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.