Sunday, April 27, 2014

Velcro

Vero Beach FL
Capt. Pauly

We understand we have to be north before the start of hurricane season or tucked into the area from Jacksonville to Savannah but we wanted to wait until some warm weather showed up first. Seemed mighty silly to venture north in jackets and socks when we have no reason to be up there at this time. We were one of two sailboats heading south and we drew quite a few looks. Seemed to me that there were quite a few people rushing to get home. We have nothing to rush to. Home is where the boat is.

Now that we are in Vero we see lot's of folks in no hurry to rush north. Some are waiting for a weather window to go offshore and others are just relaxing. Relaxing sounds good. With our late start on the season and our slow movement we decided to stop here and smell the roses. Eventually we'll get bored and move on.

The slow pace of moving when the weather suits us is quite nice. Thirty mile days seem about right. Eventually we'll end up in the Chesapeake for some summer light air sailing, exploring and bug swatting. Don't much feel like doing anything with the computer at this time so I'll post in more detail about some of our stops along the way here sometime next week.

Highs and Lows:

  • Dolphins! Lots of Dolphins. We had an escort alongside as we got close to Vero
  • Broken hose fitting on the exhaust siphon break. 
  • Mantus works very well and is one heavy bastard to lift manually.
  • Melbourne. Poor anchorage with crab pots and a marina that lies about its approach depth.
  • Weather sucked for many days. 
  • Picked up our first mooring ball on 2nd try.
  • Noisy anchorage with something tapping on our hull. Aquatic woodpeckers? Killer scuba clowns?
  • Hot showers at anchor after the engine shuts down are awesome.
  • Happy to have a 30 gallon holding tank.
  • ROCKET LAUNCH! Saw a ROCKET LAUNCH! Yes, a ROCKET LAUNCH!
  • The low frequency rumble from the rocket was awesome. Very bright too.
  • I am overly and unnecessarily concerned about Deb liking it out here.
  • Deb has not killed me yet.

Some photos until I feel like writing again. Time for a nap in the cockpit.

Marina view. New Smyrna

Titusville weather

Are you the gatekeeper? I am the key master.

Was a blast picking up a moorig in this.

Finally it left us. Conch shells were blown.

Bet the inside is nice.

Cocoa anchorage

Velcro Beach moorings

No one ever mentioned the small planes overhead every 5 minutes
At one time we had a lawnmower, weed whacker, leaf blower, generator,
several small planes overhead, a harley on the bridge and then this
cropduster buzzed the moorings. Peaceful.


Cheers!
PJB






5 comments:

  1. Awesome. My blood pressure goes down just reading this.

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  2. So happy you're finally on the way! We probably won't get to see you till the Fall. You'll be north of us by the time we get to Beaufort for the summer. btw, loved the highs and lows list.

    Deb
    S/V Kintala
    www.theretirementproject.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete