A Sailor’s Thanksgiving

Like American ex-pats the world over, sailors also get together to celebrate our Thanksgiving tradition.

St. Marys, Georgia, is well known for bringing sailors together for a Thanksgiving festival.  The local Riverview Hotel opens its dining room to hundreds of cruisers, and locals volunteer to roast enough turkeys and hams to feed this army of transients.

Hotel owners Jerry and Gayla Brandon started our morning off with a bang by mixing up a large cooler of Bloody Marys while Charlie Jacobs delivered them by dinghy to every boat in the harbor!  I’ve never had a drink at 8.30 am, but I do highly recommend it!

The sailors arrive at the hotel from late morning through noon bearing all the side dishes and desserts.  Three long tables are set up in the hotel lobby to hold all the platters of food.

It almost felt like family, and it was a wonderful gathering.  Everyone was a bit homesick for loved ones, but we were a rag tag family to each other… and that was okay!

Missing my family and friends quite a bit this weekend….but I’m also  thankful for the generosity of St. Marys’ community and the newly made connections to very friendly cruisers.

I did wear my sleeve-less “Ann Jacket.”   And at the end of the day I picked up stitches and started the first sleeve.