Sadler Point Marina in Jacksonville - Last day

This is NOT your usual used book store - they have 2 million books!! Many first editions and rare titles, right by the marina

Today was tax day. I thought I would start out today's blog with something exciting... Being on a boat, one has to do things remotely. All the tax forms from banks, investments, etc. can be downloaded from the internet so you have access to everything you need to do your taxes. I use TurboTax, mainly from habit (all my old records are in their format) and it goes fairly smoothly. If you use one of the major investment companies, you can even have all the investment information entered automatically (downloaded). With that and my internet connection via the hotspot on the iPhone, I completed my taxes in 1/2 day, sending in the forms via e-filing, no stamps required. 

The used bookstore pictured above is famous in the area. It has over 2 million books for sale, many rare titles you can't find anywhere else. I found book number one of the Tarzan series that I had always wanted to read. However, browsing the stacks inside is just staggering, just about overwhelming! It's too big, countless rows of stacks.

It's also a do-it-yourself yard as these owners are doing, you pay for the space

Invigorated after that success (although I owed a bunch of money, oh well...) we made another trip to Publix for all the things we forgot to get yesterday. The rains had stopped by noon and the day turned out better than predicted. I talked to the yard manager here at Sadler Point Marina and he said the area was about three weeks later than normal in weather temperatures for this time of the year. Fortunately, that still puts the average temperatures in the mid 70's so I'll take that. In the middle of all this, Ann found the time to prepare one of her usual outstanding dinners, Poulet au Porto with sugar peas and long grain wild rice. Wonderful to have a good cook onboard!

"No Hoolie, you can't go this time..."

We'll start out Wednesday morning for Fernandina and a mooring for a couple of days and wait for good weather to round the buoy out in the inlet by Jekyll Island, a notorious shallow spot. Speaking of which, there are shallows that are a real challenge just south of Fernandina. It's very hard to even find 5 ft at low tide and we'll have our hands full trying to negotiate that hazard! It's the start of shallow waters on the way to Georgia and South Carolina, neither of which has any money for dredging the ICW. At least Florida has an independent fund although they don't seem to use it for Fernandina.