Thanksgiving Etc

We're still here in Vero Beach at anchor with the Fosters. Yesterday we had a great Thanksgiving dinner celebration with about 50 other cruising boats in a very nice park building about a 5 minute dinghy ride from our boat. A number of turkeys, hams, and every side imaginable. The temp. was a sunny 72 and a number of folks ate outside on the deck.

The photo shows the anchorage from a high rise bridge that takes us from the island into the town of Vero Beach. We are about in the center of this picture. This is a great cruising destination, but Monday we head south for brief stays in Ft. Lauderdale and Miami, then onto our next rest stop at Marathon. We expect to be in Marathon for a month and then onto Key West for our luxury month at the Galleon Marina on a dock. Then in March we will either head for the West Coast of Fla or retrace our steps back to New Bern.

Vero Beach

We're settled in at Vero Beach. It finally feels like Florida with temps in the 70's at least. We are moored adjacent to the Vero Beach City Marina. We share a ball with friends of ours (Tom and Ollie Foster) from Blackbeard Sailing Club. There are a large number of other boats here provisioning and waiting for suitable weather for crossing the Gulf Stream.

Great shopping, dining, and a free city bus system that takes you everywhere. We went to a Publix market which rivals Pittsford Wegmans and Charleston Harris Teeter. Took in a car show yesterday which featured a lot of classic 50's Detroit Iron. 50's music was blaring and Carol & Ollie were dancing in the street.

The cruisers had a BYOB and snack party yesterday afternoon - great turnout and great food. We will be here though Thanksgiving and are looking forward to a big cruisers Turkey Day Potluck.

Melbourne

It's a little after lunch time and we are anchored out in a creek off the Indian River in Melbourne. We are in a beautiful protected spot, but it is still mighty windy and the forecast is for this to last indefinately!

The Indian River is a shallow wide river which runs north and south separated from the ocean by a narrow strip of sand. When the wind is out of the north (or south) you have many miles of fetch and some choppy waters. Last night we rocked and rolled at a dock in Titusville Marina which is not well protected. This morning the winds were down a bit and we were able to get off the dock at around 7:30. We let out the big gennie and began motor sailing south. I was sleep deprived so went down for a nap around 9:00. About an hour later Carol woke me up because the sail wanted to gybe. As I woke up I thought our engine was coming apart - making a loud vibrating noise. When I came up on deck and looked at the gps, we were doing over 7.5 knots so the diesel was just "idling" at 2500 rpm. A diesel engine wants to be under a load and the sail and wind were depriving it of that load. We shut the engine down for a while until we were overpowered with the sail. Then we shortened sail, then rolled it up and motored to an early arrival around noon at Melbourne. Tomorrow we head for Vero Beach and a two week stay.
Can't wait to settle down.

Titusville

Another cold front is coming through with a reiforcing shot of frigid air and a lot of wind. We actually sailed part of the way down the Indian River today. It was a sleigh ride and you could steer by keeping the huge Vehicle Assembly Building (at Cape Kennedy) right on the bow. Way to much wind (for us) to anchor out on the unprotected Indian River so we ducked into the Titusville Municipal Marina.

Tonight we will have a pizza delivered and will buy some Ben & Jerry's for the first ice cream in a month. Freeze warnings tonight, the space heater will be working!

Smyrna Yacht Club

What a relaxing day today has been!

We spent last night at anchor in Daytona. All was well until about 2 am when the tide started coming in against the wind. We were in a pretty good standing wave for a couple of hours. We did manage an ok nights sleep, but we were out of there at daybreak.

Arrived at this beautiful Spanish Architecture club about 9:30 am and have enjoyed the most relaxing day of the trip. Did a little cleaning, some reading, some napping, etc. What a great place to stay and for a terrific price - one night free! We have been talking with some of the members and getting tips for similar clubs along our route in Florida. Apparently Florida has a strong cruising yacht club association with reciprical privilages for members. Some but not all of these honor the Yacht Clubs of America card. This reminds us of the joys of cruising to the yacht clubs on Lake Ontario. We'll see how many more we can stay at over the next 4 months.

Daytona Beach

We're in Daytona after a bit of a long day. Not too many places to stop between St. Augustine and here. There was one anchorage listed by Skipper Bob, but we ran softly aground trying to get in. So we continued on a few hours after we really wanted to stop to anchor out in the middle of the city of Daytona Beach. Interesting spot on a Sunday night.

Tomorrow it is a few miles down the ICW to a free night at a dock at the Smyrna Yacht Club. We expect to be in Vero Beach on Thursday and will spend about two weeks there and celebrate Thanksgiving at the cruisers potluck.

We're in Florida

Well it's been a few days since we've posted anything and there is much to talk about. We are now in St. Augustine Florida and have finished our second day here. We spent one night at anchor and are currently tied to a dock in the municiple marina. But let me back up a minute.

On our trip down from Jekyll Island we spent two nights at anchor. The first night was just south of Fernandina Beach Fla. Lots of cruisers go there, but we didn't go ashore to find out why. Lots of noise and smelly paper mills. So we had a noisy / smelly night and moved on early the next morning. It was about then that we began to worry about our cell phone. No service since we entered Florida. It was like going to a foreign country. No cell phone service could be a big deal. If you get into trouble on the waterway it's the cell phone that gets you help. So when we pulled into St Augustine, the first order of business was to call Tracfone and find out what happened. Apparently our digital phone was becoming obsolete and at least in this part of the country we needed a GSM phone. Getting set up with a new phone was amazingly inexpensive but took most of the day.

We spent yesterday at anchor and paid $10 to use the marina facilities. This was a test exercise since it will be our mode for much of the time in Florida. It's simple economics - $10 versus $90 per day. We got an amazing bonus with our stay at anchor - viewing the launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavor. It was a night launch and at this distance we saw a bright orange streak until the first stage burnt out and was discarded. It was pretty thrilling.

We spent today biking around St Augustine and taking in the historic sights. The weather has been hot and humid the last several days, but a cold front is supposed to be coming tonight. Several sailboats in the marina are planning on going outside tomorrow to take advantage of the fair winds for south bound boats.

Carol snapped the picture of the egret on our dock. These birds are pretty tame and would probably come into the cabin for a snack.

Great Day on Jekyll

We had a busy day today on Jekyll. We started out doing the various boat chores which accumulate. I changed the oil and vacuumed out the boat while Carol borrowed the marina van and went grocery shopping.

We rode the bikes back to the Jekyll Island Club Hotel and had a terrific lunch in the Grand Dining Room. Very relaxing - I can't remember spending over an hour and a half for lunch. A dish like shrimp and grits for Carol, and capellini with shrimp, shittake mushrooms, kalamata olives, and artichoke hearts in a garlic and white wine sauce for me - yumm!! Dinner will be an apple, some yogurt, and a cookie.

Then we got back on the bikes and tried to work off some of the calories. We stopped by the Georgia Sea Turtle and got to visit the patients in the turtle hospital. It was facinating to learn how they restore rescued turtles to health with the goal of returning them to their habitat.

We are off to Florida tomorrow if the weather settles down a bit over night.

Jekyll Island

After three nights on the hook in the Georgia salt marshes, we arrived today at Jekyll Island. The marshes are actually very pleasant and surprisingly bug free. As soon as you pull into a marina in civilization you are in a swarm of no-see-um bugs.

We spent the afternoon biking through the historic resort grounds formerly winter playground to the rich and famous, now expensive hotels and a state park. We plan to have lunch tomorrow at the Jekyll Island Club featured in the attached photo. Also will be putting a few miles on the bikes on the extensive bike trials on the island

Finally Beaufort SC

After three nights in a boat yard off the North Edisto River, we are finally back on our ICW track. Other than making our wallet flat, the stay in Rockville Marine wasn't too bad. We have a new raw water pump and water temperature gauge and I have learned a few new things about the boat. I also have an ongoing email dialog with Westerbeke about their "improved" raw water pump which failed after very few engine hours. We think it's about time to repower Traumerei with the latest in Japanese marine propulsion technology.

We anchored in a very quiet creek last night near the Dataw Island housing development we looked into about 15 years ago. This morning we slid into the Beaufort City Docks for a little laundry and grocery action. The temps are in the high 70's and it seems like summer here at last. Beaufort is a charming historic town with a terrific waterfront including resturants and a great park. We ate lunch at Plums on the waterfront, took a walk through the historic district, and I read a book on a swing in the park before dinner. Very nice!

The cruising guides warn about the NO-SEE-UM bug in Beaufort. We were here in December helping a friend move his boat North and of course now. We can attest that Beaufort has the No-See-UM bug in a big way!

Tomorrow we head further South and expect to be in Georgia soon. We are looking forward to spending some quality time in St Augustine and then coming to rest in Vero Beach Fla.

A little inconvenience

On our way motoring to Beaufort SC yesterday, we heard a strange sound from the engine exhaust. Fortunately we had heard it before when mussels tried building a home in our engine sea water intake and we knew to shut down the engine right away and drop anchor. Unfortunately running a garden hose from the deck washdown pump down the engine intake did not solve the problem this time. It was time to collect on about 10 years of paying for unlimited towing insurance. It was a Sunday and I think we got most of our ten years worth of premiums back. We are now at a competent boat yard off the North Edisto river and should be underway bright and early Wednesday morning with a new seawater pump.

We'll spend the time doing some boat chores, making a few improvements to the living conditions, and enjoying the shore power and great wifi connection.

The boat yard goose is swimming against the falling tide. Carol has also seen a Snowy Egret at low tide.

Terrific warm fall weather today. We had a great day for biking into Charleston along the Battery and ending up in the market section. Only tacky junk for sale there so we moved along on Meeting Street to a bike shop where I bought an inner tube for our bikes as a safety spare. Outside Carol got a tip for a public market in a large park by the old Citadel (now a hotel). It was terrific! We got some fresh produce and enjoyed talking with the farmers and fellow shoppers.

We then had lunch at the Southend Brewery - a nice beer or two and a terrific vegiterian pizza. The people in Charleston really know how to eat!

We are off tomorrow heading for Beaufort. Hope to be there on Monday evening and will spend
Tuesday there for the election returns. Expect to encounter some dirty weather on the way. Stay tuned.

The parallel parking boat from a couple of days ago is the Mystique. She is parked across the way from us and is 156 feet overall. Yesteday she took on a little fuel, 6,100 gallons to be exact and her tender took on a mere 300 gallons. Just think of what you could do with $20K or so!

Bye