Jacksonville Florida Info Request

Anyone from the Jax area? We are planning to relocate to Jax in the next year. We will be on the East Side of town and are currently considering Palm Cove Marina or Beaches Marina for our 2003 360 Sundancer. Anyone have experience with either?

Looking forward to being on the intercoastal and being able to take trips North and South. We also like to do day trips to raft up at an island or sandbar. Not seeing much about this is my searches.

Thanks in advance.

It is vastly different here in NE FL than where you are. It's pretty much either river or ocean. The Atlantic is most often rougher and colder than the Gulf. Not much in the way of sandbars until you get to Matanzas south of St. Augustine. For boats of 37" fixed draft like ours paying close attention to the tides and channel markers is paramount.

Not as much in the way of restaurants you can boat to as I found on the gulf coast.

Trips up to St. Simon's Island (north) or down south to St. Augustine are great fun. We like the Conch House marina in St. Augustine. It does not have the currents nor wind that the marinas downtown have to contend with. That said, coming into the downtown marinas at slack tide is probably best.

Haven't gone upstream the St. Johns River (the water actually moves north, so upstream is south), but friends say it is fantastic. If you want you can take the St. Johns all the way to Sanford (near Orlando) from Jax.

South of St. Augustine and Daytona there are nice sandy stretches and it can be very pleasant at Ponce Inlet/New Smyrna. Also very crowded weekends/holidays. Farther south from that is the Cape Canaveral/Kennedy Space Center area. We like that area a lot. Cocoa, Cocoa Beach, etc., is one of our favorite areas. Last April we took in a Falcon Heavy space launch from our boat. Very memorable.

The Cocoa area is a longish day trip from our place, and we usually divide it into two.

Good luck with your relocation and keep us informed. Perhaps we can get together. Maybe St. Augustine.

@Third Edition thanks for the great info on boating in NE Florida. We are excited about boating on the intercoastal with will be very different that our experience in NW Fla. I was able to get some good info on the marinas over on the Hull Truth. We are looking forward to the move. We are probably a year away, but maybe next Spring we can meet up in St. Augustine.