Friday morning dawned cool and windy in the Brickhill River anchorage as we prepared to depart for Fernandina Beach. The run was only 11 miles or so, but we wanted to fuel and water in preparation for our offshore trip to Cape Carnaveral. As we wound our way out of the river the vhf radio traffic hinted at military movement again but, as we had discovered they are rather secretive about their intentions. As we approached the sub base a supply ship hailed us to ask our intentions. Once we explained our plan he said we were good up to go however, he asked us to stick to the extreme right side of the channel as two ships would be leaving the base. These 250’ ships looked like the ships for the offshore oil rigs in Newfoundland, superstructure in the bow and long low aft decks for equipment. By now the wind was blowing steady 20 kts. with gusts to 25, Fernadina lay 7 miles ahead and the Seaport anchorage at Cumberland was only 2 miles away. We were debating stopping there for awhile to let the wind drop before attempting to dock for fuel when a 25’ military RIB pulled up beside us to once again ask our intentions. Actually, he suggested we stop at Cumberland, considering he was powered by 3 250hp outboards with a 50 calibre machine gun on the bow we wisely took his suggestion. Then it all made sense, the two ships were guides for the sub that was leaving the base behind us; some people have made this trip for years without seeing a sub and now we’ve seen 2 within a week.

The cold north wind never relented all day and the temperature barely got into the low teens Celsius so we decided to stay put in Cumberland for the night. After all we had less the 5 miles to the marina and we could easily fuel in the morning on our way out.The planned run to Cape Canaveral was about 27 hours and we needed to time our entrance to coincide with a bridge opening. Fueling was a bit of a challenge at Fernandina because a small cruise ship was blocking the fuel dock, but all went well and we were steaming out of the channel by 10 a.m. The forecast called for wnw winds of 10 -15 kts. the offshore breeze kept the seas to a minimum as we set the sails in bright sunshine. Unfortunately, the winds were lighter than forecast so we ended up running the engine at low rpm in order to keep our speed up. Eventually as the winds increased the Westerbeke got a break and we welcomed the silence as we managed to sail over 30% of the way. And guess what, another sub! As we approached the inbound channel to Jacksonville a sub and destroyer crossed our bow, inbound for the port, that makes 3 and counting.

The rest of the trip was uneventful under the starlit sky, and as dawn approached we set our course around the large shoal off Cape Canaveral. We enjoyed a beautiful sail for the last 3 hours as we cruised along at a leisurely 5 kts., our ETA showed us arriving only 15 minutes prior to the bridge opening. We had never been in here before and I must admit the views are impressive, from the numerous launch towers at the space Center that line the coast to the 7 huge cruise ships that are docked. As we drifted up to the bridge we were tired but happy to have made the trip, and even happier to discover that there would be another rocket launch that night.

Today’s picture is of Dagny and 2Outrageous in the Brickhill River anchorage.