12/06/2009, Melbourne Florida
Lara has been determined to get a photo of a Dolphin's face... This is close!
The holidays on the ICW. Well, having spent many Christmases in Vermont, it is kind of odd to think about Christmas without snow and cold. As we went though a couple bridges today, the bridge tenders were wishing people Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays... It felt wierd! I had lots of time to think about it (we were in the ICW for 10 hours today) and realized that Christmas (and the other holidays celebrated this time of year originated in warm climates. So, maybe it is very appropriate for us to be headed into warm waters for this season. After a couple weeks in the Bahamas with the "big kids", we will all return to VT for Christmas amongst family and friends us there.
Relationships we make with friends out here are fitted to the lifestyle. We meet on the radio, sometimes joke, laugh, share excitement or upset over the radio. Occasionally we meet face to face and chat and often we remember people by their boat or boat name. Last night we were anchored with Belinda B, First Light and a few others. We chatted on and off with Belinda B and heard First light talking with bridges behind us. We got off to an early start motor sailing the length of the Indian River with two other boats Delphious and Medori. They stopped in Titusville and Belinda B arrived here after we were anchored. When we were in Fernadina Beach, we ran into a Canadian couple who had two kids with them, one much younger than Isobel. We first met them in Oriental NC.
Feature length Isobel movie:
|
Comments [0]
12/05/2009, Rockhill Creek
Now this feels like we are in Florida. We are in a peaceful little creek just a hundred yards off the intercoastal Waterway near the Ponce River inlet. We arrived about 3 pm as the clouds cleared and the sun shone for the first time in days. Today started with the rain pouring down and a temperature of 52 degrees and ended with sun and 70 degrees. We quickly put the dingy in the water for an expedition... first we stopped by "First Light" to thank them for leading us to this pretty anchorage. We chatted for a while and learned that they had been on their boat for 23 years. Mostly cruising, stopping occasionally to work, spending the winter months a marina in Marathon Florida.
Next we motored (thanks to Joe and Ed) out through the creek toward the inlet, gazing at the many birds (where is my bird book). The light was that perfect evening light, horizontal and yellow increasing the vibrancy of the green saw grasses, blue sky, red light house and yellow of the Egret legs. A flock of Spotted Sandpipers (I think) fly up startled flashing their wings in the the light, circle around and land again on the beige beach. The beach calls for us to walk on it, leave our foot prints in the clean unbroken curves. Isobel squawks, Lara sings "You are my sunshine" and withing seconds she is asleep, cradled by her PFD. We putted back to the boat to watch the sunset give use a hundred colors I can't name.
Now, as the smells of dinner rise up from the galley, I listen to the Coast Guard as they route boats around the Cape Canaveral as the US Air Force prepares for the launch of one of their communication satellites. Isobel is playing her "singing bowl" using a wooden spoon.
|
12/04/2009, St Augustine, FL
Isobel the climber, reached around the edge of the settee, palmed a hunk of bread and proceeded to take bites out of it... (note wool shirt and sweaters on both of us!)
A long day at the wheel. Still in the intercoastal Waterway. It would have been a good day to go outside although there were no safe outlets to the sea. We rode the current and checked out birds through the Marine Estuary Research Reserve.
As I sat at the wheel, My thoughts went like this: review my "punch list" in my head... Netting will have to be put up soon, as Isobel can now climb anything.. The other day we found her on the first step of the companionway stairs! I will have to find some nice place to do a bunch of engine maintenance... will have to find a nice place for the girls to hang out. Brrr... it is still in the 50s even though we are in Florida. I have heard that it is in the 80s in Fort Lauderdale... White Pelicans, Storks, Ibis?... I can't believe I forgot my bird book... Oh look, this foul weather gear works to keep the wind out of my neck... Wow, we are doing 9.3 knots over the ground... 2 knots of current... where is the channel?... it is getting shallow... does that chart say the channel is over here or over there? Where will we anchor tonight?... 250 miles to Fort Lauderdale.... I am ready for warmth... I want to shut the engine down and sail... I wonder how Bink is... I wonder how Randy did this by himself... Yahoo, hot soup for lunch!... too bad it is too cold for Isobel in the cockpit... starting to rain... can I get the rain flaps up and stay in the channel?... I wonder if the water that went in the outboard gas tank will do major damage... make a note to find out...
|
12/03/2009, Cumberland Island, GA
Isobel waves to all those back home.
We had our first real excursion. We took a half day to dingy ashore at the Plum Orchard Landing on Cumberland Island. This is the site of a huge mansion that was given to the US by the heirs to the Carnegie family.
Apparently there is a ferry that arrives there every other Sunday... so we were alone to put our entrance fee in the metal box by the Info board and to wander around. There were signs of the feral horses although we didn't see any... We did run into a couple who was staying at an Inn on the Island... they took our photo and pointed out a Stork roosting tree... Pretty neat. We tried to imagine one of those birds carrying Isobel to Keene back in February...
|
12/02/2009, Cumberland Island, GA
A beautiful morning at the Duplin River GA.
Today was another typical day in the ditch. got off early so we could take advantage of the high tide for the notorious Mud River shoals (shallow spots). We cleared them easily and made it to within a quarter mile of our anchor spot before the tide was out enough to cause us problems. We bumped a couple times in the main channel, which was kind of sketchy anyway, then we turned into Brickhill Creek to find ourselves stuck fast in 5'9" of water (we draw 6'4"!). Well, it was a beautiful spot and we threw out the anchor and waited for the tide to come in. Within 30 minutes we were floating again and cruised the last 1/4 mile up the creek to anchor near the Plum Orchard Dock on Cumberland Island. The Island has lots of history (look it up) and is now a National Park with a ferry arriving every other Sunday! Lots of big Oaks with Spanish Moss hanging.
We are about to have a huge thunder storm, so I had better post this and get below! (Big storm fizzled out!)
|
11/22/2009, isle of hope, ga
Pete has been off the boat for only 24 hours and we miss him. He has been a wonderful guy to have around. A philosopher willing to throw his body between the boat and the dock. A guy that generates peace who is happy at the wheel or up the mast. His music was inspiring. He always said good things about people avoiding the human desire to criticize. Generous and kind to all three of us, he was always able to make Isobel smile even when she was unhappy about something. We are looking forward to seeing his boat "Sea Pod" broad reaching on the horizon. Really, it is beyond language to express how much we enjoyed getting to know him. Pete, call us if you need crew.
|
11/21/2009, isle of hope, ga
We have seen lots of dolphins out in the ocean at night and in rivers and harbors. Can you imagine how hard it is to get a shot of them. Here is a photo of Sea Hawk pushing a load of fuel up the Savannah river. there were many dolphins playing in their bow waves. We chatted on the radio and they say that the dolphins are there alot and they often walk to the bow to hang over and watch them!
We took a short run to Isle of Hope GA to get back on anchor and to see the historic district, be near a store and still have access to the Savannah train station. More later...
|
11/20/2009, Thunderbolt, GA
Today we saw a little of everything... first down the ICW (see video) with Bink to the Wynah inlet... then out into the open ocean, sailing through the night past Charleston, SC and on to Savannah, GA. We were in dense fog from about midnight to 9 am.
Entering the Savannah channel at 2 PM (photo) we thought we were home free. I guess we didn't look at the chart closely or look at the current tables (at all!)... it was 12 miles up the inlet against a 3 knot current, and then the 5 miles up the Wilmington River, which is very casually marked... arriving in the dark in Thunderbolt after running aground twice! The first time we just bumped over a shoal in the middle of the channel just off the Savannah river. The second time Bill drove the boat off the channel in the dark trying to navigate by chart plotter. We already know that it takes a few seconds to refresh the screen... and those were a critical few seconds as we were going around a sharp bend in the channel. There we sat, stuck fast like a car in a snow bank. high centered (you can feel that). We laughed a bit about our blind faith in the plotter (we know better) and moaned a bit about the sparsely marked channel. We did know the tide was rising... so Lara served up spaghetti and Helen's turkey meatballs. After maybe 20 minutes we felt the the boat move a little, then it rotated, and then it was free... (we are learning or relearning everyday!) Here is a little video from the beginning of the day...
|
11/19/2009, Calabash river
We are all glad that we brought our warm clothes! It did get nice at the end of the day...
We have decided to go "down the ditch" (ICW) with my friend Bink on Eventyr since he is traveling solo from NC to Florida.
Everything is kind of peaceful and tense in the ICW... well, I guess you have to be there... You have hours of driving the boat down a long straight waterway, most of the time the channel is about 100' wide... sometimes there is a bank on both sides and you can't see out, sometimes there are houses and docks and boats tied up along the side. Occasionally another boat will pass or we would come up on another boat going more slowly than us. Think of an Interstate highway with everyone driving 5 to 7 mph! You can't quite dose off and yet there is not much action...
So, Pete is at the wheel and I need something to do, so I call up Simrad to troubleshoot the Autopilot which hasn't worked since we had rudder work done on the boat in May of 2008. I am chatting with the Simrad guy about the issues and I am punching buttons... Suddenly Pete calls out."Bill, Bill, the steering is jammed!" I leap to the wheel and sure enough together we can't budge the wheel and the boat is making a hard turn to starboard (right) aiming at some particularly unforgiving pilings not far out of the channel. The entire route of the steering cable goes through my head with all the possible points of failure, then the possible places in the rudder hinge for possible jams (all this in a second as the boat careens at full speed into the pilings.) I throw the throttle in full reverse. The BetaMarine engine and Gori prop bring us to a standstill, perfectly parked between two 10" pilings. We are all panting and wild-eyed. I look at the phone in my hand and then at the Simrad autopilot which is still on... and steering us hard to starboard!
With the Autopilot OFF and the steering returned we ease out of the pilings and head back toward the center of the channel with Bink looking at us and shaking his head. Pete says, "Learned something the easy way."
|
11/17/2009, Wrightsville Beach
Today, a walk on the beach and an early Mexican dinner at the surfer's hang out. But that misses a bunch of the story...
I think we last posted when it was raining in Morehead City. And I think you all knew that we would be sick of the rain and wanting to move. So on Saturday evening we moved our boat out of the slip in Morehead City and travel the few miles to anchor in taylor Creek in Beaufort, NC again (so Pete and I could use our beer tokens at the Dockside Restaurant). We were up early and, despite having the anchor fouled on some random line in the harbor, we sailed from Beaufort at 0800.
Once we were 15 miles south west of Beaufort the sun came out and the sea was calm. The wind blew at about 15 so we could set a broad reach. When we started, our destination was Wrightville Beach, NC. Then the wind died and as we looked at our arrival time, we decided to push on to Charleston... As the sun set, we chatted with some other boats who were headed to Marsh Harbor in the Bahamas! "Three days" they said... "hmmm" we said. We contacted our weather folks, checked our fuel and water and took a 90 degree turn to the East to head across the Gulf Stream. the night was spectacular and the wind blowing 5 to 10 out of the north promising a lump but OK passage and we were all entranced by the warm waters of the Bahamas....
At about 11 pm with everyone asleep but Bill, the engine sputtered again. Pete was rousted and we again found a clogged filter... With some mucking around we fired her up again and we off with Pete back in his berth... again the engine sputtered and again Pete came up on deck in his skivies. After a short discussion we opted for the closest port: Wrightville Beach, NC. We plotted a course that would have us at the outside bouy around sunrise. Under full sail we cruised back to the US, arriving in time to have Pancakes with Maine Blueberries abord Starbound. So, here we are... being here now.
|
