Finishing the Loop - Key West  to Jacksonville -  March/April 2007

WE DID IT!!! We completed our great loop trip when we crossed our wake at Jacksonville, Florida.  This is the log for our last leg of our Great Loop trip. The next log we post will be for the start of our next adventure. 

We picked up a 'Conch Republic' flag while we were down in the keys which we now proudly fly from the top of our boat. 

The 'Conch Republic' was formed on April 23, 1982 by proclamation of then-mayor Dennis Wardlow as a result of a blockade put in place by the US Customs and Immigration department which effectively separated Key West from the rest of the United States.  The blockade was implemented as a means of screening for Cuban refugees who fled to the United States as part of the huge 'Marielito' exodus. Mayor Wardlow, self-proclaimed Prime Minister of the Conch Republic, said in a speech  that day, "Today we're going to become the Conch Republic. As a new nation of the Conch Republic, we have 100 percent of the votes. We seceded from the United States. We've raised our flag, given our notice and named our new government.  If we're not equal, we'll get out. It's as simple as that." The Conchs, as Key West natives like to be called, are quite proud of their republic and April 23rd is still celebrated as Conch Independence Day down here.  I especially love the official motto of the Conch Republic, "We seceded where others failed."  The 1828 date on the flag designates the year that Key West received their city charter. 

I confess that I have a soft spot when it comes to the Conch Republic since I actually got caught up in the blockade.  I'd gone down to the keys with some friends and we got stopped on the way back to Miami.  It was weird, to say the least, to pass through a US Customs and Immigration checkpoint when you didn't think you'd left the country. To make matters worse, I didn't have any ID on me - I wasn't driving, and didn't want to bother with a purse.  Fortunately my English is pretty good and my friends vouched for me, so the officers eventually decided to let us pass but not before thoroughly searching our car.  

We saw this sign outside a home in Marathon - 49 miles to Key West, 94 miles to Cuba, and 128 miles to Miami. Closer to Cuba than Miami, much of the history in Key West is closely linked to that island nation.

After we left Key West, we spent 2 weeks in Marathon waiting for the winds to die down so that we could head north again. 

While we were out wandering one day, we stumbled upon  Crane Point, which is an area of 63 acres in the center of Vaca Key (the Key on which the city of Marathon is located) that has been set aside as a nature preserve.  It is named for Francis and Mary Crane, who purchased the property in 1949 and built a home there. 

The Cranes purchased the property from George and Olivia Adderley, who came to the Florida Keys from the Bahamas sometime in the 1890s.  The Adderleys lived in the upper Keys for several years. In 1902 they moved down to Vaca Key and purchased 32 acres in the area now known as Crane Point. The Adderley's home, which George built himself, is made of  Florida tabby,  a sturdy concrete like material made of burned conch and other shells mixed with water and sand. The home, together with a separate building that was used as the Adderley's kitchen, was preserved by the Crane's and still stands on the property today. The Adderley house is thought to be the oldest home in the Keys outside of Key West. 

The main Adderley house is shown in the picture below to the left. The Adderley's were clearly much shorter than Jeremy - he had to stoop to get through the front door of the house. The wooden building with the thatched roof shown in the picture to the right is the kitchen.  Kitchens used to always be housed in buildings separate from the main house,  mainly due to the heat they generated as well as the risk of fire (although it would seem in this case that the kitchen was constructed out of some pretty good kindling!)  

A Crane on Crane road.

We found this wonderful Wyland painting of a manatee on the back of the historical museum at Crane Point. 

Speaking of underwater murals, O'Farrill was just finishing this one up while we were in Marathon.  It's painted on the north wall of the local Boater's World store. 

The wind finally let up in Marathon. After two solid weeks of blowing 20 plus knots from the north, we had a two day window to make it out of Marathon so that we could start our trek north back up the east coast of Florida to Jacksonville.  We were anxious to get going for a couple of reasons - first, we needed to get the boat hauled out to do the bottom and fix a couple of 'boo-boos' we managed to inflict on poor Tardis over the past year.  The second reason we wanted to get moving north is that we really want to be up in the Chesapeake by early June - before hurricane season is upon us again. Being stuck for 2 weeks in Marathon reminded us that we needed to move when we can so we can afford those unforeseen delays when the weather turns a little bit nasty.

These are some pictures of the tiki bar at Gilberts in Key Largo where we stopped on the way down.  

We stopped off once again at Boca Chita key for a night.  We really do love this island - one of our favorite places in the upper keys. I managed to get a shot of the chapel as well as the light house and cannon on the island.  

Tardis tied to the seawall at Boca Chita.

You see a lot of mangrove plants down in the keys.  They are one of a very few plants that can grow in brackish (somewhat salty) water.  They are important to the islands since they roots help to maintain the sand and soil from erosion.  There are two types of mangrove plants on Boca Chita - black and red.  The black mangrove grows up on the sandy soil and is recognizable by the 'snorkel' roots that shoot up along the base of the plants.  The red mangrove plants grow in and along the edge of the water.  They prop themselves up above the water level with stilt roots. Mangrove plants process and exude salt through pours on their leaves - leaving them covered with a crystallized salty coating.   

Leaving Boca Chita, we passed by downtown Miami and Government Cut on the way north.  The 'rainbow' condo shown in the picture to the right was built in the 1980's by a Isreali architect (sorry, neither one of us can remember his name). We remember that it was a bit controversial at the time is was built - somehow it seems to fit in today.  

There were several cruise ships in at the Port of Miami on Government Cut when we passed by heading north. 

We passed this yacht with what looks like a 40-plus foot sport's fishing  boat perched on the back.  Funny to see a ship where the 'dingy' is larger than our home. 

We got up to North Palm Beach on a weekend, and there was clearly some sort of huge boater's party going on.   We had to slowly weave our way between all of the little boats and swimmers.   

Long 'raft-up' of about 10 boats that were there for the party.  Fortunately, it wasn't a windy day.  This would have been a bit scary had it broken loose and started drifting around. 

Speaking of scary, we saw a salvage boat lifting up a sunk boat from the waterway a couple of miles farther north.  

We stopped in Daytona Beach for a night and went for a short walk around town.  We found a 'drive-in' church - the first one we'd ever seen - and (hopefully) the last.  That just seems a bit too weird for me.  

Daytona is also quite proud of their car racing history. We found a memorial to Otto Schulze, a former local city politician who actively worked to highlight the city's link to racing history, including bringing back the famed 'Bluebird' race car, in which  Sir Malcolm Campbell set the world land speed record of 276 MPH in 1935 on the beach in Daytona Beach Shores. 

Leaving Daytona Beach, we traveled under this bridge with beautiful mosaics of dolphins and manatees around the base of the pilings. 

I shot this picture as we went past the St. Augustine waterfront.  We had hoped to stop here for at least one night, but the anchorage was full, as were all of the marinas in the area.  We ended up going past and dropping the hook in a small oxbow off the waterway a few miles past town.  Hopefully, we can stop here and spend some time when we come back down in the fall. 

What's wrong with this picture??? He's got the anchor out, but looks like someone pulled the plug on the water. 

We crossed our wake and finished the loop when we got to the St. Johns river near Jacksonville.  Our haul-out was scheduled for the following Tuesday morning (this was Saturday), so we opted to head north for a the weekend to St. Marys to celebrate our loop completion. That night, we had a 'changing of the flag' ceremony where we replaced our somewhat tired white burgee with our new gold one.  The gold indicates that we've finished the loop.  Someone came by the boat as we were changing the flag, and asked us about what we were doing.  We pulled out the map to show them our trip and they snapped this picture of us by our boat using her cell-phone.  She emailed it to me later that day. Ain't technology wonderful!!

St. Marys, is a small town in Georgia just north of Jacksonville on the St. Marys river.  The town has a wonderful river-front park and a really good seafood restaurant (Lambs) where we had our celebratory dinner that night.  

An old Spanish cannon on the main street in St. Marys. 

We spotted this old 'Roller' while we were out wandering around town.  I peeked into the front window - and what did I spy but a jar of Grey Poupon - but of course!!! 

Heading south from St. Marys back down to Jacksonville for the haul-out, we were passed by two other 'Looper' boats - Mer Sea (our sister ship - on the right), and Gypsy Blue (a neat little Rosborough 25 trawler - on the left) - both heading north.  They were both wondering why we were going the wrong way.  We explained where we were going and said we hoped to catch up with them in a few weeks. 

Coming down the St. Johns towards Green Cove Springs, we spotted this P-3 flying low over the waterway and doing 'touch and go' landings and take-offs from the nearby Navy base.  This is the same type of airplane our friend Jon Stairs flew when he was in the Navy. 

Tardis in the slings coming out of the water for her annual haul-out. We took her back to Holland Marine in Green Cove Springs, which is where we had her shipped to last year when we started this trip.  We really like this yard, so we thought it was fitting that she should end her Great Loop adventure where she started. 

We got her all cleaned up - bottom done, prop re-conditioned, scratches erased, and hull polished - all set for our next adventure.  The Clay county fare was on while we were there, so once we got Tardis taken care of and back in the water, we wandered over to take a look. 

Along with all of the obligatory rides and fair food, they had pig races at the fare.  I confess I'd never seen these. They ran a couple of  'heats' where the pigs seemed to really be in the spirit and tear up the track on the way around. 

Then they led in a set of pot-bellied pigs.  These guys were obviously not clear on the concept.  They sort of wandered out, turned around, sat down, scratched themselves on the fence. Most of them did eventually make it around.  I guess there are running pigs and non-running pigs.  Who knew???

We also saw this very cute 5-day old calf.  She was born at the fare - this is a picture of her with her proud (and tired) mama. 

Back in the water, we stopped off at Jacksonville Landing on our way back out of the St. Johns river.  We found all of these neat painted cats on display around the downtown area. 

Jag-cat and 'Pawcasso'

'J2' the robo-cat and the 'Professor of Pawsibilities.'  The professor had such notables painted on his back as Albert Felinstein, Madame Furrie, Clawed Monet, Wolf Fang Meowzart, to name a few.

Java Cat - sponsored by Starbucks, no less (those are coffee beans set in the shape of coffee cups on his back) and B'alam Agab (Night Jaguar) 

Super cat and Top Hat cat. 

This tree is called the 'Treaty Oak' and is supposed to be one of the largest Live Oak trees still standing in the state.  The tree is the centerpiece of Jessie Ball DuPont park and is reputed to be over 200 years old, over 25 feet in circumference and over 70 feet tall.  The tree was given it's name by a journalist who was intent on saving it from developers.  The reporter wrote a fictitious newspaper story that claimed that a treaty had been signed under the tree between the Indians and early settlers in the area.  The story may have been false, but the name stuck.

The land on which the tree stands was purchased by the DuPont family in the 1930s.  In 1964, Jessie Ball DuPont purchased the remaining seven lots surrounding the tree and gave them to the city  with the stipulation that it would always be a park. Originally called Treaty Oak Park, the site was renamed Jessie Ball DuPont Park in recognition of her generous spirit and abiding love of nature.  

Updated April 17, 2007

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