I saw this on the Riverkeeper's Facebook feed and thought it was well worth sharing and keeping tabs on this modern-day Tom Sawyer.
https://www.facebook.com/www.captnat.me
http://www.news-journalonline.com/article/20140630/NEWS/140639945?Title=DeBary-houseboat-adventurer-setting-off-on-new-journey
"Capt. Natural-Lee" Young is traveling from DeBary up the St. Johns to the ICW, down the ICW to the everglades, across the everglades to the gulf, and then down to Ten Thousand Islands with his 2 cats and sharing his trip along the way. Best of luck to him; I think he may need it due to timing this during the Atlantic hurricane season.
I'm sure one of the local media outlets will start picking this story up as he gets closer to Jax. Hopefully we can get a more fleshed-out story and interview with him on MetroJax.
A friend of mine just took his 33ft sailboat from Jax to Panama City via the canal system across the state and returned via the Keys and Miami. Made it back last week. Of course, being a sailboat, he went off shore a large part of the way up and down the coasts. A few years ago, we brought our boat down the East coast from Baltimore. Lots of great adventures to be had here with your boat.
Looks like he's made it to Duval after a fair amount of drama. Anchored near the Buckman Bridge.
Aw man I saw this guy yesterday twice! First was when I was down by the Doctor's Lake Bridge on 17. Couldn't make out what it was at the time.
Then I saw him booking it for cover at the Buckman Bridge right at about 4:30 yesterday, as nasty storms and bad lightning were rolling through. He's moving pretty slow. I would say it took him around an hour, hour and a half, to get from Doctor's Lake Bridge to Buckman.
Thanks for the heads up, I'll follow on Facebook now.
^^^ Yeah the St. Johns River in July has certainly proven more dramatic than one would anticipate. I wonder how he'll fare on the ICW. I imagine it's be smoother sailing than the river, except for where it opens up to the Atlantic.
The Times Union put up a story online yesterday. He's gonna visit Riverkeeper's offices later today.
http://members.jacksonville.com/news/florida/2014-07-15/story/modern-day-huck-finn-rafts-through-jacksonville-en-route-sw-floridas
Are we to expect yet another River Rambler' to pen/publish definitive enviro awareness treatise ?