Perfect Day

Tropical Storm Barry was well north of us and we could have left Bayside a day earlier. We opted to stay put for one more day. The Velcro of Miamarina had a firm hold on us. In the wake of the tropical storm the weather took a turn for beautiful, and the allure of sitting in our sport-seats, listening to the live music playing across the way at Bayside, was too great to resist. The morning of departure day came in gently. We left the marina early, determined to pass through the inlet on something other than full ebb. When we got to the Government Cut inlet we thought, “What’s this? No raging 10’ rapids?” What a difference leaving at the right time, in the right conditions can make. LaLeLu drifted effortlessly out into the Atlantic, which was equally as docile. We headed out in search of the Gulf Stream – hoping for a nice push northward.

We may not have realized we were in the stream had it not been for the fact that we were traveling at an amazing 9.4 knots and our depth finder was simply reading “deep.” The mighty stream was lying down as flat as a lake – a beautiful, calm, indescribably indigo blue, lake. It took just about all of our will power not to hang a sharp right and head for the Bahamas. Bummer! These were the conditions you dream of in anticipation of a crossing. Heavy sigh! Hard to be depressed for too long, though, as we were flying along at speeds unfamiliar to our hull and soaking in every second of it.

We put out two fishing lines: one set up with a Mackerel lure, the other rigged for Dorado. Whizzzzzzzz! The Mackerel line got a hit first. “FISH ON.” Chris started reeling in, but our 50 lb test line snapped like it was old dental floss. Don’t know what it was, but it must have been big. Not more than fifteen minutes later, the reel on the Dorado pole was spinning. This pole is rigged for big fish, with much heavier line. We were so excited that we forgot to slow the boat down. Chris was fighting the reel while the boat steamed full speed ahead. (We were motor-sailing as there was only 5-7 knots of wind). I let him sweat it out a bit before it occurred to me put the boat in neutral. Twenty or so yards off our stern we saw the green and blue flash of scales jumping from the water, confirming that we did indeed have a Dorado on line. After fumbling around in our inexperience, trying to get a good spot for the poke, we gaffed her, pulled her onboard, and gave her a long, stiff shot of Vodka. Apparently the Vodka drowns the fish quick and lessons its suffering.
Neither Chris nor I possess good hunter/killer skills, and I apologized profusely to the beautiful fish. It was a small female – about 3’ in length. (That’s small for a Dorado). The Vodka took longer than I hoped, and she looked up at me with huge, yellow, marble-like eyes, and flared her gills a few last times before becoming still. I almost suggested putting her back and trying to pretend it never happened. I bit my lip, tried not to cry and mustered up a bit of macho from somewhere deep. Chris had obviously paid close attention to the pre-departure instructions given by our D-Dock neighbors - He quickly filleted the fish by making two long slices, starting behind each gill and exiting at the tail. No guts, no skinning – just two perfect filets. Before I knew it, the fish carcass was slipping back into the blue water. As I released the carcass overboard I thought about how happy we just made the predator fish who would stumble upon such an easy snack. I imagined it would likely be a shark.
The filets went into the fridge and we took our lines out of the water. No more fishing today – the two good-sized filets would feed us for a few meals. Time for a new diversion – Ahhh, yes, the Spinnaker.

Our spinnaker has lived under the forward pullman berth since we purchased the boat more than a year ago. Conditions must be just right to fly it. The wind must be less than 10 knots and no more than fifteen degrees port or starboard of dead down wind. On this day we had a l m o s t just-right conditions and, with just a minor adjustment to our heading, we thought we could fly it.


Mind you, this pretty sail has only seen the light of day one time previously on our watch, while we were firmly tied to the dock, just to see if we could figure out how to attach all the things that need to be attached. Taking it out for the second time, in the middle of the stream and actually trying to make the boat move with it, was an all together differant experience. After a bit of fumbling around, tying-untying-retying knots, and moving around blocks and shackles, we were sailing along under spinnaker. LaLeLu was proudly being carried along by our big, colorful and billowing sheet of nylon. I burned that moment into my permanent memory banks. Everything after that was gravy – but it didn’t stop there. The ocean continued to be beautiful and gentle, and our speed continued to be impressive. Entry into Lake Worth Inlet was as easy as our exit from Governor’s Cut and the fried Dorado we ate for dinner was tasty and went down well with a rum/coke, while watching the sun set from the cockpit. As close to a perfect day as I have ever experienced.

Laying Low at Miamarina

The day after we arrived at Bayside, Miamarina, the weather started clearing. Barry was headed for parts north and taking his ugly clouds with him. The weather started breaking at about 9:00 am, and since Amber and Jace weren't heading off to the airport until 2:00 pm, we decided to head over to south beach. We cabbed it over to News Cafe and had a wonderful breakfast. After that we walked Ocean and Collins and showed the girls the sights. We took a photo on the steps on which Varsace was murdered, gawked at the high-priced items in the boutiques, stuck our feet in the sand on beach, and looked in the windows of Miami Ink. I think that about covers it for a day trip to South Beach - of course, a night trip to South Beach involves a completely differant itinarary. Next time. Back at Miamarina, the girls got their stuff and headed for the Miami Airport. Now there were three: Chris, Susan and Park. We were getting short on supplies, so after the girls left, we grabbed a backpack and headed to town.

Downtown Miami is just a quick walk from Bayside. The buildings are impressive, although it would appear to be a city in a state of flux and rapid growth. There is a crane atop almost every building - as real estate is being added to the tops. Very cool place though - thick with culture. We found a Walgreens and checked off the items on our list: Cereal, Soda, Beer, and nail polish. All very essential to our comfort level for the upcoming trip home.

BAYSIDE

Life was good at Bayside, even though the weather wasn't. When we arrived, Trop Storm Barry was still causing trouble. That didn't stop us. Bayside has an array of open air (but covered with a roof) shopping/dining/entertainment establishments. The rain outside was only noticible when we had to run back to the boat for something. We all agreed on crab legs for dinner - but learned that the only place that served them was Hooters. I stood outside Hooters and peered around - everyone was fully clothed. That was good. Waitresses were wearing tight shirts and small shorts - so what, so was everyone else in Miami. Decision made - the family would be dining at Hooters. When the five orders of crab legs arrived at the table we concentrated on finessing every last bit out of each crab leg - we picked, peeled, snapped and broke the shells and slathered the salty, white meat in generous quantities of drawn butter. Yummm!

Then we spotted him - over by the bar. We had warned Amber and Jace that celeb citings were a regular thing in Miami. After all, this is where we saw P. Diddy (or would that be the artist formerly known as?) right across the street from where we were eating breakfast. "Look" Amber said in a hushed voice, muffled by her cupped hand, "it's uncle Vito." Sure enough it was and Amber jumped up to have a photo with him. That was a nice surprise to kick off our time in Bayside. We ended up staying for three days. The living was good here and life was easy. Even the marina bill was cheap ($75 night - much better than the $125 we paid at Pier 66 in Lauderdale).

TROP STORM BARRY

Another first – caught in a storm with a name. The morning we departed from Elliott Key we could see on the XM Weather that we were surrounded by a big storm. At that time of our departure, the report was calling it a tropical depression. The clouds on the satellite covered most of the state of Florida – there was no getting around it or waiting it out. We knew we were in for a really wet ride. The morning started out cloudy and spitting rain. The wind was still coming at us at about 25k, but an interesting change was occurring. The east wind that had followed us for the last week was now turning south. Uh-oh, we thought, the south is where all the tropical disturbances comes from. The rain increased until it became a blinding downpour. We traveled under motor alone, taking turns at the helm. Waves crashed violently over the bow and slapped against the dodger. Rain was blowing at every conceivable angle and we were completely soaked through – even my toes were waterlogged. When we got to Riddenbacker bridge we couldn’t see which spans the channel went through and had to blindly rely on our chart plotter. The sight of Bayside Miamarina was very comforting, and we were glad to be safely tied to a dock while Barry passed overhead.

Elliott Key

The water around Elliott Key was skinny, so we anchored quite a ways out in about 7' water. The afternoon of our arrival we dingied to shore - it was a long, wet ride. We picked around in the tidal pools and found some really cool hermit crabs. Jace, our resident hermit crab expert, proclaimed that the crabs were Caribbean crabs as evidenced by their big, bright purple claw. As the sun was setting, the mosquitoes started getting hungry, sending us into a slapping, yelling and jumping frenzy. Back at the boat, the girls took turns braiding each other's hair. Amber fashioned a really strange thing in my hair that resembled a hairy spider. Park got a Bahamas braid and bead hair-do.

The following day, we loaded in the dingy and headed over to the Atlantic side of the Key. Our guide books said that there were a lot of shells on the other side. We went through the cut between Sand Key and Elliott Key. We beach hopped down the Atlantic side in search of shells and other treasures. The beach was littered with shells of all sizes. It was also (sadly) littered with litter. There was broken glass bottles, plastic bottles, lawn chairs, shoes, fishing floats and nets, and plastic bags. The strangest thing I saw was an IV drip bag. This island is uninhabited. I guess the trash just floats around in the ocean until it washes up onto shore somewhere.

After several hours of beach combing we decided it was time to head back to the boat. One thing we did not factor into our calculations was the tide. When we came through the cut, it was high tide. Chris and I let out a collective "oops" as we realized that the tide was falling fast and the cut was nearly dry. We each grabbed a side of the dink and drug it by hand across the few remaining inches of water. To make matters worse, the tide was in full ebb and we had to fight a swift current in the shallow water that wrapped itself around our ankles and tried to push us in the opposite direction. We made it back into deep water and gratefully started our outboard engine. Back at LaLeLu we donned our snorkel gear to take a closer look at the bottom.

That evening the XM weather forcast was bleak. We were planning to forge on to Key Largo in the morning. The forecast of a potential tropical system brewing in the Yucatan caused us to change plans and run for cover in Miami. Part of our decision was based on the fact that Amber and Jace needed to leave in two days. We needed to be somewhere that we could arrange their departure. Hunkering down and waiting for a storm to pass would not give us an opportunity to orchestrate their get-away. Another monkey wrench - no problem, we were getting good at shifting gears.

Florida Keys

Departure morning from Ft. Lauderdale was a bit scary. We were docked inbetween two mega yachts (one reportedly worth $50 million), in a slip that was twice the appropriate size for our boat. Our stern lines didn't even reach the aft pilings. We had visions of leaving a gel coat trail alongside the lovely 100’ motor yacht, Miss Breanne. Just in case, we snuck out of our slip very early so that there would be no witnesses. Phew! The wind was light and there was no contact made between LaLeLu and any other boats.

We headed out to the main channel in anticipation of the next bridge opening. While circling and conducting our other water ballet maneuvers, we spotted another ECSA boat, Soggy Paws. They were getting ready to make the opening with us. Very cool how many people we saw along the way that we knew or had some sort of connection to.

Under the bridge, another rodeo ride out the inlet, and we were off. We sailed fairly close to shore, at about 60’ depth. The ride was a bit rough, but not too bad. The girls were able to handle it fine – completely un-medicated. Soggy Paws, who was right behind us, hailed to see where we headed. Our initial plan was to go in at Biscayne Channel. Friends of ours told us that the cut was fairly well marked and had only a few spots you had to watch for coral. When we got down a bit past Government Cut, we decided that these were not the kind of conditions that one should be forging into unknown territory, and we turned around to follow Soggy Paws into Govt. Cut. We were glad that we were following because the route has changed since the last time we went through. You no longer have to go by the cruise ships.

It was really odd to see the buildings of Miami right up to the water’s edge. It felt like we were driving the boat along the streets of downtown. We zigged and we zagged through town, girls on the bow, and following Soggy Paws under the Rickenbacher bridge into Biscayne Bay. The sail from there was very nice; although the persistent 20 – 25 knot east wind got fluky at times so we decided to reduce sail for a flatter ride. We arrived at Elliott Key early afternoon. Yippeeee! We were in the Keys.

Land Ho! Ft. La-tee-dah!

Our trip from Lake Worth to Ft. Lauderdale was the turning point for us. Time to face the music, address that monkey wrench in the plan, the fly in the ointment. Up until this point, we deluded ourselves into thinking that it was going to be possible to make our crossing to the Bahamas. Sunday night in Lake Worth came/went. We never got the quick weather window promised to us by the NOAA reporter of undistinguishable dialect (this will only make sense to you if you have ever listened to the NOAA weather guy). We had to start looking hard at our Plan B. On Monday morning, Chris absolutely refused to go one foot further down the ICW, so, despite the small craft warnings, we pulled anchor and headed out to sea. We would run down the coast and go in at Ft. Lauderdale. The seas were bigger than we would have preferred and they were hitting us on the beam resulting in a not-so-comfortable motion. Amber and Jace opted for a motion sickness pill, and spent the trip laid out in the cockpit with only one eye open. Park is apparently impervious to mal de mar - she alternated between sleeping and bouncing off the walls, just like she usually does when we are underway.

As we sailed along we saw quite a few flying fish. They look like hoards of little humming birds skimming along the water. We also saw a bunch of logger head turtles floating on the surface of the clear blue/green water. Their overly large, log-like heads poked out of the surf as their round, brown shells bobbed, magically holding in suspension, while the waves pounded right underneath them. My guess was that they were waiting offshore for nightfall to arrive, at which time they would go ashore to lay their eggs.

We arrived in Lauderdale later that afternoon and decided to dock at the Pier 66 marina. What a swanky place! Marina guests get the use of the Hyatt Hotel facilities. I have never before seen a marina bathroom with granite countertops.

After our rough trip outside to Ft. LaTeeDah we gave the girls two choices: 1) Try to make a crossing to Bahamas that night and prepare for the likely possibility of getting really beat up, or 2) hang out here a few days, then stroll our way down to the Keys instead. Amber wasn’t able to respond - she was preoccupied with leaping off the boat and shouting “dry land, dry land.” I took that as a vote for choice number 2.

We spent two nights / three days at Pier 66. We ran around on the water taxi, shopped, dined, beached and had a fabulous time playing in the land of the rich and famous. A wise choice we later learned when we heard the horror stories from a fellow ECSA member who tried to cross the stream that night.

On to Lake Worth (NTB Part #3)

On the road again! "Girls, assume your positions (on the bow)." After a few hours of playing on the beach, we decided it was time to mosey on. We did a quick visit to the other ECSA boaters in the anchorage. Our buds Donna and Jim just had an engine explosion, another boat was hard around, and still others were bumming us out with dire predictions of bad weather that would prohibit us from making our gulfstream crossing. We feared that bad mojo would close in on us so we had to make a move. Once again, we were headed south down the ICW. This stretch of the river has about 7 draw bridges that we needed to get through. It was Sunday, and we were full on, smack dab in the middle of the holiday weekend. To us that meant only one thing - more boats, more idiots. The water continued to get bluer, and the power boaters continued to get stupider.

When we rounded the corner into the Lake Worth Basin, just after the last draw bridge, we were absolutely shocked and dumbfounded. It was like a scene out of Girls Gone Wild. No one warned us - but we wouldn't have believed it even if they did. Ski boats and express cruisers were rafted up all around Peanut Island - about 15 boats deep in some places. In fact, you couldn't even see where the channel was. We gingerly maneuvered our 22 thousand pound boat around the mayhem, among the throng of horny guys driving boats who were more focused on their mating calls than on our approaching bow. We heard one hailing girls on the VHF Ch 16 - yelling out on the emergency/hailing channel for them to show their tits. With a few near collisions, a lot of yelling, and several blasts from the airhorn, we made it through the Armageddon of power boats.
Just south of the inlet we found a nice, quiet anchorage. (Read: No power boats or jet skis). After that frightening experience, we found comfort and salice in the sight of the masts in the approaching anchorage. "Ahhhh, honey, look - I see our people."

Exploring Peck Lake (NTB Trip - Part 2)

Who would have guessed that there was a beautiful beach just over a little sand dune ?

Peck Lake sits just west of the Atlantic Ocean, south of St. Lucie inlet. On the evening of our arrival we were too tired to even get off the boat. The next morning the scouting committee (Chris and girls) loaded up in the dingy and headed out to see what they could see.

I was surprised to see them back at the mother ship after only 5 minutes. They came back to get me because it was so cool. I had to agree - it was definately cool.

The water was a beautiful mixture of shades of blue. That nasty east wind was really churning up the waves and causing a frothy beard at the edge of each. We walked up the beach, and then down the beach. There was hardly another soul around.

We made some odd finds as we combed the beach. Mixed in with the sea shells, sea grass, crabs and other anticipated beach stuff, there was a disturbing amount of trash that had washed up on shore. Plastic is undoubtedly as big of a curse as it is a blessing to our modern society. Previously I might have thought "isn't it wonderful how long a product made out of plastic can last?" Strolling through the washed up flip flops, frisbies, water bottles, fishing lures, etc., I thought to myself "isn't it awful how long a product made out of plastic can last?"

Trip Report - Not the Bahamas - Part 1

Saturday 5:30 am - May 26
HARBOR TOWN TO PECK LAKE.
Our departure out of Harbor Town was less than auspicious. 5:30 am rolled around. A quick head-poke out of the hatch confirmed my suspicians - it was dark and raining. Having already resolved that weather would not stop us, we prepared for departure. Oil checked-check, engine started-check, instruments on-check, dock lines untied-check, coffee in thermos-check. All systems appeared go. First hurdle – stop the blinding light that was shining in our eyes. Seems like a minor thing. I can attest that while you are underway at 0-dark-thirty, it’s not a minor thing. Having never used our chart plotter at night before, we did not realize that at night, it is lit up like a 7-11 in a bad neighborhood. In order to perserve our night vision, we opted to cover the offending chart plotter with a pillow and just peek at it every so often. Our adventure was underway as we headed down the barge canal. We made the 6:00 am opening on the SR 3 bridge and pointed LaLeLu down the river (that’s code for Intracoastal Waterway or ICW). The wind was steady on our beam at 20-25 knots and we were treated to a lovely, brisk, pelting rain (see, time does erase pain from the memory). We motor-sailed at about 6.5k. Not the sort of departure you dream of, but what the hell, we were underway on our big adventure.
The voyage was fairly uneventful until we got south of Melbourne. We had to re-assure Jace a few times that the boat would not tip over, although, I am not completely sure that she ever really believed us. A 25k wind on the beam can generate a weebles-wooble-but-they-won’t-fall-down effect. After Melbourne, the number of boats steadily increased, as did the number of idiots driving them. This was Memorial Day Weekend after all. For some reason that escapes me, anyone can buy and operate a boat – no license or training required. Bad manners seem to go hand-in-hand with bad boating skills. We bit our tongues and tried our best not to let the big wakes of the inconsiderate power-boaters bother us.

By mid day, the boat traffic was very heavy and the section of the ICW we were in started meandering. Maintaining a point of sail was becoming increasingly frustrating due to the strong, flukey east wind and constantly changing direction of the river. We put down the sails and continued pushing south courtesy of our faithful motor.
The girls preferred this as they were able to sit on the bow for a better vantage point from which to watch the waterworld show that was unfolding around us. The further south we went, the bluer the water turned. Just before we reached Ft. Pierce, the ECSA group that we were meeting advised us that, because of the exposure to the east wind in their Ft. Pierce anchorage, they were heading further south to anchor south of St. Lucie at Peck Lake as well. We decided to push on and get to Peck Lake. We lucked out on our inlet approaches at Sabastian, Ft. Pierce, and St. Lucie inlets and managed to pick up a few knots speed at each from a flooding tide. We arrived in Peck Lake at just about 7:00 pm. Amazingly, we made about 100 miles on the ICW that day.

Ebbing Tide - Lessons Learned/Earned

One thing that we "mastered" on our "Not the Bahamas" trip was how to enter or exit almost every inlet on an ebbing tide with an opposing wind. We now completely understand the reason for the warning in our guide books about trying to traverse an inlet when you have a strong ebb combined with a strong opposing wind. We almost grew accustomed to crawling up and down big mountains of water in order to clear the inlet. Once clear of the effect of the ebbing tide, we still had fairly big seas to contend with and that nasty, persistant 20-25k East wind. On our departure day, as we left Ft. Lauderdale heading for Miami, we were treated to the ebbing tide/east wind effect both coming and going. The picture above was taken coming in to Governmwent Cut over Chris' shoulder. This is not a camera trick - the waves coming in to Govt Cut really were 8' - 10'. Yikes!