Day 345 - Murphy Creek to Morrison Creek, FL
Day 345 - Thursday, April 6th: We guess most folks don't know where Morrison Creek is either. It's sort of west of San Mateo, FL. Not much help, huh?
Anyway, it was misty on the water as the sun was peeking over the trees. Sorry for the lens reflection - Ruth calls such spots "our guardian angel."
We got underway about 9:00am and cruised slowly upriver (still southbound). Again, it was dead calm:
We rounded a bend headed toward a railroad bridge that the cruise guides promise is always open "…unless a train is coming." Guess what…
Yup! Train on the way. Here she comes!
Soon the bridge opened and we passed on. Look closely at the blob on the top of the end of the bridge. That is an osprey in his/her nest. Seems like a dumb place to build a nest!
We got a closer picture a few days later on the way back downstream. Look for it.
Around midday we saw Summertime tied to a dock in Welaka, FL. We made radio contact and they convinced us to stop for a while. We tied next to them and caught each other up with our various roaming adventures.
Lenny and Roxanne were very excited about a maritime museum about five blocks away. They insisted we go visit it. So we headed out as they departed heading north. It's very unlikely that we will ever catch up with them again.
Welaka is not a big town. Small is really not descriptive; tiny might be better. As we were walking to the museum, we passed the Welaka funeral home:
Soon we arrived at the museum. It was truly fascinating for anyone who loves boats and/or antiques. This one man, Robert Speas, built everything in the museum. He gave us a personal guided tour:
Speas designed most of the boats himself. He often used small blocks of wood glued into place for construction, as in this steam launch:
Can you tell that the name panel on "Sterling" is carved into the transom wood?
Here's another launch using the block technique:
The engines Speas uses are all authentic. When he finds one, he rebuilds it, making any parts needed. They all run (quite well) and all the boats are launched and driven periodically. This one-lunger dates back to the early 1900s:
This engine, although stamped with the name "Lowe" was actually built by the Deusenberg brothers before they went into business building cars. They worked for Lowe for a while:
Speas is also a sculptor. He made this giant vase using wood blocks, carved, sanded and varnished. It is about eight feet high from the base to the top:
We tore ourselves away from the museum after about an hour and a half and walked back to the boat.
We got underway and headed out of Welaka toward Lake George.
Lake George is about ten miles long and 5.5 miles wide. That's big for a river that has no dams!
We traversed it comfortably thanks to calm winds. At the south end there is a very shallow bar. It's dredged to allow boats to pass and is marked by this seawall system:
In about another mile, we entered a small creek called Murphy Creek and anchored for the night. It was pretty quiet, but had a few homes on the shore instead of being isolated like last night. The sunset was colorful:
Position tonight: N29 10.827 W081 32.392
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