Priority Adventures: November 2011

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

On the hook at Lake Worth, FL

Look at the gorgeous turquoise colored water we found coming down the ICW toward Jupiter, FL. Jupiter Lighthouse was standing guard at the Inlet as we made the turn to follow the ICW toward Lake Worth.

After going under seven bridges with busy weekend local boat traffic we arrived to anchor in the northwestern corner of Lake Worth, FL on Sunday afternoon with about thirty other cruising boats. We learned that the experienced cruisers do not travel on weekends due to the busy local water traffic. We are getting some boat jobs done that we can only do at anchor. The stainless steel stanchions and bow and stern pulpits should sparkle since Norma removed the saltwater spray and polished them.

Jay spliced a new anchor snubber line to hook on the chain so the boat will be suspended from a bridle instead of a single line. We ran the Honda generator (red box behind Jay sitting on the transom) to charge our batteries since we have been at anchor for a few days and have not run the engine. Jay did some electrical jobs like repairing a 12V plug on an computer inverter.

Jay hoisted me up to the spreaders to run the flag halyard through the pulley so we'll be able to raise the quarantine and Bahamian courtesy flag once we arrive. We also spent time studying the Bahamas charts and guides.

Wednesday we landed and locked the dinghy with other cruiser's dinghies by the bridge. We walked a few blocks to catch the public bus into Riviera Beach for our afternoon appointments with the US Customs & Borders office. We had applied online for the LBO-Local Boaters Option which will allow us a quicker and easier re-entry to the US in the spring. Today we had to appear in person for the presentation of documents (boat papers and passports) and an interview (be fingerprinted and have photo taken). In the spring when we return, we should be able to phone the Customs office, give our LBO # and not have to wait for a Customs visit or appear at the Customs office to clear us.

We arrived early to be sure we knew where the Customs office was located, so we had time to explore. Riviera Marina was nearby with pelicans waiting for the scraps from a cleaning fish station. The US Customs office was just across the water from Peanut Island and the Lake Worth Inlet. The weather looks good for Thursday with north/northeast winds so we plan to go out the Inlet and sail down the coast to Fort Lauderdale.

Saturday, November 26, 2011

On to St. Lucie, FL

The ICW south of Titusville is a dredged and marked channel. The spoils removed when they dredge are put along the sides of the channel and eventually may turn into islands as shown in these photos. Grand Farm Island is the only inhabited spoil island with about 30 houses on it accessible only by boat. Other smaller islands serve as picnic spots for small powerboats or overnight campers. We anchored behind one spoil island near MM 925 below Melbourne on Wed. night for protection from the returning north winds.

We celebrated our Thanksgiving anchored here south of Causeway Island in Ft. Pierce, FL. It was an Italian sort of Thanksgiving for us with homemade pizza and salad - not turkey but tasted good. The anchorage was quiet with two other anchored boats and this boat which was aground. It is a reminder that we need to stay alert and watch the charts to avoid the shallow waters.

Caught this interesting photo of the morning sun through the clouds as we traveled to Manatee Pocket off the St. Lucie River. We did not see any manatees but did enjoy a long walk to explore Port Salerno and south Stuart, FL on Friday.

Saturday was a short travel day as we stopped at Peck Lake at MM 992, a saltwater anchorage off the ICW that gave us access to St. Lucie National Seashore Park. We anchored Priority and dinghied ashore. We like to put a small anchor off the stern of the dinghy to hold the stern out in the water rather than dragging the dinghy up on the beach. Since the dinghy has a soft inflatable bottom, this will hopefully keep it hole-free.

It is a short 50 yard walk across the dune from the dinghy to the ocean. The 20 knot southeast winds were blowing as we explored the ocean beach. We found coconuts on the beach and on some trees ashore. Also found some bean like pods that were green and brownish red reminding us of string beans.

Jay is enjoying a beach walk with the breaking waves. St. Lucie Inlet is behind him a few miles.

Back on board Priority after showering and hanging up our laundry towels to dry, Jay reads to plan the the next leg of our journey.

As the bright sun fell lower toward sunset, we tried out our back sunshade. We made it to keep the sun from blinding us as the sun shone under the bimini. The two panels zip onto the edge of the bimini and tie to the stainless steel stern rail. Jay thinks we could have made it from an even finer screen but it was very helpful.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Traveling to Titusville, FL

Think of Titusville,FL and you think of Kennedy Space Center. That's where we docked at a marina and rented a car to spend a day to visit and learn about Cape Canaveral and the space program. The tour takes you to the Observation Gallery a safe three miles from the launch site which is right behind our heads.

Another tour stop at the home of the Saturn V Moon rocket showed us exactly how large it is. We are dwarfed by the five motors at the base of the Saturn V rocket. We enjoyed the IMAX movies and the simulated shuttle launch experience.

The Vehicle Assembly Building was visible to us miles away as we approached Titusville from the ICW. Once the shuttle is assembled in the VAB and ready to be launched, it makes the 3mph journey to the launch pad as we have seen on TV. Currently two shuttles are being decommissioned in the VAB so they can be sent to museums in San Diego and to the Smithsonian. It was a fun and interesting full day at the Space Center. Titusville is missing the many workers who lost their jobs at the Space Center recently as shown by the many closed businesses and homes for sale. However, on Nov. 26th Mars Curiosity Rover will be launched on an Altas V rocket as part of the Mars Science Laboratory Mission so work does continue.


Unplanned but a fun coincidence, our Canadian friends, David and Kathy, came into the same marina and joined us for the Space Center day. There seems to be a "resident" manatee at the marina who shows up at any boat that has fresh water dripping. David had washed their boat off and the very large manatee appeared to drink as the water fell off their boat. Signs are posted to not feed, pet or give water to the manatees to protect them from becoming dependent on boats for water and getting hurt from boat props. They are so slow moving, friendly and curious -very interesting to watch. This was the first manatee we had seen up close.

We spent another day doing errands and stocked up on non-perishable food items while we had a car to transport them to the boat. Staying Wed. night anchored near MM 925 below Melbourne and will celebrate Thanksgiving traveling south to Fort Pierce, Fl. Have a happy Thanksgiving!

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Favorite Daytona Bridge

This has to be the "prettiest"bridge we have come through and I forgot to show it in the last posting. The boaters get a treat to pass under the bridge and enjoy the mosaic manatees and dolphins on the support columns.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Bridges of Florida

Those winds from the north returned to cool us off and let us sail into Daytona Beach, FL on Friday afternoon. There are five bridges to pass through Daytona Beach on the ICW, three have 65' vertical clearance and the first we did sail through. Then we rolled up the sail and motored through the others. Two had low clearances and we needed to request openings for us to pass through. We anchored just south of Memorial Bridge for the night. Then we dinghied over to West Marine and enjoyed dinner at a corner cafe a few blocks away.

We motored on south today passing Ponce de Leon Inlet and Lighthouse which we decided to return to visit and climb on the way back north in the spring. Waited for an opening of the George Musson hydraulic lift bridge at New Smyrna Beach which opens every twenty minutes. New Smyrna Beach is a much quieter and smaller seaside town compared to Daytona Beach. Lots of local people enjoying the waterfront on a beautiful Saturday.

Priority is anchored just off the ICW green buoy #45 for Sat. night just across the water from this interesting waterfront house. Usually you see widow's walks and look out perches built on top of some of the more expensive homes, but this was a first to see. These folks must enjoy star gazing out over the Atlantic Ocean through their own personal telescope.

The ICW is both narrow and wide depending on where you are. Tugs pushing and pulling barges like this one can appear around any corner at anytime. Glad there are two of us to keep an eye on navigation and as lookout.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Enjoying our visit in St. Augustine, FL

You know you have arrived in St. Augustine, FL when you pass through the Bridge of Lions. Lion statues stand on each side of the bridge at water's edge. It was recently rebuilt using $82 million to replace the low clearance opening bridge to keep the local history and town character. Most replacement bridges on the ICW are built with the standard 65' clearance but this one is an exception. On Tuesday we picked up a mooring on the south side of the bridge at the Municipal Marina.

Wednesday we learned about St. Augustine on a trolley tour of the town and then visited the St. Augustine Lighthouse and Keeper's House. It is across the Bridge of Lions on Anastasia Island. We climbed to the top for a view from the top.

Looking west from the top of the Lighthouse towards the ICW you can see Priority tethered to a mooring ball among many other boats. The winds have changed from the north to come from the south so our weather has gotten warmer both during the day and at night. This is the first time we have slept at night without blankets since leaving home in October. Day time is comfortable with short sleeves. We are feeling like we are in Florida now!

We enjoyed walking back into town from the Lighthouse to visit Castillo (Castle) de San Marcos National Monument which is a fort built by the Spanish in 1672 to protect their empire in America. It is rich in history and unique in design. It was a fortress to protect both soldiers and the community during attacks. We learned that the villagers hurried inside the walls for protection but left their livestock (chickens, cows, pigs,etc.) down in the dry 40' wide moat area to be safe from the attacking enemy. Animals were never allowed inside the fort to keep it clean and disease free.

It was a real treat to meet up with cruising friends from Canada while in St. Augustine. We first met Marie and John (on the left) on board Hunky Dory and David and Kathy on board Gael Na Mara in the Dismal Swamp and Elizabeth City, NC. They are also traveling the ICW south for the first time on their sailboats. We will leave St. Augustine on Thursday as it is getting ready to light up the holiday season this weekend.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Easing into FLorida

Anchoring at MM 735 in the early afternoon on Sat. gave us time to dinghy up to Ft. George Island to visit Kingsley Plantation. Zephaniah Kingsley established the plantation in 1814 bringing his wife and three children from Africa. Kingsley's family was unusual in that he purchased his wife, Anna, as a slave and she grew to also be his business partner on the plantation.

Kingsley Plantation produced Sea Island cotton as shown in the basket. The black seeds in the white basket had to be removed from the cotton buds by hand. Indigo was also grown in the gardens to produce the blue blocks of powder used as a coloring dye. You can see a sample weaving of the Sea Island cotton using white and indigo blue dyed cotton. It felt very soft.

On Sunday we took a detour from the ICW to travel up the St. John's River to visit downtown Jacksonville and visit Norma's cousin Charles and his wife, Fran. The City of Jacksonville offers free dockage for boaters at their Metropolitan Park Marina near the Jaguars Football Stadium. As you can see, we had our choice of floating dock slips. That is Priority's mast you see in the marina.


There is no dock master; no one answers phone messages or answers calls on the VHF radio. You only need a reservation if the Jaguars have a home game or there is a concert in the arena next door. So we made ourselves comfortable in a boat slip, slid our credit card in the machine to pay for electric power to our slip and explored the park and stadium area across the field. It is a beautiful facility but is located a little too far from the downtown waterfront area and shops and it is also 15 miles up the river which is a little too far for most cruisers to travel.		.

Charles & Fran were very kind to show us how far and wide the City of Jacksonville really does go as they helped us complete our list of errands. Being boaters themselves and having traveled the ICW, they knew all the things we needed such as a visit to the hardware store, groceries and dinner out. It was a fun visit!

On Mon. morning we used the fresh water and extra time as we waited for the tide to change to take us back down the river to clean off the accumulated salt spray that covered the boat. Priority left downtown Jacksonville looking shiny and clean. St. John's River is wide, deep and interesting as we saw ships being loaded and worked on in shipyards all along the shores.

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Quaint & Welcoming St. Mary's, GA

Captain Jay having a breakfast of champions at his nav seat and checking the morning news. We have our delicious souvenirs of fresh picked citrus fruit from Cumberland Island Park, compliments of the Carnegie mansion gardens and the Park Ranger. Soon ready to depart the anchorage.

As we motored up the St. Mary's River, we met the Cumberland Lady ferry taking folks to visit Cumberland Island from St. Mary's town across the ICW. The ferry is the way most people visit Cumberland Island and St. Mary's makes it easy for visitors with convenient free parking.

Free town dock to tie up and we went exploring. Market on the Square was this colorful old general store owned by Shannon shown in the photo. Shannon has lived in St. Mary's for her 28 years and only left town to go to college. She met her husband, Tony, who came to St. Mary's on a sailboat bound for a trip to the Bahamas about 5 years ago. They have a love story ready for a Nicholas Spark's novel. We also found a used book store a few blocks off Main Street that should be on your list of places to visit for its decor, chatty owner as well as the books inside.

As we were walking back to the boat, on the sidewalk we met Dave and Sue from England who also took the Cumberland Island tour with us yesterday. They are visiting by RV camper. They bought their RV a few years ago in Ohio through the internet and have camped the West Coast. Now they are working up the East Coast. They camp for 6 months in the US and return to visit family in England for 6 months. It was Dave & Sue's first time ever on a sailboat or boat smaller than a ferry. We decided that we were all camping, them on land and we on water. They liked being able to get off and walk around. We don't think we sold them on boating. It was a fun afternoon meeting new friends.

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Cumberland Island, GA is a National Park

The trip from Jekyll Island south to Georgia's southern most barrier island, Cumberland, provided another great sail. We had to sail out toward the ocean a bit to go around a shallow area in St. Andrew's Sound. With the north winds and the current against us, we felt the ocean swells washing inland giving us quite a ride. We had not felt those swell since we have been on the more protected waters of the ICW. We sailed past King's Bay, a Navy submarine base, shown above, and all seemed quiet. As we sit at anchor across the ICW, you could hear taps being played at sunset.

As we were coming in to anchor next to Cumberland Island, we had to edge around a shrimp boat anchored in the channel. They are quite impressive with their wings and nets outstretched.

This morning we took the dinghy ashore to join visitors to Cumberland Island who had crossed over from St. Mary's on the ferry. Paulene, the National Park Ranger, gave us a tour of Dungeness. It is what is left of Andrew and Lucy Carnegie's mansion they built here in 1884. It once was a four story mansion with a higher tower in the middle front of the house. She said the chimneys and tower could be seen from St. Mary's across the harbor. At its prime, they employed over 300 people to help run the house and grounds. Now it belongs to the Park Service. About 95% of the Island is part of the National Park. You can visit, hike, bike, and camp. You must come to the Island by boat- either your own or on the ferry from St. Mary's across the ICW.

After our tour as we continued to explore, Paulene's husband Brain, a Parks maintenance worker, came along and shared some citrus fruit (tangerines, grapefruit, and sour oranges) with us he had picked from the trees on the Carnegie grounds. He also showed us the olive trees and had Jay pick a few black olives. They taste very bitter until you do a special soaking in a saltwater brew.

Then on for an ocean beach walk to get our toes wet and collect some shells. We found an unusual starfish but of course left it to swim another day. It was a beautiful day on the beach.

The walk from the ocean back across the island to the dinghy dock took us through this live oak forest with palmettos underneath. We thought the low curvy branches of the trees caused by the strong ocean breezes over the years were especially interesting.

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Biking Georgia's Jewel - Jekyll Island

After anchoring a night at MM614 on Kilkenny Creek for a night and then at MM665 on Wally's Leg, we had another good sail through Jekyll Creek to stop and visit Georgia's Jewel. Jekyll Island is one of Georgia's nine barrier islands and well worth a visit by boat or car. The north end of the island is slowly eroding so these huge trees have died and are left as huge beautiful driftwood sculptures on the beach. However, the southern each end of the island is growing. The local islanders say "Jekyll Island will someday be located in Florida if this keeps happening".

The Jekyll Harbor Marina had nice cruiser bikes with soft seats we could explore the island on using paved or hard packed trails. We followed the white painted turtles to the Georgia Sea Turtle Rescue Center.

After enjoying the turtle museum we met lots of lucky turtles in the hospital tanks. Each turtle had a name, a story, diagnosis and treatment plan. Some were hurt by boat propellers, attacked by sharks or found diseased. We learned that sea turtles can not retract their head and flippers into their shells completely like land turtles and sharks can attack their exposed flippers. We also learned that the temperature of the turtle eggs determines whether they are born males or females. Facts of the day!

Overhead mirrors let you see the turtles down in the tanks. The loggerhead turtle on the left had just come back from surgery with the team below. Two of the team carried the turtle to the rolling cart padded with towels for the ride back to his tank.

In the museum you could watch them examine the turtles through the window but surgery was done through the back right door out of sight. Here they work on a smaller 6" green sea turtle.

It was lots of fun riding on the northeast beaches with the north winds at our backs. Jay even tested his camera talents to video and ride at the same time as shown below. He did a great job!

It was a day of riding and exploring. We rode all through the historic sites telling the history of the island and its inhabitants through the years. We covered about 12 miles on bikes. The bike trail through the southern end of the island shows the lush vegetation of the maritime forest. We left the Jekyll Island Museum to tour on our next visit - it would be a day's adventure, too. Leaving today to continue south.