From the Captain

South to Ft. Lauderdale

12/16/13 Stuart, FL to Hobe Sound, Jupiter Island, FL 17 nm.

Today, we passed what is probably the last piece of undeveloped land along the southern Florida east coast. Northern Jupiter Island is a nature preserve. Mangroves line both sides of the waterway. We are headed toward Peck Lake, an anchorage recommended by Silas, our friend in Vermont. He told us it is a short walk to an uninhabited beach.

We left Stuart in a 10-15kt. north wind. Today, the waterway is fairly straight, and we can sail. We put out the jib tentatively at first for it has been quite a while since we've sailed at all.

We're rusty. The wind fills the sail on a port tack. Luna heels to starboard. The commander has cleaned all the lockers and left the doors off so they can air out. Things begin to fall from the port lockers. The starboard jib sheet keeps fouling in the winch. It is not led through the block on the jib track on deck. Finally, we get everything straightened out and turn the motor back to a fast idle. We're sailing again!

We reach Peck Lake, but there is a major dredging operation going on, and there is a barge across the entrance channel. We continue south to another anchorage further down Jupiter, where the mangroves have given way to moderately well appointed houses. We find a spot suggested by Skipper Bob from his book of ICW anchorages. We move close to the developed shore to minimize exposure to the north wind. The anchor is secure. The full moon rises.

12/17/13 Hobe Sound to Lake Worth, FL 13.6 nm

If we ever do this trip again, I'm bringing a crew member, and his last name will be Cousteau. We had an opportunity to meet another diver today, and it's getting expensive. We were anchored  alongside the ICW off Jupiter Island and were unable to raise the anchor in the morning. We used Luna to pull the anchor rode in various directions: nothing doing. I took another anchor line and looped the chain around the original line. Hopefully the loop of chain will  sink down the line and reach the shank of the anchor. Pulling the new line from the opposite direction may dislodge an anchor stuck under a pipe or a cable or a rock. I row the spare line out in the dinghy and pull. Nothing.

I tried to flag a fishing boat across the waterway. He didn't see me, but a man standing on shore did. He called on the VHF radio asking if we needed help. His name is Matthew, and he works for the owner of the house near our fouled anchorage. She lets him keep his boat there. He came out to meet us. I tied the second anchor line to his boat and had him pull in a different direction: still nothing doing.

So, I got another opportunity for an unplanned swim, this time with mask, snorkel, and fins. Pulling myself down the anchor line, I saw the anchor chain tightly looped around an old pipe coming up from the bottom. There was no way I could stay down long enough to loosen the chain. So I put a line on the end of the pipe which was quite near the surface, and had Matthew try to pull it up with his boat: nope.

I asked Matthew if he knew a diver, and he did. He called a friend on his cell phone, and his friend agreed to come over in the afternoon as soon as he was finished with another job about 45 minutes away.

Our friends on Mighty Fine guide us in to Lake Worth anchorage

Chris Kent, the diver,  was able to undo the loop, and we raised the anchor easily. His services were reasonably expensive, but much less so than the Rocna anchor and chain we would have cut away. We were on our way south by 2:30 pm. Fortunately, we didn't have far to go to. Our destination was an anchorage on the northern end of Lake Worth where our friends from Stuart had spent the night before. Luckily, we arrived to meet them just at happy hour. Unfortunately, we missed a lunch date with my mom further south in Palm Beach.

We never have a chance to sit and observe the Intracoastal Waterway. When we're traveling, we rarely see other boats, because all are going at about the same speed. A few faster motorboats pass us, an occasional faster sailboat. Most of the time, we're traveling alone. Therefore, I was amazed by the great number and variety of boats that paraded past us as we sat on our anchor next to the channel. Sail boats outnumbered motor yachts by 3-4 to one.  Once we got past the urge to move, waiting was a rather relaxing and pleasant experience. The commander made muffins. I did a few small tasks. The sun shone. The time passed quickly.

12/18/13 Lake Worth.

The northern part of Lake Worth is a very pleasant anchorage. From the boat, it is a short dinghy ride up a small creek to a beach by the roadway bridge. Tie the dinghy there and walk up to the road. It's only a couple blocks to a Publix supermarket, a bank, and other stores and restaurants. None of which, by the way, seem decorated for Christmas, now only a week away.

Afternoon at the beach, John D. MacArthur State Park

In the afternoon, we returned to the road and walked a couple of miles to the John D. MacArthur Beach State Park. This is a 324-acre wildlife preserve and bird sanctuary. A long boardwalk crosses an estuary where white ibis, herons, and egrets fish in the shallows. We can reach the beach from here and sit for a time admiring the turquoise water.

The park was a gift from John D. MacArthur. He, and his second wife, Catherine T., both well known among public radio listeners for their eponymous foundation, also established a fund to maintain the park. I learned that John D., born to humble circumstances in Pennsylvania, acquired and built Banker's Life and Casualty Insurance Company. In 1954, he bought 2,600 acres of land in northern Palm Beach County. This included the area around the park, the lake in which we are anchored. Eventually the holding became the towns north of West Palm Beach. At the time, he was one of the wealthiest men in America.

It was a long walk to the park from the bridge under which we tied our dinghy. It will be a long walk back. But, there is a gift shop. Fortunately, the shop sells ice cream. Believe it not not, I found my

Luna adds light to the presolstice darkness

first ever (wait for it…) mango creamsicle. Next time I'm in Mexico, where this was made, I'll look for another.

The walk back was fine. All in all, some decent exercise and a good, relaxing day after the anchor problem of the day before. Luna's Christmas lights, wound around a long spinnaker sheet attached to the end of the boom and bow and hoisted up the mast with the main halyard, shone in the harbor.


12/19/13. Lake Worth to Las Olas Marina, Ft. Lauderdale, FL 53 nm.

We had another reason for spending a second night in Lake Worth. Watching the weather forecast, today looked like a good day to make the trip to Ft. Lauderdale by leaving the waterway and sailing off the coast in the ocean. Not only would Luna actually get to sail, but we would miss the 20 or so drawbridges between us and our destination.

No one making this trip has anything favorable to say about drawbridges. Many run on a schedule: they open every half hour or hour. Going south from here, some open on the half hour and some on the quarter hour. You can time your speed so you don't have to wait for an opening. The speed is about 7 kts, which Luna makes only with some difficulty if there is not opposing current.

Waiting at a drawbridge is always a source of anxiety. If the current is going toward the bridge, you have to sit in reverse or make circles until the bridge opens. If there are other boats around, you have to gauge their intentions and avoid them when you turn. We met some Vermonters on their sailboat in St. Augustine. The husband said of his wife, "She never uses bad language, but tell them what you said about the drawbridges last time we were down here." "Fuckin' drawbridges," she replied.

Having hoisted and lashed the dinghy to the foredeck last night, we weighed anchor at 7:45am and motored south toward the Lake Worth inlet. Just before the inlet, we rounded Peanut Island.

Peanut Island is of some historical significance. A former Coast Guard station, it sits like a bull's eye in a cosmic horizontal dartboard in Lake Worth. When President John Kennedy vacationed in Palm Beach, this was the site of the presidential bomb shelter. During the Cuban missile crisis, when Americans held their breath and the Russians blinked, I imagine the insurance companies were having fits. A well-placed Russian nuke would have wiped out half the property and marine wealth in the country, or so it seems. That was then in the 1960's. As we were to find, the balance of ostentatious wealth has moved south toward Miami.

Nonetheless, I would imagine that Peanut Island would have been to a Russian Bomber as a new hat is to an overflying seagull. This actually happened to me once. We were standing on the wharf in San Francisco waiting for the Sausilito ferry. I felt a splash on my head. Luckily I was wearing a hat. Unluckily, it hit my shirt as well.

The commander and I have had an ongoing discussion since: was this a random act of nature? Or did the seagull aim for my hat? She favors of the former interpretation. I, of course, the latter. What does this say about us?

This would be a good addition to the standard psychiatric intake interview: "If you were sitting in a theater and noticed a fire, what would you do?"…"I see."…"And how is an apple like an orange?"…"Yes, yes." .."And if you were standing around and seagull droppings landed on your head, would you consider this an intentional act on the part of the seagull or a random event of nature?"…"Oh, I see. And why, do you suppose, at you, in particular?"

In any case, the weather called for NNE winds at 11-17 kts with waves 2-4 feet and an occasional 5-footer at a period of 6 seconds. To me, it sounded perfect. Remembering the broad reach down from Sandy Hook, I imagined we'd be making nearly 7 kts the whole way and reach Ft. Lauderdale by mid afternoon.

It didn't quite work that way. Leaving the inlet, the wind speed was 20 kts, and direction had turned more to the east. Waves were more frequent and at the high end of the prediction. Not confident in the forecast, I climbed up on the cabin top and reefed the mainsail. I wore a life vest and clipped a safety line to the boat.

It felt wonderful to be sailing again. Luna handles the swells. The spray occasionally breaks over the bow, but does not reach the cockpit. Making a sandwich in the bucking galley is unthinkable, so for lunch the commander brings out some crackers and cheese, a can of Pelligrino Orange and a can of seltzer.

Meanwhile, the deep blue color of the ocean is gorgeous. There are occasional turquoise highlights closer to shore. There are no dolphins, but little flying fish skitter over the wave crests, flying on their wing-like pectoral fins. Where there are a lot of them, there must be larger fish below. Mahi Mahi prefer flying fish.

Maybe in retrospect, we could have left the mainsail fully set. On Lake Champlain, I wouldn't reef the main below 20 kts. The ocean is so much larger and to me, daunting and unpredictable. We met a Canadian couple who are sailing on a 48 foot boat they built from a hull. They retired this year, sold everything, and are intending to live on their boat until it's time to go to the nursing home. They started their journey in Toronto and sailed down the St. Lawrence, past the Bay of Fundy and down the coast of Maine. They have sailed outside the shore including a harrowing run from Norfolk to Cape Fear. Running downwind near Hatteras, the wind kept backwinding the mainsail, eventually breaking their battens and tearing their sail. All cheerfully told, of course, but I accord the sea much more respect at this point.

We passed large sport fishing boats bobbing around off shore. A larger sailboat passed us further out

Give the cruise ships a wide berth in Port Everglades Harbor

to sea heading south. With our shortened sails and larger waves abeam, our speed drops to 4-5kts. According to the GPS, we will not reach the Ft. Lauderdale inlet until 5:30 pm. It will be getting dark. At noon or so, we turn on the engine and motor sail the rest of the way. We get to the inlet at about 4:30 pm, drop the sails, dodge a cruise ship leaving port, and motor up to our waiting slip at the public marina at the base of the Las Olas Blvd bridge.

Our friends from Mighty Fine and Mar-a-Lago are here to help us. We tell them of our adventures at sea. We covered about the distance from Key Biscayne to Bimini, though always within sight of land. They tell us of the huge houses and boats along the waterway and their experiences with the drawbridges (all uneventful).

While we are sitting at a picnic table in the early evening, the Las Olas bridge opens. On alternate openings only one side raises. I'm not sure why this is. A huge motor yacht, the size of Rhode Island, glides by. As she passes the bridge, we hear metal scraping. She emerges with her antennae bent. The radar dome looks askew. Her captain must have missed the fact that half of the bridge was down.

John Prine sings, "Have you ever noticed, when you're feeling really good. There's always a pigeon that'll come shit on your hood."

12/20 - 12/22/2013 Las Olas Marina, Ft. Lauderdale

Ft. Lauderdale beach--Where the Boys Are

This is a nice place to be. Inexpensive at $1.35 per foot. A block and a half away from the beach. Clean. Friendly. A little noisy with the bridge going up and the boat traffic. "Get back behind the barricade. The bridge is going up!" yells the bridge tender over the loudspeaker with a great sense of urgency to an errant pedestrian.

I changed Luna's oil in the morning. Tightened up a hose clamp on the fuel pump that was leaking diesel fuel into the bilge. We took a walk to the beach in the afternoon. My mom's friend and caretaker drove her down to visit later. We walked out to Luna. Visited for a bit. Had an early dinner on Las Olas Blvd.

Dinner on Las Olas Blvd.

Later we met Craig and Donna, Brian and Jane for the remnants of their dinner party at Hooters. We have never been to a Hooters before, but I imagine they are not talking about owls. The six of us walked back to the marina and made plans to take the dinghies to explore some of the canals  lining the waterway. One of them leads close to a Publix and West Marine, always popular stops among the yachting set. All the canals, it seems, are lined with large houses and boats to match.

We had a nice time with my mom. While I can trace my introduction to and love of sailing to my dad, I think I have my mother to thank for my sense of fun and adventure.  And for the optimism to believe I can take on some of the more ambitious things I do, and it will work out ok. Such as this trip.

Greetings from Ft. Lauderdale