Ft. Pierce, FL

Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com

When we last left you we were headed to Vero Beach to the city mooring field where we were going to take a mooring for a couple days before continuing south.  We had misgivings about the mooring arrangements there, specifically the requirement that multiple boats raft up and share a mooring but we decided to give it a try anyway.

So Tuesday morning we called ahead to make a reservation at the Vero Beach Mooring Field.  We were told no problem, but that we would be required to raft.  Okay fine.  

We made our way to Vero Beach and on our approach to the marina we called on the radio for a mooring assignment.  No response. We try again,  no response.  We try the phone, we get voicemail.  We’re now in the mooring field.  We call again, no response.  Is the VHF not working?  We do an automated radio check on channel 27 - no problem the VHF is working fine.  Back to 16 and continue calling.  Finally after seven attempts they answer.  

Of course the marina knows nothing of our reservation but finally assigns us a mooring.  We go there and find a boat on the mooring that we are to raft with.  The boat is unoccupied and in very poor almost derelict condition.   The boat has two small fenders aft, none forward and cleats that are tiny - too small to even get our lines around and nothing else we can tie to.  This isn’t going to work so we decide to call the marina for a different mooring assignment.  No response.  We try three more times - still no answer.  We decide to pull up to their fuel dock to find out what the hell is going on and to get a better mooring assignment in person.  As we do this, there is a big wind blowing us off the dock and no one there to catch a line or assist.  Enough is enough.   We decide to leave and travel an additional 12 miles south to Fort Pierce.  We will not be returning to the Vero Beach Municipal Marina.

In Fort Pierce at noon we tie up at the Harbortown Marina.  A very nice marina that is within convenient walking distance to Publix and a West Marine.  It turns out to be convenient for another reason.  The marina is also the home of Whiticar Marine Services - a Yanmar dealer.  We have been looking for a place to do the 600 hour service on our engine which involves checking and adjusting the intake and exhaust valve clearance.  That means cracking the engine open - something Brian has no intention of attempting himself.  Whiticar agrees to do the service first thing Wednesday morning and will replace the engine coolant while they’re at it, another part of the 600 hour service.  Great.

The service technician shows up at the boat at 8:00 AM and we head out to the grocery store while he works.  When we arrive back at the dock he is finished.  We put the shopping away, eat lunch at the marina restaurant  and spend the remainder of the day changing oil in both our main engine and our generator and Brian attempts to dismantle the windlass which needs to be cleaned and greased.  He is unable to figure out how to remove the gypsy from the unit and will have to do more research.  We also open and clean all three of our sea strainers.

This morning, (Thursday) we get up, battle the strong winds to get out of our slip and head for the fuel dock where we take on 25 gallons of diesel and pump out our waste tank.  We then head out, point the boat south on the ICW.

All of a sudden we have a problem.  Judy who was at the helm notices it first.  The engine temperature gauge is pegged all the way over to the hot side.  Brian goes down below to investigate thinking that maybe he had forgotten to reopen the engine thru hull when he cleaned the strainer but it was open and whats more the engine was pumping good seawater out of the exhaust as it should be.  We turned the engine off and pulled out of the channel into an area of very deep water and dropped the anchor.  This was a very tight area with old pilings and concrete piers visible along the edge.  To add to the fun, we are way too close to shore to allow for the appropriate anchor scope for water that deep thus we can feel the anchor drag and then catch, drag and then catch as we slowly drift toward the shore with it’s deadheads and hull crunching concrete.  

Time for professional help.  We call TowBoat US which is based back at the marina we just left.  TowBoatUS arrives within ten minutes and tows us back to Harbortown.  Thankfully we had purchased towing insurance and so while no one likes being towed back to port - at least we didn’t have to pay for it.

Back at the marina we explained what had happened to Tim who is the owner of Whiticar Marine.  He acknowledged that the coolant service was not done properly and assigned a technician to take care of it.  He also agreed to pay our dockage for the night at Harbortown.  He could not have been nicer.  Long story short, the technician had not put enough coolant in the engine to account for our water heater which is 15 feet away from the engine.  Thus, we were running the engine with almost no coolant.  The engine seems fine. We believe we were able to shut it down before the heat caused any damage.  Lucky. 

So, as this is written we are tied once again to the dock at Harbortown.  We will try again on Friday to leave Fort Pierce and head for Palm Beach.  We plan to anchor out there and then head for Fort Lauderdale.  We will leave the boat on a mooring there, rent a car and then drive over to Naples for a day to see Brian’s step-mom Pat.  After that visit we will return to the boat and wait for a weather window to head out onto the ocean down to Miami.

The weather here has been nice.  It rained briefly tonight and is still windy but the temperatures are in the 70’s and the sun has been out almost every day. 

St. Augustine to Vero Beach, FL

Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com

We have done it!  We have finally outrun winter.  The multiple layers of clothing are starting to come off.  The past few days have been filled with sunny skies and temperatures in the 70’s, a lot different than what we were dealing with just a little over a week ago.  We are hopeful that as we make our way towards South Florida the weather will continue to improve.  

A word of encouragement to those cruisers still far north of us and dealing with tough conditions - keep coming south, there is relief in the promised land.

We stayed at St. Augustine for three nights.  On Saturday we slipped our mooring and after a stop for fuel and other needs we pointed Sweet Escape south headed for Daytona Beach where we spent a pleasant night in an anchorage just off the ICW.  We had some trouble getting into this anchorage though.  Our cruising guide’s instructions didn’t work.  Each time we would make an approach following those directions we found water too shallow to get through and would have to back out.  Seeing our plight, another cruiser - Wind Seeker, a boat that was already in the anchorage called us on the VHF with instructions on how to get in.  After that we had no problem.  We were able to get into the anchorage and never saw less than 11 feet of water.  So much for cruising guides.

Sunday morning we weighed anchor and continued south traveling 55 miles to Titusville where we anchored again just off the ICW and in the shadow of the NASA complex.  From the waterway you can see the Vehicle Assembly Building where the rockets are assembled for flight.  Just north of our anchorage we passed through the NASA railroad bridge,  an unattended bridge that is open unless a train is coming through.  This is the rail line that NASA uses for transporting large rocket components that are then assembled at the Kennedy Space Center in the aforementioned VAB.  Interesting to imagine what all has made the trip across that rail line.

This part of the ICW is a wide expanse of water between the mainland and Florida’s barrier islands.  For the most part the cruising is easy, the water is deep enough in most places and the tides here are no more than a foot at the most which makes getting under most fixed bridges easy.  

The anchorages here are really not anchorages in the way we think of them up north.   Here you simply find an area of suitably deep enough water and pull over out of the channel.  They are completely unprotected from wind and wave.  We have been fortunate to have had calm winds the past couple of nights.  These anchorages could get nasty and be really uncomfortable in a wind storm.

There is a lot of wild life in this area of the ICW.  Yesterday we saw something that neither of us had ever seen before - pink flamingos in the wild.  Two groups of flamingos flew by us and we were able to get some photos from a distance.  Brian was thinking how embarrassing it must be to be a male pink flamingo, having all the other male birds always making fun of you.

This morning, shortly after we got underway we had a visitor in the form of a dolphin that swam with us for about five minutes.  We were able to get some video that we posted to YouTube and which is available at right.  

Dolphins are interesting animals.  When they swim with you alongside the boat they always swim alongside where you are on the boat as if they want to see you and want you to see them.  Sweet Escape is 44 feet long but this dolphin swam alongside the cockpit at the back of the boat where we were.  They seem to seek out that interaction with the people not just the boat.

We anchored for the night at Cape Malabar about 20 miles north of Vero Beach.  Again we are anchored in the middle of the Indian River and again we’re thankful that the winds and waves are calm.

Tomorrow we will head for Vero Beach also known as Velcro Beach among cruisers because cruisers tend to stick there for a while.  Velcro or not, we will stay just a couple days.  We intend to pick up a mooring but we have heard that if they get busy the marina which runs the mooring field requires mandatory rafting.  Essentially you find a boat that is already secured to the mooring and pull up next to it with fenders down and tie up to the other boat.  We’re a little nervous about this since we’ve never done it before.  

Patient readers will have to tune in to the next exciting installment of Travels Aboard the Good Ship Sweet Escape to find out if and how it all works out.

Thanksgiving Thoughts

Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com

The other day we were meandering our way down the ICW talking on the phone with our daughter Erin and Judy was drooling over some of the beautiful water front homes. 

Erin recalled a conversation we had years ago.  We had taken a Caribbean Cruise.  We were on the deck waiting for the ship to depart some island and we were talking about the psychologically different viewpoints of the people on the shore versus the people on the ship.  How the people on the shore looking out at the ship desired to be aboard the ship and how the people aboard the ship looking at the shore desired to be on shore.

  

Erin reminded us that such is the case with the beautiful homes along the ICW.   While you gaze upon these homes longingly, the home owner is on shore watching you go by and wishing for the freedom that you enjoy aboard your boat. 

We are genuinely grateful for so many things.

Making it to Florida has been such a goal of ours for so long we are still in awe of being here. Saint Augustine is a delight.  Other family members have stated how much they love Saint Augustine.  It is the first time we have been here and now we understand why.  It is a city that needs to be experienced and we are so glad that we stopped here.  

As much as we are happy to be cruising we can’t help but miss our family and remember past holidays.  We are very much looking forward to their visits this winter.

We are having a very relaxing Thanksgiving watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and football under sunny blue skies.  Spending time chatting with family on the phone, while our oven is stuffed with cooking food, making the boat smell so good. Glad we are not traveling today but looking forward to our next trip Saturday.  

After eating we are hoping the winds will die down and we will take a dingy ride back to town or maybe just hang out here. Life is good on Sweet Escape.  Hope it is for you too, no matter where you are.

We're in Florida!

Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com

We have not been able to update this blog as much as we would have liked because we have been without reliable internet service a lot lately.  Hopefully that will improve now that we will be traveling in more populated areas.

We left our Possum Point anchorage on Saturday morning and headed south towards Brunswick Georgia.  Our intention was to make it to an anchorage just north of Brunswick named appropriately - North River.   From there we would have two travel days to get to Fernandina Beach Florida just south of the St. Mary’s River.  

We spent the day winding our way through the vast saltwater marshes of south Georgia.  Once again it was cold with the icy north wind blowing 25 knots at times.  We took turns at the helm, an hour on and an hour off so that the other person could go below out of the wind for a while.

Underway we did have some entertainment.  Bridges in Georgia are on VHF channel 9 and the International Hailing and Distress Channel is channel 16.  We keep our radio on scan so that we can hear both frequencies.  On Saturday we were monitoring two guys (think Goober from the Andy Griffith Show) who were using VHF channel 6 as they were hunting bear.  They had apparently shot and wounded one and were tracking it.  At one point one of the guys says “I think he (the bear) musta went into them bushes over yonder”.  His partner replied “yea but don’t go in there till I get there or he might jump ya.”  Didn’t hear if they ever found their bear or not.

We traveled 60 miles and arrived just before dark and anchored in the North River.

Sunday was a little warmer with less wind and the sun actually showed itself in the afternoon.  We were bound for an anchorage 20 miles north of St. Mary's but had another tide problem.  We were still having extreme high tides.  We were on the Brunswick River and as we approached the entrance to Jekyll Creek which runs along the west side of Jekyll Island it was obvious that there was too much water to allow us to pass under the fixed height Jekyll Creek Bridge a couple of miles to the south.  So we pulled off to the side in the Brunswick River, dropped the anchor, had lunch and watched some football.  After a couple hours we decided that due to the delay we would not be able to make our planned anchorage.  Since it had been a week since we had been to a marina and had laundry to do, we decided to take a slip at the Jekyll Island Harbor Marina.  We were also getting low on the all important Diet Coke and this would be a good opportunity to reprovision the boat.

The marina is located just south of the troublesome fixed bridge.  Once the tide had gone down a little, we were able to clear the bridge and get tied up at the marina.  We ate dinner in their restaurant and then Judy did laundry.  Note that Brian does not do laundry.  This is because Judy wisely will not allow him anywhere near her clothes for fear that they will come out a different size or a different color than when they went in.  We also attempted to update this blog but found that the marina wifi was not working.

The next morning we borrowed the marina’s courtesy van and drove to the only grocery store on Jekyll Island.  Surprisingly well stocked, the store is really two double wide mobile homes put together located right on the beach on the Atlantic side of the island.  We bought groceries and then stopped at the Dairy Queen on the way back to the marina for lunch.

Back on Sweet Escape we are getting ready to depart.  Judy is at the helm and Brian takes the bow line off thinking that the 3 knot opposing current will swing the bow out away from the dock.  It does - really fast and by the time Brian got the spring and stern lines off, the boat had swung too far from the dock for him to get on.  So, there is Brian still standing on the dock and Judy is on the boat out in the middle of the channel.  Great.

Thankfully Judy had no trouble turning the boat around and returning to the dock to pick him up despite the strong opposing current.  Nothing like a little excitement to spice up a Monday morning.  Brian started to worry that Judy had one of those bear hunters stashed down below and planned to leave Brian at Jekyll Island for good.

As we headed south on Monday we passed by Cumberland Island, one of the South Georgia barrier islands and home to herds of wild horses.  These horses were brought to the island by a doctor from Europe in the 1920’s.  After the man’s death and to this day the horses roam free on the island.  We actually saw one grazing in a marsh as we passed by.  See the photo at right.

We made our way south to the St. Mary’s River and then to the promised land - Florida.  We spent the night in the Fernandina Beach anchorage just south of the Florida - Georgia state line.

Each night we study our charts for the next day’s run.  We could see that Tuesday was going to be a challenge.  We would have five fixed bridges on Tuesday between Fernandina Beach and St. Augustine, our destination for the day and where we would stay put until Friday.  In addition to high tide problems with bridges, there would be low tide concerns as well because there are many reported shoal areas along the waterway in that stretch.  Therein lies the rub.  On the one hand low water is good to help you get under fixed bridges but on the other, low water makes getting through shoal areas especially difficult.

We left this morning (Tuesday) on dead low tide at 6:45 AM.  We felt that we would prefer to run aground over losing our mast at a bridge.  As we motored along the sun made an appearance and was with us most of the day.  In fact, one man came up on channel 16 and asked “What is that strange round yellow thing in the sky?”  We are not the only cruisers who have been dealing with the crummy weather the past several weeks.

We motored along the ICW and after a couple of hours it started to look like Florida.  We crossed the St. Johns River which if you turn west will take you into downtown Jacksonville.  Sweet Escape continued south.  The waterway south of Jacksonville is lined with beautiful and expensive homes that are fun to see as you pass by.

We made it through all of the reported shoal areas and under all the bridges except the last one just north of the Bridge of Lions in downtown St. Augustine.  As we approached this last fixed bridge we could see another boat ahead of us make an approach to the bridge and then abort, turning away.  We called this vessel on the VHF and he reported that the tide boards were reading under 63 feet clearance.  Not enough for us so we pulled to the side of the river and dropped the hook to wait.  It was about 3:00 PM.  We waited until about 3:45 when another boat reported that the tide boards were now reading 65 feet.  Up more than two feet in just 45 minutes?  I don’t think so.  Seems that the first guy didn’t know how to read the tide boards.  We cleared easily allowing us to make the Bridge of Lions 4:00 PM opening.

Once through the Bridge of Lions we called the St. Augustine Municipal Marina on the VHF for a mooring assignment.  The marina runs the large mooring field here.  They gave us mooring ball 20 which we found easily and picked up with no trouble.  As this is written, Sweet Escape is swinging on her mooring in downtown St. Augustine.  There is a moderate wind - still from the north and it is in the mid 60’s under a sunny sky.

Progress is a beautiful thing.

Check our albums page for additional photos from this time period.   

Church Creek to Savannah, GA

Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com

Church Creek like most anchorages along this part of the ICW is essentially a navigable channel that runs through a large marsh.  There is little wind protection from any direction and there is almost always a significant current that will reverse at least once while you’re there and maybe more than that depending on how long you stay.  A challenging anchoring scenario in any case.  We anchored there on Sunday night following our departure from Charleston.  Overnight we had winds in the 30 knot range but once again our trusty Manson Supreme anchor held us fast.

On Monday morning we got an early start and headed south bound for Beaufort.  Along the way we ran into some really shallow water.  At one land cut we saw depths as low as 4.5 feet and we actually had to drag Sweet Escape’s winged keel through half a foot of mud to get through the channel.  Along the way we passed by another sailboat that had wandered out of the channel and run aground.  We called this boat on the VHF as we passed to insure that the crew was okay.  They were fine, just waiting for the tide to come back up and re-float the boat.  The penalty for not paying attention to your chart.  See the photo at right.

We made it though and pulled into Beaufort Monday afternoon.  We anchored just off the downtown area.  It was a beautiful day with bright sunshine and temperatures in the mid 70’s - but that would soon change.

Warning - Read further at your own risk because there WILL be whining.

The weather report called for another cold front to pass through about midday on Tuesday and in addition to the cold temperatures it would also bring clouds and rain.  Add to that the fact that there would be a new moon that would cause extreme tides and the next several days were sure to be a challenge.  More on the tides later.

We decided to stay in Beaufort on Tuesday and woke up to the same gorgeous weather.  We put the dinghy in the water and went into the town dinghy dock.  From there we went to Blackstone’s Cafe for breakfast and and then walked the ten or so blocks along streets lined by oak trees covered with spanish moss to the Piggly Wiggly where we did some minor reprovisioning.  At one point along the way Brian pulled some moss off a tree and gave it to Judy.  A lady who was planting flowers in her front yard saw this and laughed.  “We’re not from around here”, we explained. “Thats what I figured, we don’t usually carry moss around”, she said.  

At the Piggly Wiggly checkout as we were putting our groceries into backpacks and our little pull cart that we use for such trips, the store manager approached us and asked if we were cruisers.  We answered that we were and he then offered to drive us back to the dinghy dock and we gratefully accepted.  So it was that Donald, the store manager drove us back to the dock and even took the long way, giving us a mini tour of this charming southern town filled with so many friendly people.

At about 3:00 PM the cold front came through and the temperatures dropped 30 degrees, the clouds rolled in, the winds kicked up and it started to rain.  We just finished getting the dinghy back up on the davits when this happened.

The next morning we had planned to travel about 60 miles which would put us well south of Savannah Georgia.  One look at the weather and the tides and we knew we would not be going very far.  It was raining and it was cold and as uncomfortable as that is that was not the biggest problem.  That day and every day since we have had extreme tide events where the high tides run up to three feet higher than normal.  This has been causing local flooding here and it poses a problem for us with respect to our clearance under fixed bridges.  This means that we have to time our fixed bridges with the tides and this has been severely impeding our southern progress the past few days.

We left the anchorage at Beaufort on Wednesday afternoon just before low tide so that we could clear the Beaufort fixed bridge just to the south.  Had we attempted any earlier in the day and we would not have been able to pass under the bridge.  Because daylight savings time is no longer with us we lose an hour of travel time as well so, we were able to go a total of nine miles on Wednesday instead of the 60 we had originally planned.  We anchored in Colwin Creek just east of Paris Island, the Marine Corps recruit training facility and endured yet another cold, windy, stormy and mostly sleepless night on the hook.

On Thursday we woke to another raw, wet and cloudy day.  We could not leave until noon in order to clear two fixed bridges.  On Thursday we were able to travel 25 miles.  We anchored overnight in the Cooper River just north of Savannah and spent a comparatively peaceful, albeit cold night.

This morning, Friday - we woke up and actually saw the sun, for five minutes before the clouds once again moved in.  Today we had three fixed bridges to clear and timed our departure so that we would arrive at the first one at mid tide.  That meant that we could not leave the anchorage until 11 AM, a little better than the past couple days.  Today’s run was also a little more tolerable than the past couple too because the strong north wind was at our backs most of the day.  It is counterintuitive to think that the north wind would be in your face while you are traveling south but the fact is that the ICW is like a snake and you are often traveling in directions other than south.  We were able to put on 30 miles today and are anchored at Possum Point just north of the Vernon River about 20 miles south of Savannah.

A word about the weather.  We have been generally disappointed in the weather we have had on our cruise so far.  It has been cold much more than it has been warm.  Unseasonably so ever since we left the Erie Canal in October.   Today, we were speaking to a man at a marina where we stopped briefly for fuel.  He told us that this weather - highs in the low 50’s and lows in the low 40’s is typical for late December and January.  Indeed we have had some nice days but they have been few and far between.  We feel that if we can get further south the weather should improve but in practice it just hasn’t been the case.  We don’t expect any sympathy from readers, but it is discouraging to get up day after day, dress up like we’re going skiing and sit in a frigid, closed up boat every night.

The desire to get south as quickly as possible has us considering skipping the Cruisers Thanksgiving celebration in St. Mary’s Georgia.  St. Mary’s is located on the St. Mary’s River just north of the Georgia - Florida state line and about five miles off the ICW.   Each year hundreds of cruisers assemble there at the Riverview Hotel for a large thanksgiving day potluck where the hotel provides the turkey and ham and the cruisers bring everything else.  Right now our desire for warmer weather outweighs our need to attend thanksgiving dinner.  We’ll see how it goes.

See our albums page for addition photos from this time period.

Charleston, SC

Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com

We arrived in Charleston on Thursday.    

Readers will remember that we ordered a life raft while in Annapolis and were unable to catch up with it in Yorktown, VA as originally planned.  Consequently we had the package sent to the Charleston City Docks - not the marina where we ended up staying.  When we called attempting to make a reservation, we were told they were full.  Thats why we ended up at the Charleston Harbor Resort four miles away from our elusive life raft.

As it turned out we were fortunate.  This is a very nice marina with a great staff and lots of amenities.  We took advantage of one such amenity shortly after getting Sweet Escape secured Thursday afternoon when we boarded the complimentary shuttle to downtown Charleston.  The shuttle drops off and picks up in front of the Ben and Jerry’s on Market Street every two hours.  We were dropped off at 4:15.   We had dinner and Judy did some shopping along King Street, the famous shopping district in Charleston.  It didn’t take Brian long to realize that the sooner we get out of Charleston the better at least as far as our wallets were concerned.

We decided to catch the 8:15 shuttle back to the marina and arrived at Ben and Jerry’s at about 7:40 which meant we would have to wait.  In the area of the Ben and Jerry’s are located several candy stores, one especially noteworthy for it’s delicious buttery tasting pecan pralines and it’s slightly nasally woman who shouts “free samples” every time someone walks down the sidewalk past the store.  It is almost comical and Brian had to resist the urge to walk back and forth in front of the store to see how many times it would take before she stopped calling out “free samples”.  We must confess to having tried a “free sample” and then purchased the goods to enjoy later back on the boat.

Our impression of Charleston is very positive.  It is an historic and very pretty city and would be a great place to spend a vacation.

On Friday we again took advantage of the shuttle and went to the Harris Teeter grocery store where we did some serious reprovisioning of the boat.  Friday was noteworthy for another reason.  The USS Yorktown, a post WWII era aircraft carrier is docked as a floating museum next to our marina.  Upon our approach to Charleston we had noticed that there were bleachers on the deck of the carrier and could not understand why.  As it turned out, the Yorktown was to be he site of 2012 Carrier Classic basketball game between Marquette and Ohio State.  The game was scheduled for 7:00 PM local time on Friday.  We ran into a lot of Milwaukee and Wisconsin people who had flown down for the game.  The Goodyear Blimp showed up and was circling the marina but...the game was not played.  Because it has been colder than normal here, no one apparently thought about the possibility that the playing surface, being outdoors at night,  would collect condensation making it slippery and thus dangerous for the players.  That is exactly what happened and the game had to be cancelled.  Wow - I imagine someone is sweating their job over this one.

On Saturday we put our dinghy in the water and drove the four miles to the Charleston City Dock where we finally collected our packages, including the life raft.  We also hired a diver to check for any damage to Sweet Escape’s hull resulting from our unfortunate encounter with several submerged logs on the Dismal Swamp Canal.  Luckily the diver found no damage other than some missing bottom paint.

Saturday afternoon we broke out our folding bikes and put on 12 miles.  The bikes did fine - we on the other hand are a work in progress.  We rode to West Marine and then to Walmart before returning to the boat.

This morning (Sunday) we fueled up and pumped out and left Charleston for parts south.  We only ran 25 miles today and are anchored in Church Creek with four other boats as this is written.  Tomorrow we will head to Beaufort, SC (pronounced bew-fort and not to be confused with Beaufort, NC, pronounced bo-fort) about 50 miles south.  It is supposed to turn cold again later in the week and we would like to be as far south as possible when that happens.