Palm Beach to Daytona Beach

On Monday morning, the 21st, we took the cut through to the ocean. The winds were pretty light so we motor-sailed. The northerly winds were supposed to turn more to the west but that never happened (that’s because we were heading north I suppose). It was a pretty uneventful 9 hours on the water (no running aground; no sails tearing; no Sunday drivers and not a lot to see). We took the cut to the ICW at Ft. Pierce and anchored near a tiny island with one other sailboat and spent a very peaceful night. Since ABC was about the only network we could receive, Em was able to watch “Dancing with the Stars” so that was a good thing!

On Tuesday we fueled up at Ft. Pierce and headed north on the ICW. There were only three bridges today; the first one we needed to open and the other two were 65 ft. so no problem. We decided to only go the 2 hours to Vero Beach. We’d heard it was a nice place to stop and Paul somehow picked up a cold so we didn’t need another long day. There are mooring balls off the Vero Beach City Marina for $11. They were full but they had us raft off another boat, with a nice couple on s/v Mariah. They were heading below for a nap as they’d done an overnight sail all the way from Key Biscayne. There were two familiar Loopers boats here, “Another Compromise” and “Distant Shores”. We haven’t seen them since we parted ways back in Mobile, AL in November so it was fun to catch up. They had both spent time in the Bahamas where fuel was $5.30 a gallon!

This was how we spent two days in the Vero Beach mooring field. The Mariah was attached to the mooring ball and we were attached to them.

This is somebody showing off sailing around the mooring balls - it's not us!

We spent two nights at Vero Beach hoping Paul’s cold would improve. The winds really picked up Wed. afternoon. I was nearly stranded on shore doing laundry but got a ride back with our “neighbors” on Mariah. Paul was still not in great shape Thursday morning but we headed out anyway. The ICW here is the fairly wide Indian River. After 5 ½ hours on the water, we anchored in the Melbourne, FL area on the eastern shore with eight other boats. We got wet twice on the way, but most of the time it was a beautiful sunny day. It’s been in the low 80s with low humidity and really breezy out of the north. Em immediately checked the tv reception and was pleased that we get ABC pretty well. It wouldn’t be pretty if she couldn’t watch the new episode of “LOST”. Last night “American Idol” was very snowy and kept cutting out – kind of annoying! I just like to keep a connection with my “previous life”!

On Friday we left the anchorage just off the Indian River at the mouth of the Banana River about 9am. We were actually able to sail almost the whole way to Titusville – the first time that’s happened on the ICW. It’s still the Indian River here and it’s very wide with the channel well marked. We were headed north and the winds were easterly so that worked; we even sailed under the three fixed bridges. There were two that had to open for us; one the typical bascule type and the other a swing bridge. This is the Titusville swing bridge, we don't see many of these.

The Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island was off to our right. You can see the huge Vehicle Assembly Building for miles. We’d toured the Center some years back so didn’t make the effort to take the tour again.

We anchored just off the Titusville City Marina mid-afternoon Friday. You can use their dinghy dock free for the first week; they charge $2 to use their showers. We saw another “Restless Wind” sailboat there. We saw a “Restless Spirit” last fall but never the exact same name as ours. That reminds me that we were mistakenly called “Reckless Wind” by a lock tender back in Alabama when he misunderstood us on the radio (or did he?) The good news was that it was a very calm night; the bad news was that we still couldn’t pick up a wifi signal (that’s why I got so behind with this blog!)

Here are two entries in our “sad boat contest” from the Titusville anchorage. Some of them are unbelievably neglected.

On Saturday morning we followed the ICW across the Indian River to the Haulover Canal which is a one-mile rocky cut between the Indian River and Mosquito Bay with one bridge to open. We saw lots of families kayaking and fishing. That led us into Mosquito Lagoon which was much nicer than it sounded; we were on it about 8 miles. We saw dolphins, picnics along the shore, lots of recreational boaters but they had to go slow as it was a manatee zone. This was a scene along Mosquito Lagoon with New Smyrna Beach in the background.

We had planned to stop there but decided to keep going since it was early. We saw the Ponce de Leon inlet (the cut to the ocean) and Lighthouse off to the east. This was a charter boat we encountered on the ICW near there. Most of the passengers were on the port side and it was listing a bit; it looked like a party!


We had to take the Ponce de Leon cut and it was like rush hour on the highway with all the Saturday traffic. There was dredging going on too to watch out for. This is a view looking aft. I think there are 7 boats visible.


A few of the larger cruisers will slow down to give you a slow pass but all of the little boats just roar on by. We heard on the news there was a boating fatality not too far north of us when two boats collided head on. It wasn’t hard to imagine that happening with all the traffic.

After the cut we were on the Halifax River part of the ICW. After 7 hours on the water we arrived at Daytona Beach. We anchored in about 8 feet of water just off the channel with a few other boats. We had a fairly peaceful night but at 6:18 am we were nearly rocked out of our berth by a wake. It was pretty violent; some plates even flew off a galley shelf! We never saw what caused the wake but when it’s flat calm like it was it doesn’t take much I guess. On Sunday we took a long dinghy ride to shore and looked around Daytona Beach. We checked out the Halifax Harbor Marina and found a West Marine store. Guess what – we bought a new inflatable dinghy! Paul had been looking at them for awhile now and decided to go for it.

On Monday, the 28th, we came into the marina for a pump-out, fuel and a slip for the night; first time at a marina in about 2 weeks – it’s huge with SIX shower and laundry buildings in different parts of the marina. We picked up the new dinghy and here it is. It’s a 10ft. West Marine brand RIB (rigid inflatable bottom) made of PVC which should be a smoother ride plus it won’t leak! PVC isn’t very desirable in this climate so it was less expensive but in our area it’s not a problem.


Here are some stories from the local news that you probably won’t hear in Wisconsin:

There were two shark bites over the weekend in New Smyrna Beach (the Shark Bite Capitol of the World – 20 per year). Both victims were surfers who hopped off their boards onto small sharks – ouch!
There was a dolphin accident at Sea World. Two dolphins collided during a mid-air jump and one was fatally injured – how sad.
There were 92 swimmers rescued from rip currents over the weekend on Daytona Beach. One 19-year old man is still missing.

Heading North

The repaired sail was ready on Friday, the 18th. We took the bus to and from UK Sailmakers and used the 2-wheeled cart to transport the sail which saved our backs. They trimmed 9 inches off the leach (the back side of the triangle) to repair the torn area.

It felt great to be on our way again on Saturday. We were actually glad to leave the Miami area. We felt rather in the minority speaking English; almost like we were in a foreign country! It took almost two hours to make our way through the Port of Miami and out into the Atlantic. Here are some of the sights we saw:

We went under the Rickenbacher Causeway Bridge. That's the Miami skyline on the left; about five cruise ships were docked on the right.

It was interesting to see how they load the massive container ships. This one was from St. John's; others had Nassau and Majuro on the stern.

We passed these condos just as we were heading out into the Atlantic Ocean.

Further up the coast was Miami Beach; high rise after high rise!

We were able to sail most of the way heading northeast with an easterly wind. No worries about running aground here; we saw depths from 310 to 583 feet (this is per the charts; our depth meter was stuck at 195 feet). We think we may have been getting a boost from the Gulf Stream because our knot meter showed 5.2 and the GPS showed 7 knots; it’s sort of hard to tell for sure. We came through the inlet at Fort Lauderdale and into the ICW.

We hooked onto a mooring ball next to the Las Olmos Bridge in Ft. Lauderdale, “the yachting capital of the world”. There are an amazing number of HUGE yachts here, most flying the flag of the Cayman Islands. Paul thinks they register them outside of the U.S. for the tax advantage. It was $30 for the mooring ball which gave you access to the dinghy dock and marina facilities. Here’s a view of what they call “the miracle mile”. Million dollar yacht after million dollar yacht!

No sailing on Sunday; we stayed on the “inside”, the ICW. The view along the way was like lifestyles of the rich and famous! We haven’t seen mansions like this since Naples. Here’s a nice one with a dock for your yacht. This one wasn’t for sale but a lot of them were.

It probably wasn’t the best idea being on this stretch on a weekend; lots of “Sunday drivers”. The county we’re traveling through, Broward County, has the most registered vessels in Florida, 42,000! One power boater cut us off as we were coming through a bridge and Capt. Paul was just a bit upset with him. We used our horn but the guy was totally oblivious. Here’s some of the Sunday boat traffic on the ICW.

We needed to have a total of 19 bridges opened. The first one was the Las Olmos in Fort Lauderdale and the last was the Flagler Memorial Bridge near Palm Beach. A lot of them open on request, you call them on the marine radio, and others open every quarter hour or half hour. I thought this was one of the nicer looking ones, the Ocean Avenue Bridge:

After making 42 nautical miles we anchored in a large mooring field/ anchorage on Lake Worth in 10 ft. of water. The winds picked up and it rained some but no problems with the anchor holding.

Farewell to the Keys

On Sunday the 13th we unhooked from mooring ball E-4 and headed out of Boot Key Harbor for the second time. The last time we were here we were on the end of Q Row – Q-10, so E-4 was a whole lot closer to the dinghy dock which made Em very happy (and that’s important!)

We fueled up at Pancho’s again, this time diesel was $4.45/gal (it was $4.08 a couple of weeks ago). This is the most we’ve ever paid for diesel, the good thing was we only needed 11 gallons.

We headed out into Hawk Channel which runs between the barrier reef and the islands but we’re technically in the Atlantic Ocean. We saw one depth of 34 ft. but average depth was around 20 ft; the water’s a gorgeous turquoise color. Winds were very light so we motored with the main up; the genoa (the foresail) was in and out. We had a very close encounter with dolphins; two of them were swimming right at our bow just below the surface. It would have been a very cool picture but by the time I got the camera out, they were gone!

We listened to the Brewers beat the NY Mets on XM Radio on the way. Since we were listening to baseball when we began this trip in September, it seems funny that now it’s baseball season again and we’re still out here cruising.

Here’s the view at sunset from our anchorage at Rodriquez Key off Key Largo. It was a spot recommended to us but it was wide open (not very protected) and no chance to go to shore; just two other sailboats anchored there overnight.

Of course the winds really piped up by the time we anchored. We set the Fortress anchor but when we noticed it was dragging we put out the Bruce which did a fine job for us. Paul decided to sleep in the cockpit and keep one ear alerted to the depth alarm anyway. I slept okay until 3:30am when the rocking got to be a bit too much to be comfortable. The “cold” front they’d been forecasting for days arrived during the night.

On Tuesday we were able to sail quite a bit of the way to Key Biscayne heading northeast in gusty winds. That’s the good news; the bad news is that the wind ripped the genoa along the leach side. We knew that these sails were nearing their end so we weren’t that surprised. After that we motor-sailed with just the main. We got a kick out of seeing three of these yachts towing their “little boats” – kind of like the big RVs towing their cars on the highways!

This was a strange sight to see out in the middle of the water. There are 7 of these homes left in "Stiltsville". They were built one mile offshore as gambling wasn't allowed any closer to shore. Before Hurricane Andrew in 1993, there were over 20 structures still standing and were under private lease until 1999. The Biscayne National Park Service has established a "Stiltsville Trust" to try and restore the structures and eventually open them for park use. Now that would be a water view!

We’d planned to anchor in No Name Harbor off Bill Baggs State Park but it was pretty crowded; about a dozen boats were in a very small space. We were unsuccessful getting the anchor to grab because we couldn’t let out much line so we headed to the second choice, Hurricane Harbor. This is actually more like a canal with a basin that’s available for public anchoring but no shore access as there are private homes all along the wall. The Bruce held well in the brisk winds but the Captain had another night of sleeping with “one ear open” for any changes.

Here’s a view of the Miami skyline from Biscayne Bay. It reminded me of being on Lake Michigan and seeing the skyline of Chicago in the distance.

Here’s the view from where we anchored in Hurricane Harbor.

On Tuesday we headed over to Dinner Key Marina on the mainland, a huge place with room for 582 boats. We hadn’t planned to spend any time in Miami but the ripped sail changed that plan. We arranged for the sail repair place to pick the sail up at our dock; they said it would be $300 and done in a couple of days. The marina was around $100 for one night; April is getting to be an expensive month!

The “cold front” felt great! The high temp of 69 degrees actually broke a record: the lowest high temp for April 15th since they’ve kept records! It got down to the 50s at night; good sleeping weather.

We’ve now moved over to the mooring field at the Coconut Grove Sailing Club – adjacent to the Dinner Key Marina. It’s a very short dinghy ride to their dinghy dock. They charge $25/day with use of their facilities so we’ll hang out here until the sail is repaired. The boats are really close together but I guess that’s not a problem. No one uses a dinghy; the sailing club provides transportation to and from your boat. What may be a problem is there’s a crocodile on the loose. They’re protected (alligators are not) so they’re working on getting him moved out of the area. We’ll keep an extra close eye on Ginger! Speaking of, here she is in her new cooler “do”:

Since we’re now out of the Keys, here are some factoids on the Keys:

The Keys are called “the islands you can drive to”
42 bridges connect 126 miles of the Keys
The longest island is Key Largo at 30 miles long
Key is derived from Cayo, the Spanish word for island
The highest point in the Keys is in Islamorada at 18 feet above sea level

That’s all for now - I'm all blogged out! I thought I'd better take this chance to give an update since we're right across the street from the library.

One More Day in Marathon

We decided to stay an extra day at Marathon – “the heart of the Keys” for two reasons: we wanted to take a snorkel trip and some fellow Loopers arrived in Boot Key and we wanted to spend a little time reconnecting with them.

On Saturday we took the 1pm snorkel trip on the “Starfish” which takes you out about 5 mi. to the Sombrero Reef Marine Sanctuary and Lighthouse. We thought it was pretty reasonably priced at $28/person plus $6 if you want a wetsuit. Before we left, we got to meet “Lumpy” a manatee who frequents the area, this is Lumpy getting a drink (this is a no-no but I guess they really like it). I did get to touch this one (another no-no).


Here’s a picture of the power catamaran, Starfish. They can take as many as 40 passengers; on Sat. we had 15 people plus a crew of three.


This is Capt. Steve and his son, Tristan. Steve was very knowledgeable about the area and lives aboard his sailboat so Paul enjoyed talking with him all the way out to the reef. He was nice enough to give us a ride back to our dinghy and Carolyn, one of the employees, picked us up on her way to work so that worked out great for us “no wheels” people.


We took our time getting out to the reef as there was a group of dolphins ready to put on a show. The one furthest out of the water was the baby of the group. We’ve seen dolphins quite often but never saw such a little one.

I wasn’t able to stay in the water that long; I was feeling a bit claustrophobic with the mask and snorkel plus the waves that far out were a bit intimidating – I probably need to practice first in a swimming pool! But what I did have a chance to see of the underwater world was just beautiful. The coral and plant life and brightly colored fish are truly God’s handiwork! It was 15 – 20 ft. deep and the water was crystal clear. There are mooring balls at various places along the reef to protect it from the damage from anchors – a pretty neat system. The State of Florida and the federal government have been working together for over 25 years to protect the marine environment in the Keys. The Keys National Marine Sanctuary is North America’s only coral barrier reef and the third longest in the world. Here’s some of the group in the water and a group of yellowtails going crazy after Steve threw food overboard for them.



We’d first met Mark and Linda of the m/v Lolligag, a Nordic Tug 32, back in September in Chicago where they began the Loop. The last time we saw them was back in the Kentucky Lakes so it was fun to get together. We have been able to keep up with each others’ trips through our blogs which is great. We each dinghied over to Burdine’s for dinner Saturday night, had a great meal and the smoothest dinghy ride in memory on the way back. The only bad thing was our nav. light (the red and green one in the bow) must have come loose and went overboard while we were climbing up on the dock because it was nowhere to be found when we needed it in the dark.

We really are planning to leave Marathon, "the heart of the Keys" tomorrow!

Back in the Water!

We would never have imagined this seemingly minor repair would have kept us out of the water this long but.....after TEN days, we launched Thursday the 10th and are back on a mooring ball at Boot Key Harbor in Marathon - yay!

This is Paul using a hose to pump compressed air inside various holes drilled in the rudder to force the water out. They started this process on Tuesday after we got back from the four days "up north" in Florida visiting Paul's brother Jim and family who were good enough to take in the "homeless couple". We weren't supposed to live aboard while the boat wasn't in the water because of the marina's insurance (we kind of had to work around that later in the week however).

By Wednesday afternoon, the technician was able to fill the holes and do the rudder repair with a West System product. After that set up, he was able to apply the barrier coat and bottom paint.
(sorry this is probably not that interesting to non-boaters).

Below is the finished product before we were lowered into the water on Thursday noon. We thought Joe did a great job and we were pleased that the bill from the boatyard wasn't nearly as high as we expected. We'd recommend Marathon Boatyard for anyone needing work done in the area. It was rather ironic that after all that time waiting, Cap'n Paul wasn't even here for the big launch. He happened to be returning the RAV we'd rented and was madly peddling his bike back from the airport. It was great having the car for a week and being able to get groceries and run errands anytime we needed to.

They also discovered our props had minor damage and were "dog-eared", probably from hitting a "deadhead" coming into Mobile, AL back in November (a deadhead is a log or piece of wood floating in the water but just under the surface). Here's our feathering prop after the re-conditioning work was done. They also replaced the disintegrating zincs with new ones when we discovered they needed replacing. Salt water eats up the zincs which prevent the shaft from being damaged. Salt water is definitely different from the fresh water of the Great Lakes and very hard on your vessel.

While we were waiting, Paul diligently worked on our inflatable dinghy to plug the leaks. Unfortunately, we found out yesterday that we still have the problem. We may be in the market for a new dinghy before too long. Weather permitting, we'll be heading northeast up the Keys toward the mainland tomorrow. It's been in the high 80s and too hot down here for us northern people. We did finally get Ginger a real haircut and she's much more comfortable. Em had been her "barber" for the past 7 months and it looked like it!

Misc: We met a couple from Wausau on the mooring ball who have been wintering down here on their s/v catamaran "Camelot" and saw m/v "Heaven Bound" with a home port of Sturgeon Bay.

Dry Docked

This was the sunset at our anchorage spot on Saturday night, Newfound Harbor off Big Pine Key.

Sunday aft, March 30th, we got to the Marathon Boat Yard where we were to have the rudder repair work done. This was the scene Monday morning when they lifted us out of the water.

Here's our rudder with a chunk missing from too many groundings. We think just the final one was an encounter with "something hard" and did us in. It doesn't look awful but Paul wasn't comfortable going out into the Atlantic not knowing what could be going on inside the rudder. The keel had a little paint missing in places but no damage.

The yard charges $10 per foot for pulling your boat; labor charges will be $80 per hour once they can start the repairs. The worst part is the yard doesn't allow you to stay on your boat once it's out of the water due to insurance so.... they arranged for us to stay at the Blue Water Motel across the street at the supposedly reduced rate of $129 per night which is $143.04 after taxes. Not that it wasn't enjoyable to have a real bed, shower, air conditioning and cable tv but we would have gladly stayed onboard and climbed up and down this ladder (below).

When on Wednesday the water was still dripping out of the rudder preventing the repair work from starting, we decided to rent a car and leave the rudder to drip. So on Thursday Paul biked to the airport to pick up a rental car and off we went for the 5-hour drive back up to Bonita Springs where we're staying with Jim and Lou for a few days. You guys are a godsend!

It was a pretty drive and interesting to see the Keys from the land side. You can see very clearly what they call the "bayside" on our left and the "oceanside" on our right. We crossed the state from east to west on I-75, known as "Alligator Alley". I only saw one gator though. Hopefully at next posting we'll be back in the water.