Mark Twain, in a letter to Will Bowen, 8/25/1866
With plenty of Cumberland Island left to explore on our return trip, we took advantage of the pre-frontal weather and made a short hop up to Little Cumberland Island for an early anchorage. We're staged for an early exit at first light tomorrow morning so that we can catch the rising tide through the Jekyll River, one of the 3 big problem areas in GA that require tide help for us to get through. Unfortunately we're finding some other problem areas that haven't been written about, like passing Red #60 at mile marker 704. I had read to mind the markers there and not the chartplotter because they have two different ideas of where the channel is located. So, carefully minding the markers, we passed through 8-1/2 feet of water while making the turn. Not a big deal except that we had +6 feet of tide at the time, simply impassable at low tide for a sailboat. We've pretty much decided to only travel the flood tide, which is 4:30 AM until 10:30 tomorrow, and getting about a half hour later every day. It means a lot of short 6 hour or less days, but at least we can float off if we get stuck.


We got to see the blue shirts mustering for weekend duty on the boomer sub as we passed by Kings Bay Naval Base this morning. I'm glad they're out there protecting our country, I'm also glad it's not me anymore.




The Georgia State Bird has proven itself to be in abundance here, and a hearty bloodsucker he is too. Unfazed by pungent burning mosquito coils, constant swatting, and the limp carcasses of their comrades spilled on the floor, these green headed horse flies have a bite to rival the Florida Alligator. (Too bad Georgia's bulldog can't rival the Florida Gator!)

Thankfully Felix came to us with especially nice screens and mosquito netting over all of the hatches, so while it's not comfortable hanging about outside, we've got fans and bug-free luxury down below in the cabin!

The last picture I'll leave you with, so that you're not stuck with the indelible image of the Georgia State Bird, is another one from our stay at Cumberland Island. No, it's not delivery, and no it's not DiGiorno either.

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