Air temp 79, water temp 83, winds W @10
26 nm today, 191 total from Marathon
Anchor up at 9:30am to continue our "bridge dance" to Stuart. We had 7 bridges today and the first 4 were on a 1/2 hour schedule. We passed through the first 3 without hardly slowing down as the schedule was close to our boat speed. The Indiantown bridge was 4 miles away but we only had 1/2 hour from the last bridge. I knew we couldn't make it so throttled down so we would not be too early and have to hold the boat near the bridge. It all worked out well and the next two bridges were on request and pretty close. 1/2 hour later we were in Hobe Sound with only one more bridge over an hour away.
While cruising, we almost never pay attention to the day of the week. Unless, it's a weekend. Then, it seems like every boat ever made is out on the water and we're dodging them (and their wakes) big and small. Especially today as it was a beautiful morning - warm with light winds. The waterway was crazy busy and Hobe Sound was even more nuts. Most of Hobe Sound is a 25 knot speed limit which is perfect for the big fishing boats to put out a huge 3-4 foot wake to everybody around them. But, it gradually calmed down for us as we passed a couple major anchorages which seemed to be the destination of most boats.
Have you seen electric hydrofoil boards? They look like a lot of fun but I don't know if I could balance myself on something that small. They look like a tiny surf board but have a fin underneath with an electric motor about 3 feet down pushing a hydrofoil up to the surface. The rider stands on the board with a remote speed control in his hand. As he / she goes faster, the board gradually lifts out of the water and looks like something from Back to the Future. Here's a picture Laura took of a couple running around us in Hobe Sound. Notice the guy on the right is going slow so his board is still on the water. The guy on the left is going much faster so the hydrofoil had pushed the board up like he's floating on air.
We were not sure of our destination today as we had a few choices. A great spot to anchor with ocean beach access is Peck Lake about 1/2 way between Hobe Sound and the St. Lucie River. It is usually pretty full with anchored boats but we were hopeful with less cruisers on the water now there would be room. Nope. It was very full with 12 sailboats and several local powerboats. There was probably room for us to anchor between some of them but I don't like tight anchorages. If the winds picks up, ya never know how good the anchor system is of the other boats. They could (and have) drag their anchors right into us.
So we decided to keep going and anchor near Stuart where I planned on getting fuel and water - probably tomorrow. Just after passing Peck Lake, a squall came through with 20-25 knot winds. The winds were out of the north which slowed us down a bit but didn't push us out of the channel.
The squall calmed down just as we made the turn onto the St. Lucie River toward Stuart with rain and winds up to 35 knots. I decided to try and new anchorage near a spot called Hooker Bay. It looked pretty wide open with good wind protection from the west and south where the winds were supposed to blow tonight. I made the turn to the west about 1/2 way between G17A and G19. Both of my chart plotters showed this whole area to be 7-9 feet deep so I didn't even slow down. About 2 minutes later I could see our depth sounder going down (shallow water) so pulled back the throttle to idle. 21 tons of sailboat doesn't stop very quickly but we did start to slow. My depth sounder alarm went off a few seconds later to show less than a foot of water under our keel. I put the transmission in reverse at almost full throttle - this is our brakes. The boat slowed much quicker but I could feel the keel dragging in the mud as the boat came to a sudden stop. It was soft mud which I was able to reverse out of fairly quickly and move closer to G19 where the water was deeper to the western shore.
This is our 29th trip up or down the ICW. It's a little game with me to see if I can make it all the way without running aground. The game was up quickly this year as we hadn't gone 200 miles (out of the total 1,700). I have made it all the way twice - pretty lucky those years.
A short time later we had the anchor down in Hooker Bay and spent a somewhat restless evening with the boat wakes from the ICW continuing until after 10pm.
Sunday, April 19th
Air temp 73 (a little cooler - YEA), water temp 84, winds W @ 8-10
17 nm today for 208 total from Marathon
We like taking our time and not rushing when cruising up and down the east coast. Our schedule is almost always controlled by the weather. When it's nice, we move. When it's nasty, we stay put. Plus, I have favorite anchorages which I know will give us good protection from specific wind directions so I plan to be there when the winds are high and we need to sit. The past few weeks have seen some nasty squalls with high winds all along the southern and southeastern states so we didn't want to go there until things calmed a bit.
Also, part of our schedule this year, we were meeting up with our friends Dean and Sue (S/V Autumn Borne) on the 21st. They have been on a mooring at the Vero Beach City Marina for several months and decided to travel north with us.
This is why we haven't gone very far the past few days plus thunderstorms have been building along the Florida coast every afternoon / evening. The weather forecast for Monday called for 20-30 knot winds from the south and southwest all day so we wanted to be somewhere with good protection from the south.
I decided to anchor Sunday and Monday nights on the north side of the Jensen Beach Bridge. We've been in there several times and the holding is good with very nice protection from any southern winds. Knowing today would be a short run, we slept in a bit and didn't leave our anchorage until 10am. As we had time to kill, I decided to motor 7 miles to Stuart and fill up our diesel, gas and water tanks. We were not running low on anything but, this year, I was trying to keep everything more full than normal in case our normal fuel stops were closed. Right now, they are all open but ya never know.
I'm not sure I've ever seen this many boats out on the water. The Stuart area is very popular with boaters but today was over the top. We did make it to Sunset Bay Marina and loaded 25 gallons of diesel (out of 150), 5 gallons of gasoline (out of 20) and about 30 gallons of water (out of 200). Because of COVID-19, we were not allowed off the boat and even handed the attendant a couple bags of trash to dispose for us.
Back down the St. Lucie River toward the ICW with both small and big boats passing us in every direction. Here's a picture Laura took of all the boats zooming around us. Can you count how many boats are in this picture?
A couple hours later we crossed under the Jensen Beach Bridge and I had to find my way over the bar into our anchorage. I knew from experience this would be tricky so I slowly edged the boat to the west off the ICW. The first two places I tried we "touched bottom" but the third time was a charm. Still there was less than a foot of water under our keel as we slowly motored behind the bridge watching the water get deeper. We anchored in 8 feet of water nicely protected from the south and west.
Winds were not too bad but it was warm and humid. Around dinner time I closed up the boat, started the generator and turned on the air-conditioner to cool down the boat and lower the humidity inside. We decided to make a breakfast for dinner with home fries, bacon, sausage, eggs and toast. What wine goes with breakfast? I choose white.
I had been checking the weather RADAR on my phone and was watching storms pass south of us but nothing showed in our area. Near the end of our dinner all hell broke loose. We had a huge gust of wind come from the side and lean the boat over 30-40 degrees on it's side. Everything in the salon slid off the table and counters as we tried to hold onto our plates. I immediately opened the hatch and crawled into the cockpit. I could barely see the front of the boat 25 feet away with the rain and blowing spray from the water. We were in a white-squall!
Laura was frantically trying to close the clear canvas windows in the cockpit and I immediately ran downstairs and turned on all our instruments then back into the cockpit to start the engine. I put the engine in gear and gave it some throttle to try and keep the anchor from pulling out. As I looked down at the instruments, the anemometer (wind speed) read 44 knots. Holy Crap! And this was after it started calming a little. What was it 5 minutes ago?
The only time I had felt the boat like this was in 2007 when we were anchored in St. David's Grenada and were hit by the tail of a Hurricane and 65 knot winds. This brought back bad memories. It cleared around us enough to see that we were not moving (this was very good) but just a few minutes later the winds (and our boat) clocked 180 degrees and we pointed the opposite direction. What the heck was this doing to our anchor? The rain and winds calmed down (to mid-20s) about 10 minutes later. I could see that we had moved maybe 100 feet from where we were anchored before the squall. I assume this was from the winds clocking 180 degrees which would have pulled our anchor backwards and out of it's set. Then the anchor would have to re-set in the new direction. I can't believe it actually did re-set when the winds were over 40 and the boat would have put enormous pressure on it. I love our Rocna anchor!
I thought we had come through pretty well when Laura said, "Look at our solar panel!". The two 7/8" stainless tubes that held the panel had broken and the panel had flipped up into a position it was never meant for. When I checked it out, I could see that the 3/16 pop-rivets holding the aluminum mounts had broken off and nothing was holding the top of the panel. We eventually tied a rope around it so the winds would not blow it back down and break the glass. Here's what it looked like while the storm was still going.
The winds gradually died down and we could hear the emergency sirens wailing for the next couple hours. There was no report of a tornado but what would have clocked the winds 180 degrees in the middle of a storm?
After that we watched a few shows on the TV and hit the sack early. Tomorrow is supposed to be very windy too and I've got a little work to do around the boat.
Monday, April 20th
Air temp 78, water temp 84, winds SW @ 15
0 miles today.
Today is going to be the warmest this year (high of 93 degrees) but it is supposed to cool down a bit after this.
Because of the 20-30 knot winds predicted for today, we are staying at anchor and not moving up the ICW. I needed to fix the solar panel and also wanted to re-anchor the boat back to our original position which would let me check the anchor and shackles for wear.
After breakfast, Laura and I swung the solar panel down and put two clamps to hold it there. Then we did pull up the anchor and move the boat. I motored slowly around the anchorage, watching the depth sounder, and looking for the best place. It turned out where I had anchored the first time was best and was between two crab pots that we had to stay away from. A short time later we re-anchored very close to were we had started before the storm last night.
I then dug out my tools to work on the solar panel. I drilled out the old pop-rivets then drilled the holes bigger for larger rivets. I replaced the 3/16 rivets with 3/8. These should not be the weak link next time. I then fixed the stainless tubing supports - seems like they had just come apart at the end caps. Laura and I put the panel back up and it looked pretty nice. Here's what it is supposed to look like.
The winds have started to pick up (as predicted) and are currently gusting over 25 knots. Doesn't seem very bad compared to yesterday. We are going to spend a quiet day on the boat and I'll check the engine over closely for hard running the next couple days.
Tomorrow and Wednesday are supposed to be the best travel days of the week so we are going to try and make over 100 miles to Titusville. The Titusville city marina runs moorings there and, if they have one available, we'll pick one up. Then we'll sit a couple / few days until the weather settles again. Maybe we will be able to drop the dinghy and take a walk!! That would be nice. Today makes a week since we've been off the boat.
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