Friday - April 29, 2011

Lat 29 53 53 Long 81 18 55; fuel 199 gal; eng 734 hrs

Left St Augustine this morning at around 8:15 am. The goal was to get to Fernandina Beach where we thought we would anchor for the night. When I phoned the City marina last night I was told there was no room at the inn because it was a local shrimp festival this weekend. Brenda phoned again this morning and they had a spot so we took it.

One thing I noticed is that the boaters with fast boats are a lot more polite in North Florida, they slow down before passing so that their wake does not almost turn the boat over. Well, that's most boaters. There were a few today that just flew by and unless you turned into the wake quickly, stuff was being thrown all over the place. In one case, an idiot ran by me and I turned quickly into his wake. Unfortunately, he was coming up on the port side where it was shallower water. Since he was on plane, he really was not too concerned about the shallower water. However, as I turned into his wake I noticed the rapidly decreasing depth and almost ran aground. This was one of several boats traveling together, all traveling fast but separated by a half mile. Could tell they were traveling together because they were constantly chattering on channel 16. The last of the boats radioed me that he was passing and I told him I would slow down so that he could do a slow pass. His response was that I didn't to slow down for him. I told him, I wasn't doing it for him. I wanted him to slow down so I wouldn't get waked. he thought I was an old grouch. Too bad.

The area that we traveled through today reminded me of cottage country along the Trent Severn waterway - lots of tress with the cottages set back a bit from the water with their boats out front.

AS we got close to Fernandina Beach, I came around a corner and was in the middle of the channel and ran aground. Thump and there we were - stuck. I really didn't know where the channel was as I was inside the green buoy. There were no red markers showing that there was a shoal there. I decided to wait until the tide rose a bit and I hoped that some boat with some local knowledge would come by and show me where the channel was. Luckily we were on a rising tide and after about 20 minutes a boat did come by and the channel was a lot closer the green side of the channel than I thought. The channel was very wide. I managed to back out once tide raised the water level and we went on our way.

We finally made the marina and settled in. Took a walk around the city and found that the heart of the shrimp festival was right in the marina area and it was not a little festival. They had all sorts of stands selling cooked shrimp and fish. There is music and tomorrow there will be a craft and art show. Towards the end of the day, there must have been about 20,000 people in the direct marina area. The end of the evening was celebrated with a firework show which was one of the best I have seen in a long time and best of all the fireworks were being set off about 1/2 mile behind our boat so we had a prime seat for the show.

Wednesday and Thursday - April 27 and 28

The last two days have been mainly tourist days and getting some things done on the boat. We decided to stay one more day - Thursday because a cold front was coming in and severe thunder storms were predicted. However, as I write this nothing so far. Yesterday we went to the beach and walked along it. Visited a local craft and food market. Instead of going out to dinner, decided to have a good lunch instead and stay on the boat for the evening.

Today was mostly work around the boat and not much else.

Tuesday - April 26, 2011

Picked up a car this morning, and Brenda and Linda went shopping at the local outlet mall and they dropped me off at the World Golf Hall of Fame. I spent 6 hours there before I phoned Brenda to pick me up. If you are a golfer it is well worth the visit. The displays are excellent. Two in particular, I thought were really good - one on Bob Hope and the other on Nancy Lopez. Bob Hope was a major contributor to the game through his playing and always Promoting the game. However the display was more than that - it covered his entire life and the time he spent entertaining the troops, his movies etc. Lots of other stuff to see including an area on the British Open, Bobby Jones, and of course area on all the inductees. There are two Canadians in the Hall - Guess who they are>

Came home after that and then went to dinner.

Monday - April 25, 2011

Got up this morning and phoned the electronics specialist. Apparently he was located in Jacksonville and was not really interested in coming down to St Augustine. However he did tell me a couple of tests that I could do to see if it was the hardware or software and it would appear to be the software. So we went over to Westmarine and bought a new chip for the chart plotter, inserted it and it worked. It appears that the old chip simply crapped out as I was going along the ICWW.

In the afternoon, the folks from Q's End and ourselves went over to the Lightner Museum which was founded by some guy call Lightner from Chicago. He apparently was a n avid collector of stuff and he encouraged others to collect stuff even if it was match books. He left his collections to the museum and encouraged others to do the same. There were collections of many things, cigar labels, dolls, dresses, crystal, dishes etc - many of them very interesting. The most interesting however was a collection of music machines that operated by themselves. While we were there, we were fortunate to have a demonstration and these machines were amazing to see and hear - operating on paper holes, or huge copper and steel discs.

The museum used to be an old hotel which was constructed by a man named Flagler who also built a number of other hotels and churches in St Augustine. He also built a railway to bring people down from the northeast to Florida for the winter. Of course they stayed in his hotels. By the way, Flagler co-founded Standard Oil with Rockerfeller which now is known as Exxon. He was obviously not short of money to fund his other ventures. In any case, this particular hotel had at one time the largest swimming pool in the world and in 1925, the US women's swimming championships were held in the pool. The existing pool is now long gone but it was a far cry from the swimming pools we know today.

After our visit to the museum we went for pizza and wings at a local restaurant.

Sunday - April 24, 2011

Will be staying in St Augustine until we get the chart plotter fixed. Had a visit from a Canadian sailboat which we passed along the way a couple of times over a couple of days. Camelot II from Belleville, they were returning from the Bahamas.






Went out for brunch this morning and then we wondered around the town a bit, took a train ride which shows all the sights in old St. Augustine. This city is the oldest continually inhabited city in North America. Founded by the Spanish in the late 1500's as part of their fortress protection for the Spanish ships heading back to Spain loaded with gold and jewelry etc taken from the natives in the New World. Very pretty town and very interesting. Lots of restaurants, and lots of things to see. We went and visited the fort Castillo de San Marcos - and did the tour. Entrance was free because this was National Parks week and the fort is part of the National Park. Want to get over to visit the Fountain of Youth and try out the water, see if it works. This city is the location and it was discovered by Ponce de Leon.






The City changed hands several times form the Spanish to the English to the Spanish and finally tot he US as wars were fought and won or lost as the case may be. St Augustine is also the location of the World Golf hall of Fame so we are going to visit it sometime while we are here.

Later on we had lunch and did some more wandering. They had an Easter Parade so we watched the whole parade. It was quite interesting and obviously had a Spanish motive as does the whole city, no marching bands though.










Looking down one of the streets

Saturday - April 23, 2011

Lat 29 12 24; Long 81 00 82; Fuel 199 gal; eng 727.24

We heard from our friends on Q's End that it was rough getting into St. Augustine City Marina because of the winds and the tidal current in the marina. I checked the tide charts before we left Daytona Beach and found high tide was around 1:40 in the afternoon. Therefore slack water would be around 1:00 to 2:00 pm. While I could not eliminate the effect of the wind, I could minimize the effect of the current by getting there sometime around slack. Since St Augustine was about 55 miles up the ICWW, and we would be traveling around 8 knts, this meant that again we would have to leave around 7:30 to arrive at St Augustine at the right time. In fact we did leave at 7:45 again. Again the morning was quiet - no wind but it built up over the day. The trip was very circuitous as the ICWW wound around lots of shoaling and little sand islands. Had to pay strict attention to our course and where we were going. One of the bridges we passed under had mosaics on each of the pillars of dolphins and matinees - very pretty.




A little further along, a I was about to pass under a bridge, a sculler moved right into the channel in front of me. Fortunately we were under a no wake order in this part of the channel so he was faster than me at this stage. However, he could have been run over if I had been going my normal speed of 8 knots. It is dangerous for people to think they automatically have the right of way because they are not under power. Common sense should tell that I cannot stop or maneuver as easily as them, especially in a narrow channel. However no harm, no foul. The rower was part of club out for their morning row.




Lots of Canadian boats heading home for the summer. Of course when you see the Canadian flag,there is always a special hello.

We continued to travel down the waterway, a just before St. Augustine, my chart plotter went out leaving me to navigate with my paper charts. I don't know shy it went out and I am going to have to get an electronics guy over in St Augustine to fix it, because it is a lot easier to traverse the waterway with an electronic chart in front of you and a lot safer.

Anyways we arrived in St Augustine around 2 and there was little current but a lot of wind. Fortunately we moved right into the slip with little problem even though the wind was on our beam.

Our friends from Q's End were here and we went out to dinner with them and caught up to their adventures in the Bahamas.

Friday - April 22, 2011

Lat2 8 21 47; 80 43 54; Eng 718.38; fuel 118 gal

We left Cocoa this morning at around 7:45, probably one of the earliest starts ever. Said goodbye to our friends on Lazy Dolphin and moved out. Morning was cool and there was no wind. It was really perfect for cruising. Our goal was Daytona Beach, about 70 miles up the ICWW. Lots of bridges but fortunately they were all over 25 feet and many were 65 feet so no problem in going under them. As we passed Titusville, we hear a boat on the radio saying thank you to the marina they stayed in the night before. The boat was Unchained, which we had not heard from since the Port St Joe on the Florida panhandle around November 25, 2010. Unchained is owned by 4 brothers and a cousin from Michigan and they are traveling the Loop together in a 37 foot trawler. Anyways we radioed them and had a bit of a chat as we were going along. Hopefully we will see them in a future port.

Unchained as it leaves Titusville

Lots of bird life along this stretch of the waterway, one island had thusands of birds.












Osprey nest (I think)

We arrived in Daytona Beach at around 3 and the wind had really picked up, actually it was really blowing hard. The Daytona Beach Marina, asked if I wanted fuel and a pump out and we stopped for both. The wind was blowing directly behind us so it was a little work to get in but we made it. We then went to our sip ant the wind was blowing across our beam. Fortunately the the channel was wide so I could make a good turn into the slip. Just had to back up once before we got in. We settled in then went to dinner at local pub. food was good.

Thursday - April 21, 2011

Just about ready to leave this morning. Last thing to do was uncouple the electricity and Brenda says she wants to stay another day. Yes dear, so we stayed another day. Allowed me to do a few things around the boat. Brenda and Barb from Lazy Dolphin went shopping. After lunch we all went over to the Amish Deli and bought a few food things like jam, salsa etc. Tomorrow we leave early for Daytona Beach.

Wednesday - April 20, 2011

Got up this morning and went right over to this neat hardware store about a block from the marina to see if they had a light, since a couple of our lights in the boat had burned out. This is an old hardware store and has a lot of stuff but not the light I needed. I browsed around a bit, bought a couple of things and then went back to the boat. Phoned Enterprise and rented a car for the day so that we could go up to the Kennedy Space Center.

The shuttle transporter



We drove over to Space Center which was only about 11 miles away and went in. About 20 years or so ago we went with the kids (I think Lesley was a year old) but the Center is completely different now. You also look at things differently when you don't have rug rats with you. Had a bus tour through to the launch area, although we really did not get close to the pads and saw the next shuttle which is set to go for an April 29 launch. They bring the shuttles over some 30 days in advance for preparation on a specially built vehicle that moves at around .5 miles per hour from the building where work is done on the shuttle. In the picture below you see the Endeavour sitting on the pad with the big fuel tank sitting about the structure. to the right is a tank of liquid hydrogen cooled to below -400 degrees. Can't see it but to the left is a tank full of liquid oxygen. Have to keep them apart otherwise there could be an impressive explosion. These two elements are put into the fuel tanks just before launch.

Endeavor on the pad



We then went and visited the building where they have all the information about the moon launches. I forgot that they went to Apollo XVII before they shut the program down. Lots of information about the launches and they had a mock up of the Atlas rocket which kicked the astronauts into orbit. I never realized how big the rocket was, they built the building around the rocket rather than moved the rocket into the building. They explained how it was done and the various parts of the rocket and when they kicked in to move the modules into position for a slingshot to the moon. Really worth while. What really amazed me is that the calculations were done without the computers that we have today. While there were computers, they did not have the speed, capacity of today's computers. In fact many calculations were done with a slide rule.

The Atlas rocket


The command and service module for the moon trips - not much room




I took a ride on the a shuttle simulator. Quite interesting. On take off there was a tremendous amount of vibration and you felt the g-forces on your body. The vibration continued until the fuel tanks were jettisoned and then it was quiet. We then went over to the IMAX theater to watch a film in 3D on the Hubble telescope. This was really a highlight. I showed hoe the telescope has been repaired with actual filming of the repairs and showed some of the information that the Hubble is obtaining from light received from distant stars and galaxies. What amazed me was the light it was gathering was sent out billions of years ago, so it is looking back into time when these galaxies and stars were created. Who knows what they look like now. Have to wait around for another billion years unless we somehow can figure a way to transport ourselves to those stars and galaxies.

We then returned back to the boat and went to dinner with our friends from Lazy Dolphin.

Tuesday - April 19, 2011

Vero Beach Marina



Lat 27 39 48; Long 80 22 21; Fuel 128 gal; eng 711.48

Left Vero Beach after waiting about an hour to fill up on fuel only to turn around and find a sail boat had pulled up to the dock as I was pulling out. Decided to forget it, we had a lot of fuel. Only reason, I wanted to fill at Vero was because it was Valvetech fuel. So we left and pulled out into the channel with our destination set for Coco. For those of you who can't remember the movie The Right Stuff, Coco Beach was where the Mercury astronauts used to party and is about 10 miles from Cape Canaveral. it is about 5o miles down the waterway from Vero Beach.

Trip down was not too exciting other than a few spots where the water got skinny and we had about 3 feet under the boat. However we made it and arrived in Coco about 3:30. Along the way we saw this nest with an Osprey feeding the chicks.




When we arrived at Coco, our friends from Lazy Dolphin were there to meet us. They have been here several days waiting for their dinghy to get fixed. We have not seen them since St Pete's and we went over to their boat once we got settled in to to update each other. Brenda and I then went out for pizza and the pizza was so big that we will have enough for lunch the next several days. Great pizza.

Sunday, Monday - April 17, 18, 2011

Since Varo Beach is such a nice place, we decided to stay until Tuesday. Beautiful weather. On Sunday, we walked about 3 miles to the local Publix. The walk was over the main bridge and quite a ways up Highway 1. Good exercise. We picked up some provisions and then caught the local taxi back to the marina where we stayed for the rest of the afternoon. Watched the baseball game which the Blue Jays lost.

On Monday, clothes were washed at the marina laundromat. We then walked down to the beach and had dinner at a local restaurant. From the restaurant, we watched these crazy kids trying to surf board by running into the ocean and jumping on the board. They were not very good and mostly they just fell in the water. However they were persistent.

Saturday - April 16, 2011

Lat 26 06 65; 80 08 77; Fuel 138 gal; eng 706.30

Left Loblolly this morning at around 10 after the pump out man came by. Little room to back up into the channel so it took a bit of effort to swing the boat so we could leave. Right now I am working on now using the bow thrusters when I go into and out of a slip, so it takes a little more work specially in tight places.

More traffic on the waterway this morning as it is the weekend - more Yahoos screaming up and down. Ran across a couple of go slow zones because of manatees but have yet to see one along this stretch. All the bridges are very high so we did not have to wait for any to open. Interesting to see the effect of the current on the speed of the boat. As we approach an inlet the boat speed picks up to around 8.5 knts while the engine RPM are rather low - about 1250. After the inlet, maintaining the same RPM's the boat speed drops to around 6 knts.

This area along the appears to be older and perhaps not as wealthy as that on Jupiter Island. We decided to pull into Vero Beach City Marina for the night and then decided to stay two nights - need to look at the charts to determine possible places to stay further north. Besides it is a nice place. Went for a long walk across the island and saw the Atlantic Ocean. Had dinner at a good restaurant - delicious fish and chips except that I substituted the chips with onion rings.

After several months of no bugs, we are now starting to see more noseeums and flies. Brenda has losts of bits, I have none. It's good to have someone on board that are attractive to those noseeums.

Haven't seen any Loopers recently.

Friday - April 15, 2011

Boat along the way



Lat 26 35 48; Long 80 02 89; Fuel 145 gal; eng 700.15

Left Lantana this morning to travel further north. No specific destination just to find a marina where we could get a pump out. Nice trip up the ICW. Lots of big homes with big yachts in front of them. We passed though West Palm, another area where there are lots of yachts and cruise boats. Lots of traffic. Traveled under a number of bridges, fortunately most of which had a vertical height exceeding 19 feet. Lots of places where speed is restricted as a result of manatees so we could not travel as fast as we normally would have. In fact two young girls on jet skis wnet flying by us in a no wake zone and all of a sudden the police boat pulled out of a hidden area and stopped them - just like the cops on land. Part of our trip went alongside Jupiter Island where Tiger Woods is building his palace. However, since it is hidden behind a bunch of trees and shrubs, I can't say we saw it.


Along Jupiter Island


About three, we decided to stop at a marina cal I led Loblolly Marina which really is a gated community and yacht club which rents out to transients for extra money. Nice marina and the facilities are all new and the best thing is, we can get a pump out. As we were coming into the channel to the marina we rubbed a mud bottom. I forgot it was low tide. have to remember it when we leave tomorrow.


I think this is an osprey nest with the osprey but not sure.

Thursday - April 14, 2011

Today we stayed in L. The Xantrex service man was right there at 9, like he said he would be. Took a look at it removed it from the engine room and took it back to his office for testing. An hour later we was back and had replaced the fuse switch, and indicated that that was all that was wrong. It now seems to be working. The more important thing was he gave me a number of tips for managing the load on the batteries.

After he left we went and did the laundry, and went back to the same restaurant that we went to last night - The Grumpy grouper. Food was just as good! The rest of the afternoon we laid around the pool and read and slept.

Wednesday April 13, 2011

Ship from China in Fort Lauderdale


Lat 25 57 60; Long 80 07 64; Fuel 156 gal; eng 692.42



left Turnburry this morning in order to travel up to Lantana where hopefully, I can get the Inverter fixed. Along the way, we traveled through Fort Lauderdale. I can't believe the number of large and I mean really large yachts moored along the waterway. Our boat could serve as a tender on some of them. When we at Turnberry, I mentioned the large yachts in the harbour (100 ft +) to the harbour master and he said that two of them were owned by the same person (a Mexican gentleman) and he had another in the Mediterranean. One of the yachts was going to the Caribbean and the other would stay here. I wonder what he does for a living?


A few of the yachts along the way




The trip down was without incident and we traveled about 45 miles. Lots and lots of bridges crossing the ICW. Some of them we can get under without opening because they are at least 19 feet high at the centre. However some of them we have to wait until the scheduled lift time which depending upon the bridge occurs at either on the half hour and hour or on the quarter past and quarter to the hour. They have timed the bridge openings so that if one opens at the half hour, the next will open at quarter to the hour. You usually have enough time to make the next opening.

Went to a great restaurant in Lantana - The Grumpy Grouper - sort of the local bar but great food.

Lanata Marina while a nice marina has no pump-out or fuel. Along this stretch of the ICW, this is quite common, so you have to look for marinas which have these facilities if you need them.

And Joe,Laura and Lesley, you need to get this rig for rowing.

Tuesday - April 12, 2011

Still at Turnburry Marina. Nice place with a nice pool. Went over to play golf at Turnburry this morning and it was expensive. Also had to take a forecaddy who really just drove the cart and washed my clubs. If there were more players he would actually go down the course and spot the ball as they are hit. It speeds up the game in busy season. Since I was playing alone he was good company. Great job in retirement. He actually works for a company which hires out caddies to various courses around the US. In return the caddies get tips and best part of all get to play for free on any of the courses which the company contracts caddies and apparently there are a lot of courses including Pinehurst, and Doral. My caddy was retired and I asked him what he did before this job - alligator wrestling. He showed me a picture of him with his arm in a gator's mouth. He retired at 45 because his reflexes were getting too slow!

After my game, I came back and laid around the pool. Brenda went and got her hair done over at Turnburry and it was also expensive. I think everything around here is expensive.

Monday April 11, 2011

Miami skyline



Lat 25 40 63; Long 080 09 76; engine 687.48; 158 gallons

Left No Name Harbour this morning about 10:30 and started the cruise up the ICW past Miami. Lucky we decided to wait until Monday to undertake the trip because unlike yesterday, there were very few boats on the water. Lots of bridges, most of which I could get under but a few that I had to wait until they lifted. Lots of buildings and homes along both sides of the waterway - big homes. Saw a few cruise ships getting ready to depart for whereever.

Am having a problem with my Xantrex inverter/charger. The inverter is working fine, but the charger keeps cutting out after about 5 minutes of running. it charges the house batteries. The normal battery charger charges the start and windlass batteries Need to get it fixed because it makes anchoring out difficult if I can't charge the house batteries. So we spent a bit of time phoning Xantrex and Nordic Tug and apparently there is a service depot just north of Fort Lauderdale in Palm Beach. Looks like we are going to move north up there in order to get this fixed as Xantrex thought it was a circuit card gone. Nordic told me that I could top up the house by switching the parallel isolator to on and it would put the house batteries on the same circuit as the start.

Brenda and I went down to the pool at the Turnburry marina and had a great afternoon reading and swimming.

Sunday - April 10, 2011

lat 24 52 425; long 081 05 25; fuel 196 gallons; eng 672.57

Today, I woke up I found the water under the depth sounder to be around 4 feet. This means the depth under my stern was around 1.5 feet because of the large keel. This worried me because the ICW on the inside up the Florida Bay is not noted for its depths and I would be rubbing bottom a lot of the time. After due consideration and after checking the weather reports I decided to make a run for Miami by going outside. This really meant going all the way to Miami as there are not very many anchorages on the outside and very few opportunities to get back inside. So away we went. Left a t 9:30 and arrived at the Biscayne Channel at around 6. Long day but I never had to worry about the depth of the water and Hawks Channel is well marked.





As we pulled into the Biscayne Channel we spotted these houses that are off to each side of the channel. While some look abandoned, some people are living in others. I think I would hate to be in a hurricane while living in one of these. I once saw similar houses in Indonesia where people lived in the homes.


Inside the harbour before 7


We went into Biscayne Bay with the intention of going to Marine Stadium right across from Miami but after seeing that it would take about an hour to get there we decided to go into No Name Harbour on Key Biscayne. When we went in, it was full but we found a spot. Spanish music was being played quite loudly. Obviously this was a party spot on the weekend. However at 7, everything ended and people began pulling out for the evening. As a result there were very few boats left anchored for the night. This ia a nice quiet spot, but a little bit buggy (noseeums) but really protected. Watched the sun go down from the top deck and then had dinner. A long day but an easy one as I used auto for most of the trip. No worries about depth.


Sunset inside No Name Harbour

A few more pictures

Saturday April 9, 2011

Well we came back to Florida on the 5th and for the past few days have been getting the boat ready for the trip north. Went to dinner, the last few nights with Jay and Joan from Windsong. They have sold their boat and are returning home on the 15th, so it was in many ways sad. I ordered a hatch screen from West Marine and paid for overnight delivery since we were going to leave on the 9th. Think it arrived by the time we left on Saturday - think again. I have now got to figure how I am going to get it delivered to me. if it arrives before the 15th, Jay said he would drop it off at a marina as they went north on I95. Of course West Marine is closed on the weekend so customer service is useless, and I can't even locate the place where I can insert a tracker number.




Anyways, we have departed Marathon and our trip went along Hawk Channel until we reached Channel 5, one of the few channels that allows larger boats to cross over to Florida Bay form the south side of the Keys. It was a great trip along the south side of the Keys, and we made good time considering we left at around 11:00 am after filling up with diesel. Prices are up and it cost over $550.00 to fill the tanks. We crossed over at Channel 5 and anchored very close at Matecumbe Bight in about 6 feet of water. Nice spot sheltered from the SE wind. Water was warm so Brenda went for a swim, well she got into the water and floated around. The water was nice and warm but I waited until the Masters was over before I got into the water. Lot cooler on he water than on the docks in Marathon. Don't think we will need air conditioning on tonight, of course that would not be possible as we are anchoring out.

Beautiful night with a clear sky so you can see all the stars and the moon.