Down Florida
29 November 2011 | Vero Beach
Gorgeous Weather
So we pushed out of St Augustine with full tanks and full larders heading further south. Its just incredible how much nicer the weather is compared to last year. Great temps and gorgeous skys. Saw a few Manatee and lots of dolphins.
St Augustine to Daytonna is a good run, and we lucked in with a following current so made good time for most of it. Anchored in Daytonna just across from Halifax Harbor Marina and had a wonderful night. Great location with good protection, but a tricky shoal running N-S that can bite you. Need to enter from either the north or south and then creap into the anchorage. Interestingly some people ignore this anchorage because of the tidal range. The read the chartplotter and see a 3' tide. In reality Halifax River portion only has about 14", with the 3' tides refering to the Daytonna Beach station on the ocean vice the ICW.
Next day pushed off and had a short day running from Daytonna to Melbourne, about 30 miles. Dropped the hook in behind the Melbourne bridge just as a squall line pushed through. Most of it missed us and we had a very calm night. Next am early start and we were in Vero by noon. Topped up our tanks and grabbed a ball and were set for the week.
We rented a car and left Seahawk for a visit and to celebrate US Thanksgiving with our good friends Bob and Rusty, who have bought this gorgeous condo in Fort Myers. A great 5 days with time on the beach and checking out Naples and Fort Myers. Spent a great morning looking at the sand sculpture compitition, quite amazing. Spent the infamous Black Friday at a nature sanctuary where we came across 5 alligators. After seeing the news the next day I think we were safer than most Walmart shoppers! So after five days of too much food we drove back to Vero, sans Maggie, who is having an extended holiday with Bob and Rusty while we fly north next month.
Heading to Miami on Thursday, plan is for about 4 days. Hoping for a mooring ball with the sailing club there, which is much closer and more protected than the city mooring field, but will have to wait for a couple of days to confirm.
Should get some pics up tommorow, failing that next week lol.