A day of bridges
24 February 2012 | Ft. Lauderdale, FL
Randy - Hi of 86, winds S 10-20
Today's picture: I talk a lot about the affluence in this neck of the woods, and this illustrates my point. Million dollar homes with multi-million dollar yachts parked out the back door. Sort of reminds me of northern Minnesota and Wisconsin lake camps with 16' aluminum fishing boats at the dock, only on a different scale.
There are 20 draw bridges between Ft. Lauderdale and Lake Worth and it is impossible to always hit the opening times in stride. If you are two minutes late, you wait for the next opening, which is usually 30 minutes. That happened some, but for the most part, timing worked out alright. As it was, it took 8 hours to travel the 40 nm distance. There is a 25 mile stretch referred to as "The Canyon", aptly named because it is very developed, narrow with concrete wals on both sides, and boat wakes reverberate back and forth off the walls. Every once in a while a large sport fish boat would come along and not slow down and leave a 4' wake that would cause boats to rock back and forth a good 30 - 40 degrees. When that happens, the radio lights up with people openly cussing the bastards. I don't think they care and they never respond, nor do they change their ways. I am pretty sure they are trying to meet schedules as charter boats and they just scream on by.
Another small world story: My long time friend Clark Hurrel, a fellow Yanktonite from SD, is in Ft. Lauderdale on business. We arranged to get together last night for dinner. His colleague Dan (forgot his last name) was there as well and we had a great time eating outdoors next to the ocean. They bought me dinner, and I appreciated that very much. Clark and I had fun catching up on everything from careers to family, and reminisced about some very funny old times. There is one particular story I love to tell about Clark falling IN to the boat when we were going fishing on the Missouri River one cold icy morning. It makes me laugh hysterically every time I tell it, and I did again last night. Clark always sits mildly amused and allows me my fun. Dan probably thinks I'm a nut. I really enjoyed reconnecting with old Clark. I do miss that.
Nikki flies in tonight! WOOHOO!! She lands at 2100 so it will be late when we get her on the boat. I am bringing the boat to the Las Olas Marina which will make the late night arrival easier and also facilitate some reprovisioning tomorrow. My idea of food supplies and Nikki's are somewhat different. Let's just say I can live on peanuts and Nikki is a gourmet cook. Enough said ...
The weather gods have not cooperated so it looks like we will not be crossing the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas. Instead, we plan to sail to the Keys, possibly as far as the Dry Tortugas, which is 60 nm west of Key West. All of this is weather dependent and we'll see how it goes.