Laudy, Laudy

We are underway southbound in the Atlantic Ocean, offshore of Sunny Isles Beach as I begin typing. Shortly we will pass the site of the Surfside condo disaster to our starboard, and a half dozen anchored ships to our port. Four of those are Norwegian Cruise Lines vessels, once again idled by the pandemic.

Our very tony digs last night.

Wednesday morning the Coral Ridge Yacht Club, immediately adjacent to where we were anchored, returned my call. They were able to squeeze us in for a single night, and given that the dockage would be free and we really needed water and a pumpout, we weighed anchor right away and headed for our slip (map).

After a noon conference call and handling our pump-out with the at-slip system, I put the e-bike on the ground and made a provisioning run to the nearby Publix. I also swung by the gas station toting a 6-gallon jerrycan so we could replenish the tender, which was running low. I went back out again before dinner just to take a spin around the old neighborhood -- this area is accessible from the dinghy dock we often use. One of the dinghy docks, behind the CVS, has partly collapsed into the Middle River.

A new tie-up for us at CRYC. Running our line through a shackle on a chain around a concrete post.

At dinner time we made a quick tour of the insides of the club, but opted to eat at their outside venue, since we are avoiding inside dining here in Florida. That turned out to basically be the pool bar, with a very casual menu, and we had the place to ourselves. By contrast, the indoor bar, where no one was masked, was quite busy. The food was good and we were comfortable, albeit in charmless surroundings.

The yacht club needed us off the dock by 9am, and so we had scrambled to fill the water tank and get all the laundry done Wednesday while we had the power and water. While we ruminated about whether to return to the anchorage, or maybe see if the city docks along the New River could get us in for a night or two, we discovered that we have yet another yacht club in Fort Lauderdale, and I called to see if they might have a spot on Thursday.

The lower portion of this abandoned concrete quay, where we used to tie the dinghy, has collapsed.

The Lauderdale Yacht Club allowed as they had a slip for one or maybe two nights, but we would have to arrive at mid-tide or better due to shoaling in the entrance channel. As it happened, a 9am departure from Coral Ridge would put us there just before high tide. We dropped lines at 8:50 to make the 9:00 bridge opening at Sunrise Boulevard, made it through Las Olas and the no-wake zone just south of it in a giant conga line, and arrived at LYC just before 10. Between the bridges and no-wake zones it took us an hour to go just three miles.

They put us on the south face dock (map), I think for depth reasons, as the normal transient area on the north dock was vacant. LYC turned out to be a very nice club, and they had covered outside tables for their main dining room, so I made a reservation for 6pm. I then hoofed it a mile and a quarter to the very familiar shopping center on 17th at US-1, where I made stops at Ace Hardware and Publix.

New pinch bolt. I needed 2-1/4" so I had to cut it shorter. I took this photo so the cashier could scan it.

The Ace stop was necessitated by a need for a pinch bolt for the helm chair, which had sheared off just after we cleared the Sunrise bridge. They were also listed as the nearest SodaStream retailer, and we needed a syrup refill. The Publix stop was owing to having made a last-minute decision to jump offshore and hop to the Keys, nixing our tentative plan to stop in Aventura as per our normal inside-route routine.

By dinner time it was pouring rain, so much so that the NWS was issuing flash flood alerts. We walked the short distance to the clubhouse with our umbrellas and were seated well under cover and dry but very much outdoors. Dinner was lovely and the service impeccable, but we learned that Thursday night is "kids eat free" and the dining room was overrun with them. Our server quipped that on Thursdays he works at Chuck E. Cheese, but he gave us sound future advice to dine after 8pm, when they've mostly gone.

Miami anchorage. Four Norwegians, and, a bit closer, one container ship.

We have our sights set on Tampa Bay, which has the best heart hospital in Florida and where I have made a follow-up cardiology appointment, and the only way to get there right now is around the Keys, as St. Lucie Lock is closed for maintenance through March. Getting around the Keys requires good outside weather windows, and when it popped up that we might get a good three-day run to Key West, we jumped on it. I was able to score two nights at the city marina, after which we'll have to regroup and figure out our next move.

Today's route will take us to No Name Harbor in Bill Baggs State Park on Key Biscayne. Tomorrow we should be off Rodriguez Key, and off Marathon on Sunday, for an arrival in Key West on Monday afternoon. Unless something changes, my next post will be under way northbound out of the Keys for the west coast.

The Gauntlet

We are underway southbound in the ICW, running the gauntlet, as I am wont to call it. There are a full fifteen bridges we need opened today, most of them on a time schedule that means we either have to speed up or slow down on each inter-bridge leg to get the timing right. I much prefer to pass this stretch on the outside, but the weather is not cooperative, and it would add a dozen miles to a 35nm trip. At least we no longer have to worry about onerous security zone restrictions popping up.

Neon wall art at Batch, on Clematis in West Palm Beach.

We had a very pleasant evening in Hobe Sound Wednesday, after dropping the anchor in our customary spot (map) inside a minimum wake zone. By nightfall there were two more boats in the anchorage. We had a nice dinner on board, and it was quite peaceful other than a pair of very large wakes from cruising powerboats that didn't pay attention to the signs.

In the morning we weighed anchor and made our way through the Jupiter Inlet area, which is notorious for shoaling. It's been dredged since our last time through, but the Corps of Engineers hydrographic survey pre-dates the dredging and is no longer correct. We split the difference between our last known-good track and the nominal recommended course line and found plenty of water.

These trees on Clematis are wrapped in chasing red, blue, green, and white lights. Maybe relocated from last year's extravagant holiday display.

We were well-timed for the PGA and Parker bridges in North Palm Beach, but it's never possible for us to then arrive at the Flagler Memorial Bridge on time for an opening. We ended up dropping a lunch hook just north of the bridge to wait. Once we cleared the bridge we found the anchorage to be the most crowded we have ever seen. We squeezed in near our usual spot (map), but had to carefully position in the center of three other boats. It does not help that the majority of the "anchorage" here is in a pair of marked cable areas, forcing us into the tiny slice between them.

The Wishing Tree in Rosemary Square seems to have been pruned a bit since last year.

We splashed the tender in the evening and went ashore for dinner. Even though the anchorage was crowded, the town was rather empty and we had our pick of outdoor tables at numerous places. We ended up at a place that's been here forever but was new to us, Ristorante Santucci, where the food was good but I thought the prices were a bit steep for what they offered.

View over the marina, the lake, and the Breakers resort to the ocean, as seen from the rooftop bar at The Ben hotel.

On our way back, the weekly Clematis By Night music was just about to start. Even outdoor concerts seem a bit risky to us at the moment, and the band was not our style, so we did not linger, but it's good to see West Palm Beach continuing to offer community events. As always, the city was nicely decked out, including a new dancing-light program in the Centennial splash fountain that they are calling Clematis By Light. The pandemic still has the fountain closed to actual splashing.

Clematis by Light fountain display. I missed capturing the more spectacular portions.

After my little spa day in the emergency room back in Little River, my cardiologist in New York ordered a set of blood tests as follow-up in a couple of weeks. I've been scanning for labs on our route, and there is a Quest Diagnostics in West Palm just a short walk from the dock. En route from Hobe Sound I called and was able to score the last available appointment for Friday, and I had perfect weather for a pleasant walk along the waterfront. On the way back I dropped a generator oil sample in the mail.

With a day of weather-imposed downtime and prompted by a question on social media, I unpacked, inspected, and supplemented the contents of our "ditch bag." I might write it up in a future post.

We returned ashore together in the evening for a nice dinner on the sidewalk in front of Kabuki, one of our long-standing favorites. I've written here before about how much we like West Palm Beach, and a key reason is a plethora of outdoor tables at a dozen or so restaurants just a short walk from the dock. Regular readers may remember that we spent the Christmas holiday here last year.

Appropriately, I snapped this photo of the ever-evolving BLM mural on MLK day. Interesting to compare it to a year ago.

Saturday morning we treated ourselves to breakfast bagel sandwiches at Makeb's Bagels, which are as close to NY bagels as you can get in this part of the country. Then we briefly strolled the enormous GreenMarket, which encompasses the lawn as well as several blocks of Clematis Street. I would have loved to spend a little more time, but once again, the venue felt too crowded to us even outdoors. We returned ashore in the evening for dinner at long-time favorite Lynora's, which has a discounted happy hour menu even on the weekend.

Our view from Lynora's and Batch of different chasing lights.

Sunday's forecast was for gale force winds, ramping up over Saturday night. The wind was already picking up on our way home from dinner, and we decked the tender as a precaution, to keep it from bouncing around and in the event we had to maneuver during the storm. There was lots of jockeying for better positions in the anchorage as vessels prepared for the winds.

The Goodyear blimp passed us back and forth several times today, running along the beach as we made our way down the ICW.

The wind did keep us on the boat all of Sunday, but it was not nearly as bad as forecast; we may briefly have seen 35 but it was mostly less than 30. By dinner time it was flat calm, but too cold and damp to want to eat outside ashore, and we had a nice dinner on board. With the tender already on deck, we discussed the possibility of continuing south in the morning, but this stretch of water is bad enough on the weekdays, and running the gauntlet on a holiday seemed ill-advised. We decided to just spend another day.

Sunset view from our table at Coconuts.

Yesterday was a nearly perfect day and I took the opportunity to stroll around town a bit, on my way to and from the Publix to restock some critical provisions. We returned ashore for a final dinner at Batch where, like Lynora's and Kabuki, we enjoyed the happy hour menu. I was disappointed, but not overly surprised, that there was no MLK celebration in town. I did notice all the buildings with decorative lighting were lit magenta instead of their usual colors in the evening,

Update: We are anchored in a familiar spot in Sunrise Bay, Fort Lauderdale (map). As with the last few anchorages, it's more crowded than we have ever seen it and we had to squeeze in. I had to stop typing once the bridge transits became constant, and with waits of 15-25 minutes on three of them, it was time to head for dinner as soon as we had the anchor set. We had a nice sunset meal at Coconuts, perhaps our favorite place in all of Lauderdale. In the morning we will see if the yacht club right next door to us can get us in for a night or two.

Missed connections

We are under way southbound in the ICW, on the Indian River just abreast of the St. Lucie nuclear generating station as I begin typing. It's a gloomy day with lots of crosswind, but Otto is handling it well, freeing me to type.

Sunday afternoon we pulled off the ICW in heavy chop and squeezed in between two spoil piles in the Indian River and dropped the hook (map). I selected this spot because it was the southernmost point we could reach in daylight where we could also get ashore for dinner, being just across from a waterfront restaurant in Palm Bay.

Vector at anchor in the Indian River, as seen from our dinner table.

The spoils did not provide much relief from the southerly fetch, but conditions gradually improved through the afternoon, and we decided to brave the chop to go ashore. We landed at the "dock" of the Lazy Turtle Riverfront Grill and Tiki Bar, which itself was a challenge. The dock is really a walkway out to a riverfront overlook with a few bar stools and a counter, without any thought for boats docking. A trio of short ladders extend down from the dock for the purpose, but you have to duck under the railings, which have no gaps. Also, the water is just 18" deep.

Ascending the steps from the dock lands you in the Tiki Bar, where a live band was playing. We walked through the restaurant to the patio on the other side, where a much more subdued solo steel drummer was playing. The inside dining room turned out to be white tablecloth, fancier than I expected. The food was decent, the steel drum pleasant, and the temperature acceptable behind the wind screens set up for the purpose.

The dock at Lazy Turtle, with Flux nose-tied.

In the morning we weighed anchor and set out for Fort Pierce, where I had the West Marine set aside the fuel filter I needed to finish the dinghy repair. That meant getting ashore at the city marina, and we anchored in the closest spot, a familiar anchorage south of the causeway (map). I figured to race ashore as soon as we arrived, to get my part before a forecast storm moved in.

Somewhere under way the forecast changed to move the storm back well into the evening at a lower intensity, and we call our friends Alyse and Chris in Vero Beach to see if they wanted to meet us ashore for a cocktail or a bite. After a little back and forth, we agreed on an early meet-up at 4:30, at the closest restaurant to the dock. They offered to drive me the mile and a half to West Marine for my part.

We had the anchor down by 3pm, in a tight squeeze among the other boats. Right after setting the hook we had some discourse with a Frenchman on the next boat, who was certain we were much too close (we were not). Ultimately he decided he could "wait and see." Perhaps he lacked confidence in his own tackle.

The gathering storm. Red lighting in the distance is where we would have been when it hit.

As we were preparing to drop the dinghy, another check of the forecast revealed yet another change, this time in the opposite direction. The storm was now forecast to arrive while we would be ashore finishing dinner, and with a vengeance. Reluctantly, we called our friends back and waved off our get-together. They are not only boaters, but also licensed captains and boating educators, so they understood completely. We left the tender on deck.

It was the right call, as the storm arrived even earlier than the latest forecast. Vector got a much-needed rinse, and we had a nice dinner on board, which Louise had started preparing first thing in the morning before we made arrangements to go ashore. As the wind ramped up into the high 20s and clocked around, I kept an anchor watch in consideration of our neighbor's concerns, but it quickly became clear that we were both well-set and our circles did not overlap at all. We came closer to the boat on the other side, an unoccupied dilapidated sailboat on a permanent anchor.

By the time we went to bed, both the rain and the winds had stopped altogether. But overnight the winds picked back up and were again in the high 20s in the morning, and we opted to just spend another day, in the hopes that I could find a time to get ashore for my part and not have to re-order it further south. By lunch time winds had laid down just enough for me to pick my way across, and I grabbed my backpack and set out for the dinghy dock.

"Spin" e-scooters. $1, plus $0.35 per minute - 1/4 mile at top speed.

I was fully expecting to hoof it the 1.3 miles from the dock to West Marine, and in fact we even discussed loading the e-bike into the tender. (I decided against that because I was expecting to have a rough tender ride, and the time savings is minimal between loading, unloading, setup, and breakdown). In the year since our last visit, I had forgotten completely that Fort Pierce has dockless scooters, even though I had included that fact in my blog post for exactly this reason. This blog is really our own note-taking system (in case you wondered why lots of mundane uninteresting facts end up here), or as we are fond of saying, we blog to remember and drink to forget.

Upon re-discovering the electric scooters, a different vendor from our last visit, I downloaded their app and unlocked a scoot. The round trip to West Marine cost about seven bucks, money well spent given where I am in my cardiac recovery. After picking up my filter I walked across the street to Aldi to restock some needed provisions. We're not usually Aldi shoppers, where every item has just a single brand, but they had everything on our list and my pack was full when I walked out.

"Pizza Brewery" with a covered patio in the lee. Perfect.

I was pretty successful in picking my way across and back in the tender, holding to the windward shore most of the way, so we decided to give it a try at dinner time as well. We got a little wet from the spray but we had a decent meal at Sailfish Brewing, with a couple of drafts, a small pizza, and a salad. It was very comfortable on their patio, on the leeward side of the building. Returning after dark we opted to leave the tender in the water overnight, which proved to be a mistake. We ended up hip tying it at 3am after hearing it bashing into the swim platform.

This morning's winds were only a bit lower than yesterday, but with our business in Fort Pierce finished, we got under way, where the stabilizers are giving us a mostly comfortable ride. Our sights are set on a familiar anchorage in Hobe Sound. It's a beautiful spot, but ever since being struck by lightning there, we are always a little on edge.

Back in the warmth

We are under way southbound in the ICW, on a very short run from Cocoa to Palm Bay, Florida. The last few days have required a lot of attention to the helm cruising inland, and this is my first chance to update since we were offshore en route to St. Simons Sound. I actually started this post yesterday, but that, too, was a short cruise and I only got halfway through.

Immediately after I posted here, we were outside the 3nm limit, and we started to discharge our waste. Within less than a minute I realized nothing was pumping at all, which is never good. With the tanks nearly full, we'd have to make a beeline for a marina with a pumpout as soon as we arrived. Usually followed by a very unpleasant changing of the pump.

Falcon-9 launch as seen from Mosquito Lagoon. Best my little Fuji could do.

The pump did not sound broken, so on a hunch, I got out my 3-pound engineer hammer and gave a few taps on the check valve in the engine room, the couple of 90s in the pipe, and the through-hull, and I also operated the through-hull valve a couple of times. That did the trick and we were back in business; perhaps the divers in Little River inadvertently wedged some barnacles in the outlet when they were cleaning the hull.

Just as I was finishing with the pumpout we drove straight into a dense fog bank and ended up running the horn for an hour or so. In the middle of that we were overtaken by the Nordhavn 50 Grey Goose, a boat we've crossed paths with numerous times. The current owners have only had it a couple of years and we were able to update them a little on some history.

All that remains of the Golden Ray incident. The large crane is removing the environmental barrier.

Our good friends aboard Barefeet have been in Brunswick for a while, docked at the Brunswick Landing Marina, and we were hoping to connect with them. But our arrival time to the sound meant we'd arrive at the marina after closing and in the dark. The forecast for Sunday was for winds around 20 knots all day (escalating to gale force overnight), which would ace us out of docking then, too. We thought we could anchor in a familiar spot on the Frederica River if they could use the courtesy car to come meet us at the Country Kitchen there, but they turned out to be closed for New Years.

With no way to connect for at least two days and riding out a windstorm in the interim, we reluctantly decided to wave off, and hope to connect further south. Instead we set our sights on an anchorage near where the ICW exits the sound to the south (map), for decent protection from the southerlies. As we came into the harbor we passed the enormous environmental barrier from the Golden Ray salvage, being dismantled by a huge crane.

Sunset over St. Simons Sound.

We got an early start Sunday, both to get ahead of the worst of the winds, and to have a full eight feet of tidal help to get through the shallow section behind Jekyll Island. Not wanting to also cross St. Andrews Sound in high winds (and thus heavy seas), we planned to stop in the diminutive anchorage near the Jekyll Island docks. Perhaps we could even get ashore for dinner or to enjoy some of the island; it's been a very long time since we visited.

While there was a little room for us in the anchorage, there was no protection from the relentless wind, and it was unclear there was enough room for the scope we'd need for storm anchorage. Getting ashore would be dicey, and the nearest restaurant was closed for the holiday. We opted to take our chances with St. Andrews Sound before the wind got any worse, and continued south, with the option to turn around if need be.

Passing through Kings Bay submarine base. Boomer on left, security boat with 50-cal keeping an eye on us at right.

The sound turned out to be manageable, and at a very high tide level I was able to cut the big corner and shorten our stay a bit. We then had an uphill trip most of the way to Fernandina Beach. Hoping to have just enough lee to get ashore, we anchored in a new spot south of the mooring field, where we found enough room to put out storm scope (map).

Our choice of anchorage made for a just-tenable dinghy ride to shore, where we paid the $3.99 landing fee and walked through town in search of an outside table. We found one at the Amelia Island Brewing Company and had a pleasant early dinner, in short sleeves for the first time in quite a while. The town was nicely dressed for the holidays.

Max wind 59mph. 41mph while a new arrival was trying to anchor.

We returned to Vector through decent chop and left the tender in the water for the night. I was running out of anti-inflammatory meds, and had calls in to the doctor hoping to get them refilled in town on Monday. By 11pm the winds started ramping up into the 30s, but it was clear we were very well set on 7:1 storm scope. I folded all the furniture on the aft deck, and the tender had a bit of a wild ride, but we went to bed without worries. At 5:30am we were awakened by a spotlight shining through the stateroom portlight, and went upstairs to investigate.

The spotlight turned out to be a yacht that was trying to anchor next to us in 40mph of wind. At that hour, we could only imagine they had dragged in another area and came over here in search of better holding. They did not stay, and we never saw them again. But glancing at the anemometer display, we noted that sometime in the previous hour, the winds had reached 59mph. That's storm force, or what used to be called "whole gale." That might explain the itinerant yacht. We did not budge.

Our plot for our stay in Fernandina. Smile in NE quadrant was the overnight windstorm.

Monday came and went with no progress on the medication front. It was too rough and chilly to want to bash our way ashore for dinner, so we decked the tender in anticipation of an early start, and had a nice dinner on board. In the morning we weighed anchor, which was well buried in the bottom, and headed south for the St. Augustine area.

We got lucky with the tides, and made it all the way to Vilano Beach in a long day. We dropped the hook in our usual spot (map) and tendered ashore at the public dock to find some dinner and walk to the Publix for more provisions. We ate at old standby 180 Vilano; the town was very quiet. We made a note for the future that Puccini's Pizzeria, right next door to the Publix, has lots of outside tables and serves beer.

"Airstream Row" office park in Vilano Beach.

Under way to St. Augustine I finally reached someone in the cardiologist's office to renew my script and send it to the Walgreens in Daytona Beach, within walking distance of the dock. And thus we weighed anchor in time for the 0830 opening at the Bridge of Lions, sailed past downtown St. Augustine, and had a smooth run down the inside to Daytona. Under way I called the Halifax River Yacht Club there and snagged a slip on our reciprocal "one night free" arrangement. We were tied to the dock (map) before the tide dropped enough to make it difficult.

The yacht club had an outside table available on the deck and so we opted to have dinner there instead of walking to town. We were literally the only patrons eating on the deck, despite the dining room being rather busy. There is no mystery why Florida is dark red on the case count map. Now that we are back in the warmth, we'll avoid inside dining altogether. We're also able to slow our pace down a bit; this is the reason we've been rushing to Florida since our visit in Charleston.

Our anchor came up sideways in Vilano Beach and wedged in the roller. We drove through St. Augustine and beyond like this until I could get a break from the helm to go out and free it.

I hoofed it to Walgreens and the gas station in the morning, and we were off the dock before noon with enough tide to make the harbor exit easy. With the morning already gone, I figured on a short day to New Smyrna Beach, where there is a free dock, with a decent anchorage for backup. Under way, however, the Coast Guard started making security zone announcements for a rocket launch; a quick check of the schedule revealed a Falcon-9 launch at 4:49. In striking distance of a view of the pad, we decided to pass NSB and continue as far into Mosquito Lagoon as we could get before launch time.

As we passed the NSB anchorage, we spotted Grey Goose, with a dive boat alongside. Captain Mark shared that they had lost their anchor and were hoping the divers could find it. The root cause was side-loading of the stainless anchor swivel. There was a similar swivel aboard Vector when we first got the boat, and long-time readers may recall we removed it early on for exactly this reason. They are a weak link in the ground tackle system, and have a tendency to fail at the worst time. I can only imagine what such a failure would have done in the 59mph winds we experienced just a couple of days earlier.

Many boats at the yacht club had "dressed ship" for the upcoming change of command ceremony Vector is at left, and Memorial Bridge in the background.

We have never anchored in the Mosquito Lagoon, because it is almost entirely too shallow for us outside of the marked channel. Motivated by the launch, I pored over our newer, more detailed charts, and found exactly one spot where we could exit the channel in the lagoon. That exit led to a small pocket of deeper water, and we were able to make it there (map) and get the anchor set by 4:30, in plenty of time for the launch.

It was a perfect viewing spot. We could see all the way to the pad and the entirety of the rocket. It lit off right on time and we watched it rise past the tower and head downrange. We could see the burn all the way to MECO, but we were too far away to see the booster return. The shock wave and roar reached us, nearly 18 miles away, a full minute and a half after liftoff.

Our home club burgee adorning our table at dinner. Both these glasses are plastic, as was the china, since the deck overlooks the pool.

Nary a boat passed us all evening or overnight, and we had a dark and quiet night. Well, mostly quiet -- a drum fish under the boat sang the song of its people all evening, serenading us through dinner. We had a short day planned for Friday, just two hours to Titusville, so we had a relaxed morning and a late start. Before we weighed anchor we were passed by Grey Goose, sans anchor. At $225 an hour for the diver, there was only so much searching Mark was willing to buy. Eventually someone anchored in NSB is going to haul up a very expensive stainless Bügel anchor.

We weighed anchor shortly thereafter and headed for Titusville, where we made plans to meet up with good friends Dave and Stacey, who are docked in Sanford but have a car and were willing to make the 45-minute drive. We arranged for a late lunch (really, early dinner) at Pier 220, which has a dinghy dock, and we dropped the hook in a familiar spot just south of the causeway (map). By the time we arrived, winds were N at 15-20, but the causeway afforded us decent protection.

The little downtown festively decorated.

That was fine for Vector, but the dock for Pier 220 is on the north side of the causeway, and as we passed the end of the land and rounded the fishing pier, we found ourselves bashing into steep two footers in the dinghy. It was, I think, the roughest tender ride we've ever had. Making matters worse, just as we pulled up near the slips, the engine died, and we soon found ourselves being blown over toward the rip-rap shore, with me paddling like crazy to try to get within reach of something.

A man at the bar (we assume) saw our predicament and came over to help; Louise was able to throw him a line and he pulled us over to the dock, averting disaster. I looked for him later to buy him a beer, but he was gone. A quick check revealed we were out of fuel, however I had put a gallon in while we were in Daytona (hence the gas station stop), and this was the first time we'd used the tender since. Somehow, most of that gallon disappeared over the course of two full days.

Sunset from a very peaceful Mosquito Lagoon.

We had a nice long meal over a couple of beers with Stacey and Dave; it was great to catch up with them. Afterwards, they drove us to the gas station so I could put another gallon in the tank, thus preserving our "emergency" gallon we keep in the back of the dink. The seas had laid down a little since we arrived, and we made it back to Vector without too much bashing. However, the tender again died just as we arrived, this time with an overheat warning. I was able to restart it and get alongside before we blew all the way to Cocoa. I disconnected the fuel tank after we decked it, to keep from losing any more fuel.

Sometime after we left the bar, a live band showed up at Pier 220, and that was our evening entertainment. Fortunately, it was music we liked and, at a distance, not unpleasantly loud. I spent much of the evening studying tender manuals and looking at sources for various parts that might need replacing. I found a West Marine on Merritt Island across from Cocoa, with a dock within kayaking distance of an anchorage, and in the morning we weighed anchor for a short three-hour cruise, dropping the hook as close to shore there as depth would allow (map).

I spent the whole afternoon in the tender taking apart the fuel system. I eventually discovered that the fuel filter/water separator cartridge had rusted through, making a pinhole leak. It was leaking enough to empty a gallon over two days, which simply evaporated because there was no evidence it ever left the tender, but not enough to prevent the engine from drawing fuel out of the tank. The overheat alarm on the way home was most likely due to entrained air in the fuel causing the engine to run lean.

Hall of shame photo. I neglected this filter. I had to remove the entire assembly, mount and all, and take it down to the workbench to get the cartridge off.

I solved the problem by simply removing the unit from the fuel line. It's an optional accessory; there's a fuel filter on the engine and a screen in the tank. That meant we could again run the tender without worrying about it stranding us, and we went ashore at dinner time to see if West Marine had a replacement (they did not) and find some dinner. Unlike its neighbor Cocoa Village across the bridge, Merritt Island is a dining wasteland. We walked to Carrabba's, which had a half dozen outside tables, but a giant party was taking up the whole patio. We ended up at Tijuana Flats, a counter-service place that at least had two outside tables and three beers on draft.

This morning we weighed anchor and headed south, without a clear idea of where we'd stop. After spending a half hour with Google Maps and the chart, we've set our sights on a spot between two spoil piles across from a waterfront restaurant. Winds are again in the 20s, and we're hoping we can get ashore.

Update: We are anchored in the Indian River, between two spoil piles and across from the Lazy Turtle restaurant in Palm Bay (map). In the morning we will continue south toward Vero Beach and Fort Pierce. There is no weather window for an offshore run for at least a week.

Happy New Year

We are under way in St. Catherines Sound, bound for sea and thence to St. Simons Sound near Brunswick, Georgia. It has been an enjoyable trip down the ICW, much less stressful than our first couple of times owing to better tools and skills. That said, it's still a lot more work to get this big boat through the low country than to run offshore, and since we have the weather for it today, we're making our break. We have a temporary moratorium on overnight trips while I continue to recover from heart surgery.

We have not been ashore since departing Charleston, notwithstanding my prognostication that we might be in Hilton Head for New Years. In actual fact, we made much better time than I had allowed for, pushing all the way through the really shallow stuff around the Ashepoo-Coosaw cutoff at the end-of-day high tide and dropping the hook in the Combahee River inlet, right off the Coosaw (map), just after sunset.

That had us whizzing past Hilton Head in Calibogue Sound mid-day on Thursday. We had been lukewarm on stopping there anyway, with Omicron keeping us out of anything too crowded, and so we had been hoping for, but not counting on, a festive atmosphere we could enjoy from a distance, with perhaps some more holiday lights, maybe some music or even fireworks.

Sunset at anchor on the Combahee.

With none of that guaranteed, and a slip at the marina running $195 a night (regular rate -- I never even got as far as asking about the holiday), adding an extra day to the mix was the final straw, and we opted to just keep going. The tide let us get as far as an anchorage on the New River next to Turtle Island (map), near Daufuskie Island, just before Fields Cut, another notorious shallow section. I would have loved to run the cut at the end of the day at nearly high but still rising tide, but the cut empties into the Savannah River where there is no place to anchor. Despite a reversing current of two knots, it was one of the calmest anchorages we've seen.

Once we knew we would pass up Hilton Head, I looked into spending New Years Eve in Savannah. The city had festivities planned for the riverfront, culminating in fireworks, and we knew from experience that we'd be able to distance there, or even just take it all in from our own deck. Unfortunately, the city docks, where we have stayed in the past, have been closed due to damage since October. Repairs are not yet complete, and the city dockmaster informed me that she was allowing 3-hour tie ups at the dock for the holiday, but only until 5pm.

There's really no good place to anchor on the river, and even if there was, the city dock is the only place to land a tender. The two private marinas nearby seldom have space on weekends, and again it would be $200 with no guarantee we could safely do anything at all. Thus, as much as we would have enjoyed it, we again decided to simply press on ahead. We weighed anchor early yesterday on a falling tide, in order to still have a few feet of help getting through Fields Cut. That put us in the Savannah River just as a large ship was passing the cut upriver, and I had to make a hard right and run outside the channel buoys until he passed.

Dolphins seldom play in our bow wave for long -- we're too slow -- but it's always fun to see.

The early start had us passing through Thunderbolt well before lunch, and we set our sights on a familiar anchorage in Kilkenny Creek, the last decent stop before St. Catherines Sound. With the Marker 107 restaurant further up the creek closed for the holiday, this time we only poked into the creek far enough to be out of the wakes of ICW traffic and dropped the hook (map) around 4:15.

We had a very quiet New Years Eve at home, and it was so unseasonably warm that we even had our first cocktail out on the aft deck. Dinner out there was out of the question, as the bugs quickly drove us back indoors just as we finished cocktails. We had a nice dinner inside, and I can get away with saying we went to the saloon for New Years with only other boaters the wiser.

One of the characteristics of the marshy "low country" is that you can see for miles in any direction, and we were treated to small private displays of fireworks all evening from the surrounding developments, most at least two miles away. The city display downtown was not high enough to see over the trees. At midnight I sounded the ship's whistle, as I do every year, and that was the totality of the difference from pretty much any other night at anchor. Once the fireworks died down it was a very quiet and peaceful night on the hook.

Dolphins play off our bow in the Coosaw river.

One reason we pressed on to the Kilkenny anchorage, pushing against the tide from the "top of the hill" anchorage that we generally prefer, was to allow for the possibility of going offshore today. It's a long day, up to nine hours under way, but much easier than the two day slog down the ICW. The forecast was on the cusp of comfortable, giving us pause. This morning's weather check revealed it to be acceptable, and we weighed anchor with the turn of the tide and raced out of the sound with nearly two knots behind us.

We're now offshore, about three miles from the coast, and it is indeed acceptable, if not truly comfortable. We're making decent time, with the plotter projecting a 4-something arrival at St. Simons, better than my planned arrival a bit after 5. This will be the first time in two years that we will pass through St. Simons Sound without the hulking wreck of the Golden Ray as a major feature of the landscape. While the ship and massive removal crane are gone, the environmental barrier is still in place as crews continue to clean debris off the bottom, and we will still have to skirt around the security zone.

We are hoping to connect with some boating friends here, so we may linger for a day or so depending on their schedule, and then we will continue south. I expect that, when next you hear from me, we will be in Florida.