Final Days to Marathon (Days 70, 71 and 72)

We made it to Marathon and are tied up at Burdines Waterfront Marina where we spent 5 years running our charter business and 4 years just enjoying the beautiful "Keys" winters.  Some of our "normal" boater friends haven't arrived yet but it is great to see the people we know including the marina staff who have been here forever.

The last few days we have been getting used to shore life again and, of course, cleaning up the boat from 10+ weeks traveling.  Here we are as of Sunday, December 13th with the boat looking pretty good.  I didn't get a "before" picture but it was pretty bad.  The bow had a dark stain from the ICW and there were black marks down the sides from moorings we had stayed on.

Monday, December 7th (Day 70)

It was a very windy day in Card Sound (on the gulf side of North Key Largo) but the anchorage was pretty nice in the morning.  Our morning winds were from the west and the western shore here was only about 1/4 miles in front of the boat.  The front came through early and we had some rain but not as bad as expected.  The winds were mid-20s and our ground tackle (anchor, chain, snubber, etc.) handled it all very well.

The winds were supposed to clock to NW then N later in the afternoon but still only 20s.  This anchorage was open about 3 miles to the NW so we knew the waves would build when the wind came from that direction.  I planned on moving the boat just before dark to the north shore for more protection from those winds - anchor up at 5pm.

Around 3pm a squall came through just as the winds moved to the NW.  The waves coming toward the boat increased from 1/2 foot to 3 footers and were very close.  The boat started bouncing around pretty good.  Time to move!

I started getting the boat ready to move by checking the engine and engine room.  Just as I opened the engine room door we were hit by a much higher gust of wind and the boat leaned over to 20 degrees and stayed there.  I knew from experience this meant our anchor had pulled because of the winds and waves.  In almost all cases, if a boat is not anchored, motoring or sailing with high winds, the boat will automatically turn sideways to the wind and stay there.  With our two masts and high free-board (lots of boat sticking out of the water), there was a lot for the wind to push on so we leaned over away from the winds and stayed there.

I immediately closed the engine room door and went up to the cockpit to start the engine.  It took almost full throttle to turn the boat back into the wind.  Later I determined from our chartplotter we had dragged 500 feet before I could stop the boat with the engine against this wind.  I looked down at our wind instruments which were reading sustained high 30s and it seemed like the winds were calmer than a few minutes ago.  Geez!  Good news is we did not anchor close to the southern shore so were not in danger of running aground.

Laura typically is in our forward cabin when pulling in the anchor.  She handles the chain coming into the chain locker while I work the anchor windlass on the bow.  That wasn't going to work this time because someone had to be at the helm motoring the boat into the wind.  I yelled to Laura for her to come into the cockpit and she was there pretty quick.  I instructed her to keep the throttle up and try to keep the boat pointed into the wind while I pulled in the anchor.

Holy crap it was crazy on the bow trying to get our anchor in.  I think the bow was jumping up and down 4-5 feet and the wind was trying to blow me away.  I was worried about what was going to happen when I got the anchor out of the water and it started swinging around.  But, a few minutes later I had the anchor near the surface and it had a big clump of grass on it so was pretty stable.  I was wondering how I was going to get that off when a bigger wave came by and picked the bow up then smashed it back down.  The anchor was clean!  Nice!  I was able to get the anchor up the last 6 feet to the roller and secure it quickly.

Now we had to get somewhere more protected than this.  I took over the helm and cranked up the throttle.  The boat gradually started moving forward and settled at 1.5 to 2 knots with the normal engine RPM that would push us at 6 knots.  This engine is only 58 horsepower and doesn't like pushing a 21 ton boat into a 30 knot wind. I pushed the throttle a little higher to try and get more speed.

When I look back on times like this, I always feel bad that we didn't get any pictures or video.  It seems that almost everything we post is nice weather and good sailing.  We didn't get any pictures this time either.  I was fighting the wheel to keep the boat moving at a slight angle to the waves.  Directly into the waves was shallow water so I had to work my way farther north.  

About every 4th or 5th wave hit the port side of the boat while we were going down from a bounce and sent a wall of water right over our cockpit.  We stayed fairly dry but even a little opened zipper on the windward side brought is a lot of water.  It wasn't raining - this was from the spray coming off the waves.

An hour and 2.5 miles later things finally calmed down as we motored near the north shore and the squall passed us.  The winds dropped into the teens and we re-anchored 1/2 mile from shore without any problems.  The boat was soaked and covered in salt.  We had some fresh water to spare since we would be at the dock in a couple more days so I got out our fresh-water hose and washed down the canvas around the cockpit.  Almost back to normal!

Tuesday, Dec 8th (Day 71 - Start of Weed 11)

Our plan was to motor over to Anglefish Creek and pass through to the ocean side of Key Largo.  Then we would sail down the Hawk Channel to Marathon.  Anglefish Creek has a shallow spot on the very end of the channel coming out onto the ocean.  We needed at least 1 foot of tide to make it through there without touching bottom.  Oh oh.  Low tide there was 8:21am today.  We would have to wait until at least 10:30am for enough water.  Cool.  Sleep in and relax.

Just before 10am we motored the 2 miles over to the creek and passed through without problems.  When we got to the spot I knew was shallow, I kept the boat moving but very slowly.  Our depth gauge got all the way down to 6.2 feet - we need 5.5.  Good thing we waited for more water!  We wouldn't have made it at low tide.

Once on the Hawk Channel we pulled into the wind and raised our mainsail.  Once back on course we rolled out the jib and turned off the engine.  It was awesome!  The winds were low teens and slightly behind our starboard beam (broad reach).  The ride was very nice and I turned on the autopilot then relaxed with a good book.

An hour later the winds picked up to the high teens and we started flying.  We actually hit 8 knots and we always say that's when we are going to break something.  A short time later we turned into the wind and reefed the mainsail because the gusts were trying to push the boat into the wind and the autopilot was working hard keeping us on course.  

Now the winds worked into the 20s.  Still too much sail!  We turned downwind to reef (pull in some of) the jib.  Once back on course the boat seemed much more under control.  It always cracks me up that in high winds, we pull in sail and don't loose any speed.  The boat is not moving around so much and less lean means more sail for the wind to push.  

We had lunch then I looked where we would stay for the night.  The best anchorage for these winds would be on the SW side of Rodriquez Key.  But, that was only 10 miles away which would leave us 45 miles tomorrow to Marathon.  Farther down the keys the water is more shallow near shore so I would have to anchor more away from shore which meant more waves.  We talked about it and decided to anchor early at Rodriquez.  By 2:15pm we had the anchor down and relaxed with the howling wind out of the NW.  

I think everyone had the same idea and by an hour later we had 5 other sailboats anchored around us.  There was also a gent sailing a kite-board through our anchorage.  He was very good but I thought he was crazy.  The winds was still high 20s and this guy was flying.  I took a video which you can check out here.

The winds seemed to be high all night but we were calm at this anchorage.  I'm glad we decided to stop early.

Wednesday, Dec 9th (Day 72 - end of trip)

We were both up early so decided to get moving on our last day.  We had the anchor up at 7:30am and by 8am we were under sail with the motor off.  This was an excellent last day on the water and we sailed all the way to Marathon.  This time I didn't roll out the full main or jib so the boat was much calmer with the higher winds in the morning.  

By early afternoon, the winds calmed and we let out the main and jib.  Plus, we raised our mizzen sail which we hardly every use.  It was a wonderful several hours of sailing.  Laura took this video of our sail for the trip.

Later in the afternoon the winds increased so we rolled in the mainsail and reefed the jib.  We were still making 6.5 knots with 3/4 jib and the small mizzen.  

We averaged 6.5 knots for the 7 hours of sailing which is really good for us.  At 3pm we pulled into Burdines Marina where we plan on spending the next few months.  

It's nice to get to your destination but I am always sad the trip is over.  I mopped around the next 2 days then finally got my act together.  I dropped the dinghy and acid washed then scrubbed both side of the boat above the waterline.  Today, Laura and I polished all the stainless rails to remove the salt and start of rust.

If you can't see the videos on this blog, you can find them on our YouTube page by clicking HERE

I hope you have enjoyed our blog.  I like writing it but more enjoy reading back through it months or years later.  It helps to bring back a lot of memories.

If you would like to read about more of our travels, I have published 4 Kindle books on Amazon of our sailing travels from 2007 to 2018.  They are all under $5.  You can check them out HERE

Trip Stats

1,602 nautical miles in 72 days.  

Anchored - 26 nights

Stayed on moorings - 10 nights

Paid dockage - 26 nights (including 20 nights at Wayfarers Marina for carpentry work)

Free dockage - 7 nights

Overnight at sea - 1 night

Stuart to Key Largo (Days 67, 68 and 69)

Friday, December 4th (Day 67)

I counted the days wrong on my last blog.  This was actually day 67.  I don't think anybody noticed...

We thought we would be in Stuart until Saturday but the weather window for off-shore to The Keys decided to come a little earlier.  Instead, we are leaving today for the run to Lake Worth then off-shore tomorrow around Ft. Lauderdale, Miami and Key Biscayne.  Good thing we got all our boat fixes and groceries done yesterday!

The cruise from Stuart to Lake Worth is only about 35 miles but there are 8 bridges that have to open for us along the way.  The first 4 bridges are "on demand" which means they can open (or not open) at any time.  The last 4 bridges are on a schedule - most open on the hour and 1/2 hour.  

We had our anchor up at 7:45am and motored over to the Roosevelt Bridge where we had to wait about 15 minutes for a train to pass on the train bridge right behind the highway bridge.  

It was a nice day weather-wise and no problems as we zoomed through the next 3 bridges without taking the engine out of gear (no waiting).  This cruise takes us through Hobe Sound which is lined with huge mansions and golf courses.  Around this same time we passed 1,000 ICW miles from Norfolk which is where the ICW starts at Mile 0.

We slowed for the Donald Ross bridge because it was only 3.5 miles from the Indiantown Road Bridge and we had an hour before it would open for us.  Then, the last 2 bridges were spaced just right for our speed and we zoomed through them.

On the last leg to the anchorage, we were passed by this large mega-yacht.  We see a lot of powerboats that I call "space ships" because of all the curves and windows.  This boat took that to a whole new level.  It was 92 feet long and had so many windows in the hull I couldn't understand how it held together in any waves. That dark stripe down by the waterline is window too.

The Lake Worth lake is a great place to anchor and you can find protection from almost any wind direction.  But, we wanted to make an early start out the Lake Worth Inlet tomorrow morning and leaving from the lake would add over an hour to the trip.  So, we continued passed the lake and anchored only about 1/2 mile from the Lake Worth Inlet. This is a huge anchorage but is 95% full of boats on private moorings (or empty moorings blocking us from anchoring).  I found a spot that would be close to the channel but still out of the way.  It looked like 2 boats next to us were also setting up for an ocean passage tomorrow.  

We anchored at 3:30pm and settled down for the night.  The only chore left for us before heading out into the ocean was to drop the dinghy and haul the outboard onto the deck-rail mount using a block and tackle off our mizzen boom.  I don't like the 95 pound outboard adding to the swing of the dinghy when we are in the ocean.  Since the tide was really ripping by the boat, we waited until the tide change around 5pm when the currents were much less.  It would have been hard to keep the dinghy next to our boat with the current trying to take it away.

No problems with the outboard and we had it stowed on deck about 15 minutes later.  I cleaned up a few things on the back deck but we were basically ready to go.  The forecast called for slight west winds and seas of only 2 feet but 11 seconds apart.  You don't even feel those.  They just slowly pick up the boat and slowly set it back down.  Here's hoping the forecast is right!

Saturday, December 5th (Day 68)

I had the alarm set for 5am and got right up to get the boat underway.  The earlier we leave, the more options we would have in the evening.  I pulled up the anchor by flashlight and by 5:30am we were motoring out of the anchorage to the Lake Worth inlet and into the ocean.  The two other boats next to us followed us out.

There were almost no waves on the ocean and we turned south with both the mainsail and jib helping our speed with a light (6-7 knot) wind from the west.  Last year we had higher west winds for this passage and sailed the whole way.  Not today.  Bummer.

A short time later the eastern sky brightened and the Sun rose behind the off-shore clouds.  I took this picture of us motor-sailing past Boynton Beach.  What a beautiful day on the Atlantic!

As I texted to my friend Dean, it was almost too nice a day on the ocean.  Everybody was out enjoying the calm, warm waters - JetSkys to Sportfishing boats to Megayachts.  I even saw this gent arm-paddling a surfboard 1/2 mile off-shore.  That was a first for us.

We sailed right by this guy and he looked over at me so he wasn't lost or in trouble.  Just out enjoying the day.

Our predicted west wind turned from the south in the afternoon.  It was only 8-10 knots so didn't slow us down too much or cause bigger waves.  I was just bummed that we lost our helping west wind.  We pulled in all our sails around Ft. Lauderdale and motored the rest of the day.

In the afternoon we had a decision to make.  Where did we want to stop for the night.

1. Go in Government Cut (Miami) and anchor near the stadium.  We could be there by about 4:30pm

2. Continue south around Key Biscayne and come up into northern Biscayne Bay to anchor near the Key Biscayne Yacht Club (one of our favorite anchorages even through we were struck by lightning here in 2011).

3. Use the Biscayne Channel to run up into Biscayne Bay and turn south to anchor somewhere in the dark.

4. Keep going down the Hawk Channel toward Key Largo.

The major problem with the first two was it was a beautiful, calm Saturday night in Miami.  Those anchorages would be packed with locals and loud music.  The 4th choice would make for a very long day.  The first decent anchorage was about 30 miles away and we wouldn't get there until 10 or 11pm.

We decided on option 3 and turned up the Biscayne Channel around 5pm.  The Sun was just setting as we motored by Stiltsville which consists of fishing camps built on stilts so they stay out of the water.  They are located in the shallow entrance to Biscayne Bay and nobody knows how they survive the hurricanes.  Laura got this colorful sunset shot with the stilt houses.

A short time later we turned SW down Biscayne Bay and I was looking for an anchorage not too far away.  As I looked up, I saw this after-sunset glow in the western sky shooting yellow-orange rays over our heads.  It was pretty cool.

I checked the weather forecast from several sources and they all said calm winds tonight.  I pulled away from the channel and anchored near the shallows in the middle of Biscayne Bay.  I never do this.  Absolutely no protection from any wind angle but it turned out to be a great spot.  Laura did have to use a flashlight to see the anchor chain markers so I don't know if this qualifies as anchoring before dark.  Neither of us like anchoring after dark.

Our northern view was the Miami, Key Biscayne and Dinner Key skylines.  A very pretty place when the winds are calm.  After dinner we watched the British Baking Show Christmas Edition and more episodes of The Repair Shop with the TV hooked to my iPhone.  Two of our favorite shows - both on Netflix.

Sunday, December 6th (Day 69)

I woke up amazed that the boat almost never moved at all during the night.  No wind so no waves.  We just slowly bobbed around the anchor.  It was very nice and comfy.  We did have a fan blowing fresh air on us from a window.  It only got down to about 72 in the cabin.

Morning brought cloudy skies but warm weather.  It was the first time in a while that I just got up and slipped on shorts - my typical "Keys" uniform. 

We took our time getting ready as there was no hurry.  Today we were going only about 20 miles down Biscayne Bay to anchor near Key Largo.  Tomorrow there was a storm coming up from the Caribbean with south winds clocking west then north.  I planned on anchoring along the SW shore of Card Sound where we would be very protected from the south and west winds.  During the day tomorrow we would move the boat about 3 miles to the south shore of Pumpkin Key where we would be protected from the north winds later in the day.  That's the plan anyway....

As we pulled the anchor and got underway, I took this picture of the Miami skyline in the morning Sun behind us.  

It was great to be back in The Keys.  The last few days had been very calm so the water was very clear but "Keys Green".  When I pulled up the anchor, I could see it come off the bottom.

Laura was up on the bow looking at the bottom going by and spotting things like old crab traps and starfish on the bottom.  I surprised her with this picture.  Very calm water today too!

No problems with the shallow areas we had to navigate and we anchored at 12:30pm in the spot I had selected.  There is only a light wind to cool the boat this afternoon but the bigger winds from the south are supposed to pick up tonight.  Windfinder.com tells me the winds are supposed to pick up around 1am but not hit 25-35 until 7-9am.  At least I'll be able to see where we are getting blown!

We will sit tomorrow (except for moving the boat behind Pumpkin Key when the winds clock north) then head out Anglefish Creek to the Hawk Channel on Tuesday.  I don't know if we can make Marathon in one day from here.  It's about 60 miles and the days are short now.  Winds are supposed to be NW at 10-15 so we might be able to sail the whole way with calm seas because the winds will be from the shore.

Even though we have done this trip 30 times, I still get sad when it's almost over.  Our adventure is going to end for a couple months while we sit at a dock and enjoy our friends and beautiful Keys winter weather.  Hopefully, the Bahamas will loosen their COVID restrictions by February or so and we will spend a few months on their beautiful waters.  I'll let you know! 

1,527 nautical miles logged since Catskill.  Water temp is 73 here.  Still a little chilly for swimming.

 

St. Augustine to Stuart (Days 60-67)

Friday, November 27th (Day 60)

We were off the mooring at 7:40am for the 45(ish) mile run to Daytona on the ICW.  It was a beautiful day on the water as we motored with no wind to help.  One of the mansions on the shore had this huge blow-up Santa.  He was as tall as the second floor!

It was a very nice day on the ICW and, as typical in this section from St. Augustine to Titusville, there was a lot of small boat traffic zooming around us.

At 3:40pm we anchored just south of the new Daytona Memorial Bridge near the eastern shore.  I love this anchorage because it is in a no-wake Manatee zone so we don't get swamped by the big powerboats (usually....).

After securing the boat from our day of motoring, I dropped the dinghy and we motored to Caribbean Jacks restaurant about 1.5 miles away.  We went for a short walk to stretch our legs a bit, then back to the restaurant for dinner.  We ordered the alligator bites appetizer and split the Mahi-Mahi BLT sandwich.  The fish, bacon and special sauce was just as we remembered it.  Yumm.

For dessert we splurged on the Bananas Foster.  We forgot how huge it was.  Even splitting it we spent about half an hour munching it down.  Here I am with the first bite.  Sorry it's a little fuzzy.  I was on my second glass of tequila....

After dinner we rolled ourselves back to the dinghy and slowly motored back to Second Wind.

Saturday, November 28th (Day 61)

We slept in a little today and pulled the anchor around 8am.  It was a quiet morning as we motored through Daytona, around the Ponce Inlet and passed New Smyrna Beach.  I had tried to get a slip at the City Marina here for the night but they were full up.  We had spend 3 Decembers here so it would have been nice to see friends from the marina and local sights.  Oh well...

Past New Smyrna the ICW opens up a bit on the Mosquito Lagoon.  The winds helped a lot and we actually sailed with the engine off for a couple hours.  It was nice and quiet.  I took this picture of the sails up and peaceful waters.

We anchored in Titusville, just outside the mooring field, at 3:45pm.  I had thought about getting a mooring and sitting here for 3-4 days because of a front coming through tomorrow night.  But, it doesn't look that bad for this area so we will continue south another day tomorrow and plan on anchoring near one of the bridges for protection.

Sunday, November 29th (Day 62)

Anchor up at 8am for another nice day on the ICW.  I really like this section we cover in the next few days.  The Indian River runs from Titusville to the St. Lucie River.  It is mostly 1-2 miles wide so you are not cruising down narrow channels.  

The winds today helped a little but the water was very calm.  I took this picture from behind us.  Where does the water end and sky start?

It was a short day for us as we motored only 32 miles and anchored on the north side of the Eau Gallie Bridge at 1:30pm.  The Coco Beach area of the river has been experiencing Red Tide which kills many of the fish.  We saw many dead fish in the water and lots of gulls stuffing themselves.

We had anchored near the western shore on the north side of the bridge.  This would protect us from the forecast 20-30 knot south and west winds coming in tonight and tomorrow.  The winds are predicted to continue clocking to the north which will make this anchorage pretty rough.  Sometime tomorrow we will move the boat to the other side of the bridge where we will have better protection from the northerlies.  

Our anchorage was right next to a shore-side restaurant called Squid Lips (pretty funny, right?).  Turns out they had free wi-fi which was great.  We were able to stream shows all evening.

Monday, November 30th (Day 62)

The winds clocked during the night from the west and we waited for the rain.  Our friends Dean and Sue on Autumn Bourne were sitting out this storm on a mooring in Carolina Beach.  They had many inches of rain and winds up to 40 knots.  By early morning the front came through our area but it was pretty broken.  We only had about 1/4 inch of rain in spits and sputters.  I thought, "Is that it?"

Just after lunch, we pulled our anchor and motored about 1.5 miles back to the ICW channel, under the bridge, then back to the western shore to anchor again.  Now the bridge would protect us from the north winds tonight. 

After anchoring, I looked to the north and saw all these Cormorants sitting on the power lines.  It looked like a Cormorant Christmas Tree.  Notice it's still pretty cloudy.

We spent a quiet day at our new anchorage.  The wi-fi from Squid Lips didn't reach us over here so we relied on our AT&T unlimited data plan for TV.

Later in the evening, the winds picked up to over 20 knots from the NW.  Where we were anchored would have had much bigger waves.  As it was, we were getting a little swell from the waves coming under the bridge and turning around the corner.  It rocked us to sleep.

Tuesday, December 1st (Day 63)

I hadn't decided if we would stay another night here or move farther south today.  The winds were in the 20s during the morning but were supposed to calm down later in the day.  We had a few very open spots between bridges but I didn't think the waves would move us around too much.  We decided to continue our trip south and let the north winds help us along.

The morning was cold so we put up all of our canvas around our cockpit to warm up.  Our jib was out to catch the north winds and it blocked the Sun from warming us up.  The temps had gone down to the mid-40s last night and would only be low 60s today.  With the clear canvas keeping out the winds, it wasn't too bad in the boat.  I had to dig out my Winter gloves to warm up my hands after pulling the anchor this morning.  That wind went right through me.

It was a fun day motor-sailing down the ICW at 6.5 - 7 knots all day with the wind helping us.  We zoomed past Vero Beach and into Fort Pierce.  I decided on the Fort Pierce City Marina for fuel and water.  We were getting low on both since our last fill-up was Myrtle Beach 16 days ago.  

Around 3:30pm we motored into the City Marina fuel dock.  We were the only ones there so it was nice.  I filled the fuel tank while Laura pumped out our holding tank (toilet tank).  After she was done we started filling our water tank.  The water pressure was a little low and we waited another 20 minutes after everything else was done to fill our water.  We took 117 gallon of diesel and about 180 gallons of water.  The boat sat lower in the water as we had added almost 3,000 pounds (even including the 25 gallons of toilet waste we took off).

While fueling, I noticed there was an empty dock on the t-head across from us.  We had stayed there before so I asked if it was available for the night.  They checked with the office and it was.  I decided to stay for the night as the temps were going down into the 40s again and we would have full-time heat at the dock.

By 4:30pm we were tied up at the dock and relaxing ashore.  Now this cracks me up.  Laura and I had not been ashore for 4 days - since Caribbean Jacks.  Did we go ashore for a walk or to check out the local area?  Nope.  Just stayed and enjoyed our home.

We did order take out from the local restaurant - Cobbs Landing.  The marina had given us a 20% off coupon so, "why not?"   Our legs did get stretched a little with the 10 minute walk to the restaurant then 10 minutes back.  Laura ordered the snapper tacos and I had the fried snapper platter.  Both snappers were excellent but my fries were cold and soggy.  Bummer.

Wednesday, December 2nd (Day 64)

No rush this morning as we only had about 25 miles planned to Sunset Bay Marina in Stuart.  We typically stay on a mooring there and wait for good off-shore weather to sail from Lake Worth to Key Biscayne.  We can't take the ICW through Miami because of a low fixed bridge and try to avoid the 23 bridges between Lake Worth and Ft Lauderdale that have to open for us.  Currently, there was a decent window for Sunday so we had about 3 days to kill

We were off the dock at 8:30am and had a little helping wind down this long section of the ICW between Ft. Pierce and the St. Lucie River.  

The Stuart area is one of our favorites.  The marina is nice (we could catch up on laundry) and the old-town district is fun for walks.  There is also a Publix grocery and Ace Hardware nearby.  In the same mall as Publix, there is a Japanese Buffet with one of the best Sushi Bars I've ever seen plus excellent Chinese food.  I was hope they were open with COVID going on.

At 1:30pm we motored through the Roosevelt Bridge near the Sunset Bay Marina.  Oh oh.  As we motored over to the mooring field, I didn't see any open balls.  Bummer.  I called the marina on our VHF radio and they told me "no room at the inn".  The moorings are "first come, first served" so you have to just go over and see.

Instead we motored 1 mile north across the river and anchored in the corner of the river with protection from the north and east winds forecast over the next day or so.  Laura and I settled in and had a nice dinner on the boat.  The sunset had some nice colors from our anchorage.

Thursday, December 3rd (Day 65)

We had a few jobs on our list for today that we had been putting off until we were not moving.  Our decision was to start with trying to fix a poopie smell coming from our forward toilet holding tank.  Every time the boat moved around like from a powerboat wake, we could smell the poopies in the cabin.

Laura and I pulled everything out of the forward cabin including the mattress on the bed.  Then, I pulled up the boards over the holding tank.  Phew!  It was stinky in there.  I saw that the overflow valve on the tank had come apart or wasn't working right.  Contents of the tank had spilled over to the top of the tank and that's what smelled so much.  Laura help clean everything up while I tried to figure out how to fix the valve.  It was now basically a 1/2 inch piece of foam over an open hole in the top of the tank.  I thought I remembered there was a plastic top over the foam but we couldn't find it.

I eventually decided to just seal off the overflow with gorilla tape.  Duct tape wouldn't stick to the plastic tank but the gorilla tape did.  After sealing the valve, I took apart the vent line to make sure it wasn't plugged.  Nope.  It was fine.

We then put everything back in the cabin and the boat smelled much better.

I called the marina on the phone and they said all the moorings were still full.  I guess we'll just stay anchored here then for free.

A week ago we had repacked our propeller shaft.  Every day while we've been moving I worked on getting the packing nut adjusted to where it just barely drips and the shaft bearings don't overheat.  Usually, this is not a big deal. For some unknown reason, this time it was.  I was having to check the packing gland every 1/2 hour for the past 3 days.  When I adjusted it to only drip every 10 second or so (like it should), the next 1/2 hour check it would be hot which is not good.

What I decided was to put another strand of packing material under the nut.  We had put 3 strands and I thought I remembered that was what I had used in the past.  But, I think the shaft is wearing a bit and maybe it needs a little more help.  So.... I took apart the packing nut while Laura greased up another strand of packing.  This isn't a hard job but loosening the nut lets water pour into the bilge from outside the boat.  It's not a calming effect to see water pouring into the boat and the bilge pumps running almost constantly to keep up.

But, we completed the job fairly quickly and had it all back together in about 10 minutes.  I really hope it's easier to adjust now.  I'm going to need to watch it closely again for the next couple days.

Around 1pm I dropped the dinghy and we motored to the city park to tie up and walk to Publix.  The water was fairly calm with the east winds so I cranked up the new outboard and we zoomed.  We have to go through the mooring field to get to the public dock in the city park.  Motoring through the mooring field we saw an open mooring.  What the...!   Oh well.  I wasn't going back for the big boat now.

We had packed and carried our luggage wheelie and collapsible crate for carrying groceries long distance.  It was only about 3/4 mile to Publix but ya can't carry 10 grocery bags back from there in your arms.  Once at Publix, the lady at the customer service desk let me store our wheelie and crate while we went to check out the Japanese Buffet.

It was open!  Yea!  I pigged out on great sushi and we both enjoyed the Chinese buffet.  Here is a picture of the raw sushi bar.  And it's only $10 each!

As we rolled ourselves back to Publix, neither of us wanted to think about grocery shopping and hauling it back to the dinghy, then back to the boat.  But...  we did it anyway.  Not a big deal and we had everything stowed on the boat a couple hours later.

I just checked the weather and now it looks like Saturday might be good for the off-shore run to Key Biscayne.  That means we have to leave here tomorrow for Lake Worth.  I'm really happy we sucked it up and got everything done today.  Florida Keys here we come!

We've traveled 1,396 nautical miles from Catskill.  Tomorrow we will past ICW mile 1,000 from Norfolk.  Water temp dropped the last few days from 75 to 68 degrees because of the cold nights.  It will be warmer in The Keys...