Huguenot Park

I was at Huguenot Park with the family on Monday. It's a lovely park, as long as you're into beaches with cars driving on them. I don't mind as long as it's limited, but my wife doesn't like it at all. We parked by the tidal lagoon along the southern edge which is apparently a local mecca for windsurfers..

This is the park and tidal lagoon at low tide. The lagoon is deeper at high tide. To access it, one drives along the southern edge of the land, right alongside the Saint Johns River. You can park on the beach. There is a naval base directly across the river. If you look at the bottom of the picture, you can see an aircraft carrier.

The tide was pretty high when we arrived. It prevented local windsurfer Vincent Barré from joining us, which was too bad. Winds were about 8 mph but variable, and there were several storms on the horizon. After doing some standup paddling with the Kona, I rigged 7.0: a conservative choice, but the storms on the horizon concerned me.

The sailing was a lot of fun. Did a bunch of beach starts. The water was pretty shallow. I was often in the middle of the lagoon and felt my daggerboard drag along the sand. By early afternoon some other windsurfers had joined us, including John Ingram (Hope I got the name right!), who is a Kona racer. It was the first time I was with another Kona sailor.

I loved sailing in salt water. I also liked sailing without booties or my PFD. I felt a little naked without them, but it was freeing. There were some other sailors. As we left I saw someone show up with an Exocet Cruiser on his roof. I wanted to chat with him about it, but we were all packed up and driving away.

We took a bunch of pictures with a film camera, we unfortunately left the digital at home, so I'll post those when the film is developed.