Sunday, February 15
I picked up the girls at the airport and we headed back to Beaufort. We put them to work right away, helping us paint the bottom of the boat, since we were scheduled to launch the next morning at 10:00. Took the girls for oysters at the Sandbar.
Monday, February 16
They pushed our launch back to 1:00, which gave us time for a few more projects. Tom had to make a trip up the mast to fix some lighting problems and take a few photos. This is me and Carol laying on my new trampolines! --->
The boat yard brought a 200ton 'Travelift' over to pick her up, take her to the water and drop her in. She only weighs about 5 tons but it's the only lift that is wide enough for her.
The launch went off without a hitch. Tom's hard work on the diesel had paid off and it fired up right away.
She was finally in the water where she belongs!
Mona picked Buddy up at the airport and we put him to work right away, too! What a bonus it was to have an electrician on board!
Just as we were pouring champagne in the water to appease the sailing gods, some porpoises went swimming by. That was soooo neat! I found out later that this was a mating area for them. (Tom said it's a good thing that Mona didn't know about it or she would have been swimming after them...how long has Bobby been gone?)
Tuesday, February 17
Got up at the crack of dawn. The girls did some last minute laundry and shopping, while the boys changed the oil, filters, etc. and gave her the once over before we head out. We finally left the fuel dock at Jarrett Bay at 4:30 PM, waving goodbye to Mona and Mickey and the boat yard that had been our home for the last 6 weeks. We headed out the Beaufort Inlet into the Atlantic Ocean. Course was 230 degrees, towards the Cape Fear inlet approx. 71 nm.
It was a peaceful ride for the first several hours. The boys took the first watch. About 10:30 PM, the engine coughed and died. It sounded like a fuel problem. Tom and Buddy bled air from the lines and it started back up. While we sat afloat under starry skies, about 10 miles off shore, we could hear whales singing in the distance. That was sooo cool! Not that it was a good thing, but if the engine hadn't died, we would have never heard them. It made my day!
We think now that the old diesel that remained in the tanks for the last 2 years had grown some algae and that it was clogging up the filters and lines.
By now it was....
Wednesday, February 18
The seas got a little choppier and the engine continued to cough and die throughout the early morning, so we decided to pull in and take a closer look. We headed for Cape Fear and docked in Southport, NC. I called Mona and asked her to come by so we could use the car to run some errands. She was heading to see Weiner in Myrtle Beach, so it wasn't really out of the way.
The marina gave us a list of mechanics and one came out right away. He took Tom to the auto parts store for an electric fuel pump and had it installed before dark. We did some laundry, had dinner and passed out.
We didn't notice at first, but sometime in the night, waves had beaten on the new trampolines in the front and pulled one of the eyes out of the hull that was holding it on. After further investigation, Tom found that it had been repaired once before in that same spot. He did a little quick-fix fiberglass repair. Buddy was hard at work on some wiring issues.
Friday, February 20
We spent two nights at the Southport marina dock. The weather forecast off shore was good, so we headed back out towards the next inlet southwest about 5:00PM, Lockwoods Foley. We found that the inlets along here were not friendly: very little lighting and narrow channels, so, we kept going, aiming for the Little River Inlet which seemed like our best bet. (I would not recommend navigating the intracoastal waterway after dark.) In hindsight, we wish we would have gone back out the way we came in, even though it was a little bit in the wrong direction...
So we pulled into an anchorage to wait until daylight before attempting the narrow exit into the Atlantic.
Saturday, February 21
We figured we could get up by 6:00 and be out of the inlet at the crack of dawn. That’s exactly what we did, and the sun rise was indescribable (the picture doesn't do it justice.) I am SO glad we didn’t try to navigate that channel in the dark. There were marks that were not on our chart or the GPS, put there because the sandbars move around, and we probably would have ended up in the sand if we had tried it at night.
We were about 10 miles off shore, passing by Myrtle Beach on our way to Charleston, course approximately 225 degrees. The Captain/mechanic was tinkering with some things, we all have a belly full of cinnamon swirl French toast and temperature outside was up to about 55. It had been a cold trip up to now. The sun really felt good!
We’re about to put up the mainsail for the first time, even though the wind is a little squirrely. She's finally sailing!!
Sunday, February 22
Overnight, things were pretty quiet, until about 4 AM when the wind picked up and things got a little choppy again. Carol had been watching for water in the bilges and discovered that Tom's fiberglass bandaids were not holding and we were taking on water again. We also found that the batteries were not charging, and the guys determined that the alternator was bad.
So, we decided to head in. St. Simon's Island was close by, and had a nice wide entrance, so we went for it. The marina was really nice, the people were very friendly and helpful. The shower was hot, the laundry was cheap and the water nearby was calm. It was Sunday evening, so we knew the auto parts store wouldn't be open. After cleaning up a few things, including ourselves, we had a nice dinner, and all crashed for the night. I know I slept like a rock!
The next morning, we awoke with the sun. Tom immediately started taking the alternator off. We found out the the marina had a loner car, but we could only have it for an hour. I whipped up some egg sandwiches for them to take on the fly and sent Carol with them to get some groceries. I set off for the marina laundrymat. When they got back, Carol dug in to the hulls, like she always did, without a complaint, drying things out. Buddy was working on the same, trying to get one of the bilge pumps working, while Tom put the new alternator on.
We filled up with fuel and took off about 5:00 PM. Carol and I had the first watch, while the guys attempted to get some sleep. The wind started to move around to the southeast, which is exactly what we wanted. I adjusted the main a little, before the Captain took over about 1:00 AM.
We’ve been crusing all day with seas a little choppy, but I think we’re all getting used to it and it doesn’t seem too bad. It was sunny, about 65 degrees, but the wind chill was forcing us to keep our sweatshirts on. It was about time for a snack and a beer. It’s been a pretty uneventful day, except for a porpoise citing.
We were cruising along about 8 knots, one reef in the main, course about 150, heading toward a beacon just east of Cape Canaveral. Off the port side, at least three pairs of porpoises started racing by us, within a couple of feet of us. They raced across the bow and jumped up out of the water. It was sooooo cool! Then they came up on our stern, and did it again! They did circles around us for about 10 minutes, doing belly rolls in our wake. I got a little video that I can't figure out how to download, but I did manage to get a shot of them jumping right next to the boat. It was the neatest thing I’ve ever seen. They were swimming really fast, just playing with us. They finally got bored and swam away. I’m still grinning about it.
Wednesday, February 25
Happy 50th Birthday, Carol!
(I think we made it memorable for her.)
It was blowing out of the east most of the night, and rocking the hell out of us. I left the boys on watch about 8:00 and was awakened by my captain saying it was just too rough out and that we were going in.
We were approaching Ft. Pierce inlet, and decided it would work for us. Looked like it would be pretty easy, with an anchorage just inside the inlet. We through the anchor down and got a good nights sleep.
This morning, we woke just before dawn and after a few little projects, we were underway again. I had convinced Carol to hang with us just a little longer, just motoring down the intracoastal waterway, and we would hook up with Mona about Stuart, FL, 20 miles south. Just about 3 miles short of our designated rendezvous spot, the engine starting coughing again. You just have to laugh!
Captain managed to keep us going to the Jensen Beach bridge anchorage and we dropped the hook again, just as the engine gave out. I called Mona and had her adjust her course to meet us where we were. It was 10:00 now and Buddy needed to be at the airport by 11:30. The guys worked on the fuel problem and Mona found us about 20 minutes later, just as a small sportsfisherman was putting his boat in at a public launch ramp. She stopped him and asked if he would come out and give them a ride to shore. He was agreeable, so we said goodbye to our faithful crew in a hurry. We can’t say enough about what Buddy and Carol did for us. We could never repay them for sticking with us and always being ready to lend a hand.
So, after a couple of other problems were fixed, the Captain and I left Jensen Beach about 2:15 PM. Motoring down the ICW, past some beautiful mansions.
We pulled in to an achorage in Palm Beach just at dark, in the middle of a harbor surrounded by highrises. The cupboard was getting a little bare and I was too tired to cook anyway, so we had salad and bologna sandwiches before going to bed.
Got up at the crack of dawn again (I don't think I missed a sunrise the entire time). Pulled up the anchor and headed on south down the intracoastal waterway. It's unbelievable the money that people have down here. Mansion after mansion, yacht after yacht. Most of them sitting unoccupied, though I didn't really see too many for sale signs!
We were down to t-shirts and shorts, having a little snack and a beer. Temp about 75. Trying to get our timing right for the draw bridges. Most of them opened every half hour, but some were on demand.
I saw my first manatees. I guess they are all over the intracoastal waterway. Couldn't get the camera to snap fast enough to get a picture. They only surfaced for a second as they swam by.
We had to hurry to get through the last draw bridge, as we turned out of the intracoastal waterway into the New River in Fort Lauderdale. They stop opening the bridges from 4:30 until 7:00 for rush hour.
Tom's friend, Kenny Fish, was renting a house on the river with a dock and the boat he was working on was going to be in the boat yard until the 6th of March, so we get to use it for free. (It's great that Tom has kept in touch with some of these guys!)
So this is our home for the next 10 days. Kenny actually lives in a different house a few blocks away. He rebuilds boats for a living, and he uses this as his office, storage, etc. It's in disrepair, but it serves its purpose. It's definitely not like the mansions of the intracoastal. These are more 'regular' people.
Next door, a retired couple has been feeding some conures, they're like green parrots with a red tail. About 20 of them may be hanging out in the trees overhead at any one time. They like sunflower seeds! They're fun to watch, but really noisy.
The river here is quite busy. Boats going by all the time. Plus, it's narrow, winds around alot, and is lined with boat docks on both sides, with barely enough room for two big boats to pass each other. Last night, about 2 in the morning, some yahoo went by, way too fast, blaring Stevie Wonder at us.
The Jungle Queen is a tour boat that goes by three or four times a day, tooting its horn.
Saturday, February 28
So, that's the end of this story. We've got a lot of the bugs worked out on this trip and believe we are headed for lots of smooth sailing ahead...
We should be outta here by the second week of March, with Key Largo about 60 miles away, ready to start making some money!
I hope I haven't scared anyone away. We have absolutely no intention of putting our guests through anything like what we have been through in the last 10 days. This was our shake-down cruise. We expected to have problems, given that the boat sat in a boatyard for nearly two years. But, the diesel and generator are now purring like kittens. I'll be sanding, polishing and scrubbing while Tom is working on other little projects over the next few days to be sure we are ready for you!
Have you made your reservation?