We are at Sunset Bay in Stuart Florida, hanging on the mooring ball, taking the dinghy to the dinghy dock and enjoying the courtesy bikes. We had a great cruisers potluck for Christmas that I baked my country fair bread for. Ed managed to wear his Christmas socks.
Some say Christmas is not the same without snow. It's fine by me.
We've been running from the cold for what seems like forever. We finally found some warm weather near Melbourne Fl. We anchored for a few days and took the dingy ashore. Great to just stroll on the beach. Tide was out, so the hard pack sand was exposed, making for easy walking. Great day!
We took a mooring ball for a week in St. Augustine, Fl, the oldest city in America. The first few days were cold, damp and very windy. Miserable. But we got a few tasks accomplished. The sun finally broke out on Thanksgiving day! We bar hopped, looking for the Lions game on TV. They found yet another unique way to loose! Sigh.
We also got in some nice biking and walking tours of the city. These pictures are just scratching the surface of all the great sights to see there. I would recommend St. Augustine as a good vacation stp.
We celebrated Chris birthday a bit early on Friday by doing an appetizer tour around town. Yum! Also had a new tablet shipped in for her birthday. Happy birthday Chrissy!
It was a quick week stopover and we're pressing south. We dropped anchor in Daytona Beach tonight and should make Mosquito Lagoon tomorrow. It is reported to have fantastic fishing for Reds & Speckled Trout. Hope we have some luck! The weather looks good for this plan so far!
We give up!
One of the most highly touted stops on the intracoastal waterway is Cumberland Island. Canopied trails lead to miles of beautiful sand beach. Wild ponies roam the entire island. We got there on Tuesday afternoon in calm weather expecting to spend a few days exploring. Moma nature had other ideas. The wind picked up out of the northeast and started blowing hard accompanied by rain. A dingy ride ashore would have been cold and wet. We hung on the hook for a day expecting things to get a bit better. They got worse. The wind shifted to the northwest and we lost the protection of the island. So rock n roll we did; for a whole night. The new weather reports showed the wind would keep blowing out of the north forever. Well, at least a week. We could hear the horses, we were that close.
So we threw in the towel and moved on. We just beat the coast guard blockade for a nuke sub preparing to depart Kings Bay. They shut down all traffic in the area once boomer is underway.
We're now in Florida, still a bit chilly with lows in the 50's. Seems like we're always runnin from the weather! But things could be worse, we have friends much further north, including one still on the Erie canal.
Although there was some liquid sunshine this morning, the wind was calm. So we bundled up and got to work hoisting me up the mast early before the wind picked up. The pin that worked itself out of the furler foil was easy to press back into place. I was also able to retape some rigging while up there. I decided to skip replacing our anchor light with our new LED light. Cold wet hands could have led to an expensive masthead tri-color light fixture taking a nose dive for Chris' head.
So finally, down came the old sail and up went the new, crisp Mack Sails Genoa. No drama, piece of cake. We were done early enough to still get underway back on our track south. Another storm is reportedly headed for us mid-week and we want to be inland again for better protection from wind & waves.
We were able to unfurl the new sail while motorsailing and we could definitely see a big improvement. Rasberries to Doyle in Detroit for telling me our old sail was fine and didn't need recutting. Cudos to Craig H for cluing me in on the advantages of getting a new sail.
We were motorsailing today so the engine would radiate heat this evening at anchor! So far, so good. Much warmer this evening than yesterday.
While underway today, we passed Jeff & Mary on Echo again! They are former dock neighbors from Jeff Beach Marina. I'm sure we'll be seeing them again as we move south. It's hopscotch cruising!
We finally made Manteo to visit friends and pick up packages. Our much anticipated new genoa (head sail) also arrived Friday! Yipeee!
Not so fast; in trying to take down the old head sail, we discovered a pin in the furling foil has worked its way out and is blocking the slider from coming down. We can't lower the old sail! That will require me to go up the mast, swing over to the headstay foil and perform some aerial surgery. We tried early this morning but the winds got going pretty early. Not too bad for going aloft except that the headsail has to be unfurled to do this repair. The winds catch the sail and flog it all around. We need calm. It did calm down a bit, right at dusk. So we'll get underway with the old sail, looking for a calm morning to finish this task.
It's always something.
We survived hurricane Sandy just fine. So now we're underway again after loosing a week to the weather. And if you follow our track on the spot tracker, you'll see we're headed north. Yes, it's November and we're headed north!
We had a lot of mail & packages sent to Manteo, NC. But it's pretty close to the outer banks which received quite a bit of wind from Sandy. We headed inland, and south, to get away from the 'cane. So now we must backtrack northeast to Manteo to pick up all our loot. Oh well, such is the vague scheduling of a cruising boat.
Like many on the east coast, Sandy forced open our pocketbook too. Certainly not like many who got whacked hard, but we did have to spend about $500 on dockage and extra fuel. Consider it a boost to the economy!
Our bigger concern is weather, specifically temps. It's gettin chilly, nights in the low 40's will soon turn to the 30's; and we don't really have a 'heater'. We do have various ways of generating heat. The engine makes a fair bit while underway, we have a few oil lamps that do pretty well and there's always the stove. But we'd just as soon avoid all that nonsense and get the hell south!
...here comes Sandy.
We're well tied in, 3 lines at the bow & 3 lines at the stern on the windward side. This shouldn't be too much of a big deal for us. We're inland a fair distance where we should only see 30 to 40 knot winds. We've anchored out in 40 and we've seen 70 at the dock back in Michigan.
Back at our stop in Norfolk, we stumbled into some used docklines. Used, barely; they were like new. Big, fat strong 3/4" lines! One of them would sell for about $75. We got 5 for $40...total! Perfect timing, they're all in use today.
There are at least a dozen cruising couples here, riding out Sandy. The marina has a very nice clubhouse where we're having potluck hurricane dinner parties every night. Great place to swap lies and exaggerations!
Our biggest issue will be how long this lasts. Reports are gusty winds running through Thursday. We want to get going south!
We're running from the coast as fast as we can, away from the effects of hurricane Sandy. It won't be powerful, but it will be big!
We should be fine docked in Dowry Creek marina tonight through the storm. Likely not to see more than 35 sustained.
Pictured is us running in light rain, west in the Aligator-Pungo canal.
(This was written Friday, published Saturday, we have sketchy connections)
Hurricane Sandy is in the Bahamas now and the track north keeps changing toward our short term destination of outer banks NC. So we're making alternate plans to head inland. The outer banks will likely see 40 to 50 mph winds for over 24 hours. Where we're headed now, Dowry Creek, will get 40 for maybe 12 hours in a better protected marina. We'll be well secured for at least 70mph sustained winds.
Well, that's the plan! Stay tuned...
Got underway before sunrise this morning. Sunshine, light winds, following seas & a favorable current are making this a fantastic morning. Add in our first dolphin sighting since May. A nice wrapup to our season on the Chesapeake. We'll make Norfolk by mid afternoon and tie up at the free town dock in Portsmouth. This evening we'll search for a sports bar to catch the Lions on Monday Night Football.
The Thomas Point lighthouse is one of the best known landmarks on the Chesapeake. This type of lighthouse is common to the bay.
Feels good to be underway again.
Early Wednesday morn, we'll finally be getting back underway. We've been in Annapolis for a month and we're overdue to get moving.
We stopped here because of the biggest sailboat show in the country plus the powerboat show that follows. I picked up a fair amount of work at the sail show plus a few more gigs at the power show. Also did plenty of networking and should have more work coming this winter.
We also got many projects done. The dingy davits got some needed extra bracing. I FINALLY figured out the high wear on our alternator belt, mismatched pulleys and a resultant wrong size belt. Got some excellent service from a local alternator shop and we're good to go. We have dual refrigeration systems. One is driven by the engine, similar to an auto aircon system. It had a leak I couldn't find so we had a local expert diagnose and fix the leak...yea!
Best part of being here was seeing friends. We have a friend Rod, from Maine, we put up for 3 days of the sail show. Dana & Eric are friends from our old home port who flew in from Detroit. Mary & Jeff left the same marina this summer on their open ended cruise and have also been here a month. We all consumed mass quantities of Pussers Pain Killers and had a great time. We also had another visit with Mary & Chuck, who hosted us at their dock prior to our coming to Annapolis. Good seeing them too; and the loan of their car was extremely generous.
But it's time to head south. Nights are dipping into the 40's...too cold for us!
