Where are the Monarchs?

Daytona Beach, FL
29 09.28 N 080 58.55 W

Where are the monarch butterflies? In August I saw a news item in Vermont saying that sightings of monarch butterflies are non-existent or greatly diminished this year. That sensitized me to keep a watch.

In past years, as we migrated south down the east coast, we sighted monarchs almost every day. Even out at sea we saw monarchs. I remember in particular the sad case of a monarch I saw at sea. He or she was trying mightily to fly to Tarwathie. But he or she was loosing altitude by the second. Finally, the poor thing hit the water and drowned just one or two meters away from the safe haven of the boat.

This year, since being sensitized, I've spotted zero monarch butterflies. What is your experience? Have you seen them? Are there more media articles about their fate? I'd like to know.

p.s. Today is a really beautiful Florida day. Tonight we're going out to diner with high school classmates from Fayetteville-Manlius. I'll write about it tomorrow.

Fort Matanzas

Fort Matanzas, FL
29 43.01 N 081 14.45 W

Several times before, cruisers told us that Fort Matanzas was a great anchorage. I think it is a favorite of Done & Margaret & Tiller and of Pat & Walt. Always before, we passed it by because of fear of running aground at the entrance. This year, we arrived at the entrance at high tide, so we took the chance. It worked fine. We saw no depths less than 8 feet entering. Tomorrow morning at 0644 it will be high tide again and we'll exit.

So what's so nice here? In the first place, is the Fort. Fort Matanzas was built by the Spanish in 1740 to keep the British out. It was also the site of a massacre of 300 Frenchmen by the Spanish in 1565. Today it is part of the national park service. We took the dinghy over to the park office, and rode the park's ferry over to the fort. The fort is very small, very basic, but because of its superb strategic location is was invincible and could not be challenged. The fort needed only a compliment of six men. We learned a lot of history.

We also hiked on the park's nature trails. It is a wonderfully pristine area of unspoiled Florida nature. The inlet also abounds with fish. Alas we don't have Florida licenses and there are Florida Wildlife Commission men running around checking up on the fishermen. It is interesting that neither the Spanish nor the French were able to survive here without external provisions of food. One wonders why they couldn't simply fish for their supper.

Saint Augustine

Saint Augustine, FL

NoLL

We're making a quick one hour stop here in Saint Augustine. I want to shop at The Sailor's Exchange -- like a pawn shop for boat stuff.

Yesterday it was cloudy. We peered and peered in the direction of Cape Canaveral at the time of the rocket launch, but we couldn't see anything. Too bad.

I listened to The Cruisheimer's Net on SSB radio yesterday. It seems like the median cruiser is still in Elizabeth City North Carolina. I'll bet they'll have to deal with a lot of cold before getting here. We're glad to be ahead of the pack. One disadvantage though; the no-see-ums are alive and thriving. They drove us nuts last evening.

Place Memory

En Route, Pablo Creek, FL

30 20.88 N 081 36.22 W

You know what it feels like to drive the road between your work and your house. You have become completely familiar with the route. You know every twist and turn and you probably have some memory associated with each twist and turn. Well that is the way we have become with the US East Coast; both on the outside and on the inside (ICW). The exceptions are Long Island Sound where we have still never sailed, and the New Jersey ICW which is too shallow for us to attempt.

One major difference between driving and boating is speed. If you drive south down I95, then each mile passes in less than one minute. In a sailboat, the same mile would take 14 minutes. That gives us much more time to notice the setting, the scenery and the adjacent objects of interest. Therefore, I estimate that the acclimation ratio is 100:1. That is for each one pass via boat, one builds up the same mental acclimation as 100 passes via automobile. The route between your home and work you have probably traveled many thousands of times.

In the past week or two, I noticed that I have much stronger memories of some places than others. Seemingly innocuous places like the 300 yard stretch between green markers 184 and 186 I remember very clearly, and then a related but different memory of the 186-188 stretch. Strange. Delving into my own memories, I realize that I remember best those places we passed under sail or under adverse conditions. Sometimes the weather is against us and we really have to work hard to make the next mark without tacking. Sometimes, we are worried about approaching bad weather, or a change in the tide or approaching sunset. The more challenging the experience, the stronger the memory. When I think really hard about what I remember about 184-186 the answer is almost always how strong the wind was, from which direction it blew, and how hard we had to work to get where we're going. Alternatively, we may have passed 184 on another day with gentle breezes and blue sky when we were enchanted by the beauty. I conclude that we don't remember the places so much as the exciting life experiences. Passing by those places once again triggers recall of those memories.

I guess that is a large part of the reason why we love the cruising life so much and why so many blog readers wish that they too could cruise. The secret is that we really live life more intensely. We generate non-repetitive and memorable experiences almost every day. If we lived on land, how many days would pass where we did nothing more than watch TV, read a book and drive to the store?

To what do we owe our good fortune to be able to live such a life. Brushing modestly aside, I'll admit that it takes a little courage and a lot of determination. Equally important is good heath. If either of us had serious health problems we couldn't do it. We can thank our lucky stars for that.

I usually shy from offering advice, but this time I'll make and exception. If you enjoy good health, good for you. But you have no idea how long that will last. If you want to live the cruising live, do it ASAP, before some misfortune robs you of the opportunity.

Terror On The Lake

Fernandina Beach, FL
NoLL

Here's a blog post that's been sitting in my out box for some months.

Remember the day when we got hit with a boat full of kids and grandkids on Valcour Island, when the wind came up and blew like Dickens. We had a heck of a time sailing back against that wind with kids getting scared and sea sick. I wanted to give up and seek shelter until the wind died but we didn't. I wrote a blog post about it here. Well, after the fact, I learned of two real life dramas that were playing out on that same afternoon close to the same location where we were.

The first story you are getting third hand. I heard it second hand from a cruiser in Vergennes. That same afternoon, as we departed Sloop Cove on Valcour Island, another group of boats were anchored near by in Smugglers Cove. Smugglers Cove is very small but it is marvelously sheltered from wind and waves in almost all directions. But on that day the wind and waves came from that particular direction that funneled waves in to the north end of the cove. Well, as the story goes, there was a house boat anchored at that spot, and before long its anchor dragged and the boat was driven up on the beach where it would be pounded by the towering waves.

Since the beach was fine gravel, and since house boats have a relatively flat bottom, I think the skipper's best choice would be to do nothing and wait for the weather to change (it did change 5 hours later). But that's speculation. I was not on the scene. The house boat skipper, called for tow boat assistance. There is no Sea Tow or Tow Boat US franchise on Lake Champlain, but he did manage to contact someone willing to help. That someone appeared with an ordinary cabin cruiser, no towing frame or special equipment.

According to the story I heard, a crew man jumped off the tow boat and swam ashore with the towing line. (SWAM???) The tow line was attached to a bridle connected to ordinary cleats in the stern. In case you don't know, cleats are not nearly strong enough to use to anchor a tow line. What an amateur! Then, as they were towing, the house boat family, man, woman and children, waded in the surf and pushed on the house boat as the tow boat tugged. The witness telling me the story said that he feared that the people would be crushed under the heaving boat. Finally, the boat was freed from the beach. The family swam out the the boat. SWAM!!!??? Then the captain of the house boat swam to the tow boat to settle the bill. SWAM!!!??? All this was transpiring both boats drifted toward a rock cliff in the fierce winds. A witness said that he thought that both boats were about to end up on the rocks. Oh my God. The whole thing sounded like a recipe for death and injury caused by massively bad judgment.

A second story. Jenny told me that the newspapers reported that on that same afteroon a large sailboat was washed up on to the rocks near Valcour island and ground to bits between the waves and the rocks. The crew was rescued.

What is the point? Just that safety, seamanship, and good sense are sometimes needed just as much on an inland lake as in the open sea.