Dinghy 911

Fort Pierce, 27 28 N 080 19 W

This afternoon Libby and I were hauling the dinghy out of the water. Suddenly the wind blew my Little Ceaser's Pizza hat off my head, across the whole boat and into the water. I quickly called for the dinghy to be re-launched, and I jumped in and chased the hat across the harbor. The only thing I lacked was a red flashing light and a siren. Fortunately, this hat floated so I was eventually able to retrieve it about 100 meters away from Tarwathie. I've lost lots of hats overboard over the years, this is the first time I've been able to rescue one before it sank. Consumers Union should rate hats according to buoyancy. This past year hasn't been bad though. I can remember loosing 3 hats in the past year.

At Sacandaga Lake I used to plan on loosing one hat per day, so I bought them by the dozen at the dollar store.

Well I promised Libby that we could spend a night in a marina where she could do laundry and take a shower. We tried at the Fort Pierce City marina but they said no. They can't take any boat with a draft more than 5 feet. The only marina here that could take us is Harbortown. Unfortunately they cater to mega yachts. Their slips are 60 feet long and unaffordable. Oh well, we'll find a marina some other place.

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Jensen Beach

Jensen Beach, 27 15 N 080 13 W

We traveled the grand distance of 12 miles today. It was not a very ambitious day. The reason is that the weather forecasts say that we can't go outside in the Gulf Stream again until Saturday. So we had Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to kill. Also, travel Northward in the ICW is difficult because of fierce head winds.

We decided to spend at least some of the time being tourists and sampling the delights of the tropical paradise cities along the way. This afternoon we toured Jensen Beach. We're sorry to report that it only deserves a D as a tropical paradise. We saw lots of shops and businesses, but very few were charming. In fact I bet 100 of them were fingernail polish emporiums. Oh well, too bad.

Thursday and Friday we plan to visit beautiful downtown Fort Pierce. We'll see how that shapes up.

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Florida's Best Beach

Peck Lake Florida, 27 07 N 080 09 W

Well we just returned from an afternoon at the nicest beach we ever saw in Florida. Here's the story.

When we got up this morning the weather was awful. The wind howled and it blew from the North. We almost decided to sit in Lake Worth one more day, but I was antsy. I thought that if we motored up the ICW that we would find some shelter from the North wind.

I was right, and the day turned out to be nice. In fact, the wind turned to Easterly and we were able to sail and motor.

This is the one portion of the Florida East Coast ICW that we haven't seen before. It was very nice. I never saw so many boats before. Jupiter Island, which forms the ICW east shore from Palm Beach up to Jupiter Inlet seems to be one long dock, as if it were a giant marina. The homes along the shore are also especially pretty with nice green lawns and beautiful palm trees. Of course the were all million dollar and multimillion dollar homes but they looked much nicer than we've seen in other high rent districts.

Just north of Hobe Sound is Peck Lake where we're anchored. Coming in we cleaned a few barnacles off the bottom of the keel, if you know what I mean.

What a neat place. We're anchored about 150 feet from shore. The shore is actually a barrier dune only 100 feet wide. On the other side of the dune is a lovely unspoiled beach. If I strain, I can hear the surf breaking from where we're anchored. Considering how inhospitable breaking surf is to sailboats, it's remarkable that we can anchor safely so close.

We took the dinghy to shore and walked over to the beach. The beach extended as far as the eye can see north and south, and we only saw a dozen or so other people on the whole stretch.

We found lots of the baggie creatures that I've been writing about washed up on the beach. I have some pictures and I'll post them next time we have WI FI.

We walked the beach and waded out to our waists. The water was delightfully warm. We didn't swim however because the surf was rough and there may have been strong rip currents.

The weather out to sea looked fine to me for sailing. Darn that weather report.

There is a condo compound on the other shore of the ICW and they have a pontoon boat that the run as a ferry to take condo residents to the beach. We saw the ferry cross three times in 30 minutes. That must be a very expensive perq for the residents.

The weather forecast is frustrating. North winds most days, with short 18 or 24 hours of east or south winds in between. We need a bigger window to go for Cape Canaveral so we'll have to wait a few more days. We'll take the leisurely tour instead. Peck Lake today, Jensen Beach Wednesday, Fort Pierce Thursday. Then wait a little. There may be a weather window open on Saturday to allow us to go back outside in the Gulf Stream Saturday.

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Click here for an aerial view of Tarwathie's anchorage and the nearby beach.

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Staying Put

Palm Beach, 26 46 N 80 03 W

Well, for today at least, we stayed put here in Lake Worth. It is a gray, rainy and blustery day so it would not have been much fun to travel anyhow. If it looks better tomorrow, we'll motor on the ICW up toward Fort Pierce.

The weather here reminds me of how much nicer it was in the keys. There were very few thunderstorms in the keys. Indeed, there were very few clouds. The nice weather may have something to do with having to pay 5 cents per gallon for water in the keys. Some marinas charge 10 cents or even 20 cents per gallon.

We're anchored so close to the mansions of the rich and famous I thought that some of them might have come out to invite us for tea or cookies. Sadly no. Nobody from the Kennedy compound, nor Rush Limbaugh, nor the Whitneys, nor the Mellons, nor Warren Buffet came out of their houses to welcome us. Humph. Perhaps we should row ashore, knock on their doors and invite them out to Tarwathie for supper. Perhaps not.

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Wild Ride

Palm Beach, 26 46 N 80 03 W

The gold standard for small cruising boats our size is to travel 200 nautical miles in a single day. We didn't quite reach that but we did do 203 nautical miles in 28 hours. Thank you Gulf Stream. This progress was despite light winds most of the time. Last night and this morning winds were only 8 to 11 knots, yet our ground speed was 8 knots or more the whole time. At one point I noted 8.0 knots apparent wind but 8.2 knots ground speed. It makes me wonder how much further we could have gotten if we had 20 knots or more of wind behind us.

We saw flying fish and the baggie creatures, just like in the Gulf of Mexico. I guess that makes sense. They may be born to take a lifelong one way trip on the Gulf Stream.

There was lots of ship traffic as we passed Miami and Fort Lauderdale. The majority of the vessels appeared to be casino boats. Casino boats wander aimlessly offshore at night all lit up like a Christmas tree. In any event, it made us keep a sharp eye out. This time fortunately there were no near collisions and no emergency maneuvers necessary. I plotted a course dead center on the axis of the Gulf Stream and stuck to it. We never needed to go more than 28 miles offshore.

Alas, the reversal of wind direction in the weather forecast moved forward. At first it was supposed to arrive Tuesday, then it was Monday night. Now is it late Sunday and the forecast sounds nasty. It will be a strong cold front passing, the same one that caused tornadoes and deaths in Tennessee in recent days. The Gulf Stream is no place to be in those conditions. We were forced to abandon our hope of an uninterrupted trip northward. At first I thought that we could reach Fort Pierce before the front arrived. It's only 50 miles more. But that would cut it too close so around noon we put in at the nearest harbor, which is Lake Worth. Palm Beach and West Palm Beach surround us. No sooner had we set the anchors and secured the gear when thundershowers began. It was just as well that we didn't push for Fort Pierce.

This is a very nice anchorage with lots of room. Coincidentally, we are anchored just a few hundred feet from the spot we anchored the evening of our maiden voyage on Tarwathie more than a year ago.

After an afternoon map, I checked our phone and found a voice mail from June and Chris on Albion. They are up in Saint Augustine and they wanted to warn us about the cold front. Thanks June for worrying about us.

Unfortunately, the north winds are now forecast to continue Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. The first chance of a respite is Thursday. This is exactly the situation where my antsy impatience plagues me. Inaction and indecision drive me nuts. Will we sit here and wait? Will we motor against the winds on the Intra Coastal Waterway (ICW)? Will we foolishly try to put to sea again before the weather changes? Stay tuned to find out.

There is a boat anchored near us that seems to have suffered a major collision. There are patches on both port and starboard side that appear to cover up holes. The bow pulpit, bowsprit and lifelines are piled in a junk heap on the forward deck. The hull shows rust stains that make it look like the boat sat here for a long time without moving. It may have been victim to one of the hurricanes. My presumption is that the owner is a live-aboard cruiser like us and that he doesn't have the resources to repair the damage. It is a sad and sobering sight for any cruiser to see.

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