Before departure Tuesday morning I make one more run to the dock to get rid of trash and refill another 5 gallons of water. SEA JULES stops to fuel up and then we get to wait a bit more for the bridge as the railroad bridge closes and a freight train comes through about 0830. Then it is off to the races moving south to West Palm Beach.

I work most of the day so Lana gets to drive us through Hobe Sound and past Jupiter Inlet and Lighthouse. There are several bridges that we get to wait on for various amounts of time. Next we go past the Lake Worth inlet and down Lake Worth. Not sure why it is called a lake as it is more like a narrow bay or and then even more like a river with a reversing current. It is very similar to the “rivers” in the Chesapeake Bay which are more like small bays or branches. Our house in Shady Side was near the West River, we enjoyed time on the Rhode River, and our last marina was on the South River. In each case these were not really rivers in the normal sense. I guess when you get to name something the first time you can be creative.

Throughout Lake Worth there are many large superyachts and sport fishers along with many derelicts and wrecks. They may be trying to clean up sections of it as we saw two large barges moored with several derelict wrecks of sailboats and power boats hauled up and lashed down on the deck. Quite a few smashed dreams or the end of the line for those down and out or on the other hand just losing out to the bad luck of the weather draw.

We make the final series of bridges and make it to West Palm Beach where the city anchorage is quite full. We make a pass through the anchorage and decide to cross the ICW to the Palm Beach side and anchor in the open. The shoreline is closed as this is the ritzy side of town. It takes us a bit to find the right area to anchor as we come across the cable crossing marks on the chart. After discussions with SEA JULES we swap locations and end up anchoring at the same places we were before the discussions. The rest of the night is comfortable if not hot and humid but it is Florida right?

In the morning we move to the West Palm Beach city anchorage as several boats left and spaces open up. We end up at the end of one of the public piers in 13 feet of water where the chart shows 5 feet. Guess they dredged it at some time, or maybe the current has cleaned it out. Regardless we get the anchor set. Lana and Mike and Julie head into town to sightsee on the free trolley and find the restaurants and stores while I work from the boat. Late afternoon I meet them in town for a late lunch and brief walk to see some of the sights before heading back to the boat of a game of marbles. All is good in marble land as the guys win 3-1.

One of the buildings near downtown is a local art house and has a mural of musicians painted on the wall. It is quite good but I only recognize three of the five initially. Mike is correct on the fourth while I had the wrong impression. The photo is attached so you can see how many you can recognize. I will post the names in a future post. Good luck with the identification.

The next day I work from the boat and Lana goes to the grocery store by the free trolley. WHITE BIRD arrives just after lunch as they had left Stuart late the day before and anchored in Hobe Sound as they would not make the distance in one day. Happy hour is on SEA JULES and then we head in to town for the free concert by a four piece band doing covers of rock songs. They play good, but not great, as their selection is quite eclectic from Bob Marley, U2, Peter Gabriel, INXS, The Cure, The Doors and many others. During the concert it is announced the free movie at the same venue for the next night, Friday, is cancelled due to forecasted inclement weather which should arrive Friday night Saturday morning.

Friday is our anniversary (29 years) so I spend the morning working and then escape for anniversary lunch. We end up at Rocco’s Tacos which is quite noisy inside. It is then that I realize I will be unable to finish lunch prior to my standing 2P Friday afternoon conference call. So let’s set the stage for a big faux paus. The Friday afternoon conference is with representatives from all the Phoenix offices and several people that work remote, typically there are about 20 people from eight locations on the call with the president and two vice presidents usually on just monitoring. It is round robin and each person gives a rundown of their group tasking for the week and any coordination of personnel for the next week. Several people usually call in from diving jobs on the pier with generators and compressors in the background. Now recall I was in a noisy restaurant/bar and of course the background is loud so everybody asks where I was. My response, wait for it, “I am in a bar”. Only after I get on mute and walk out to the street do I realize what I said for all the attendees to hear, including the president. When it is my turn I get through my topics and then state I am going back to my anniversary celebration. So far, no fallout from that one.

Mike and Julie take the free blue trolley to the outlet malls for Christmas shopping and Peter and Kathy go bike riding over to Palm Beach where all the fancy people live and shop. That night is happy hour on SEA JULES and then back to the boats to wait on the expected wind. The wind picks up and veers Saturday morning and rains quite a bit then dissipates to overcast for the afternoon. We spend the rest of the day arranging for a mobile notary to sign some papers. I didn’t even know they were available until searching online. I had searched for UPS and Fed Ex stores as they usually have a notary on staff. This gentleman travels to your location and notarizes as necessary. Total bill for our documentation was $25 total. Not bad, as we had been considering renting a car to go to Ft. Lauderdale to meet with one of the ladies that Lana used to work with.

Later in the afternoon we had the typical boater travails of doing a simple task which becomes very drawn out. Mike and Julie decide to ship their packages to the kids and go in search of a post office with a self serve kiosk. We tag along to mail our notarized documents. Again we take the free trolley to the West Palm Beach post office which is a 35 minute ride to find out the post office is closed and this one does not have self service shipping in the lobby. Quick look on the internet and find another post office about three miles away so we decide to walk to it. Along the way we pass a couple of mail trucks loading mail from high rise condos and eventually begin to see the route we are on is correct. Once we arrive at the second post office we find it is only a distribution center with no services, much to Julie’s chagrin. Out come the phones and it is a race to get an Uber to arrive. Mike won this one as I had not set up my new phone for Uber. Six plus miles to the Fed Ex store and we get the mail shipped. Then an Uber back to the boats, total time 4 hours 37 minutes. People wander what you do with all your spare time.

Tomorrow is off to Ft Lauderdale probably stopping short as anchorages are few and far between and there are 19 more bridges. It is hard to estimate that timing. SEA JULES and OUR DIAMOND are to go inside and WHITEBIRD will delay departure and go outside to Ft. Lauderdale to meet some old friends.