We have gotten to our winter home in Marathon, FL after an overnight passage from Ft Pierce, FL. We left Ft Pierce about 0700 on Tuesday and arrived in Marathon before noon the next day. Very fast.
Normally I would have written several blog entries before we got to Marathon but this year we did not stop anywhere long enough to do any writing except for Ft Pierce. At Ft Pierce we had several computer update issues that prevented any writing, just got some bill paying in.
We left Annapolis a week and a half later than normal due to wrist surgery for Carol to repair a break and the addition of a screw to the wrist. We were very lucky with the doctor and the surgery scheduling.
We had very good weather southbound until we got to Florida, no wind, no big seas. We had our usual stops in the Solomons, and Jackson Creek in the Chesapeake and Hospital Point Cove in the Norfolk area. The Dismal Swamp Canal was closed due to damage from Hurricane Matthew but we did not plan on going that way, anyway. We took two nights at the free dock at Great Bridge for resupply, maintenance and taking down the stuff at the top of the mast. Then we stopped at all our usual spots along the ICW. The Albemarle, Pamlico and Nuese systems were okay. Not great. Okay. Our stop at Wrightsville Beach was unusual because we only stayed one night there. Carol is 'unable to work' so there was no stop to fly off. It was extremely crowded in the anchorage but we were fine. We also were lucky we arrived on a Thursday and got the buy one, get one free Hibachi Bowl at the King Neptune Restaurant. Yum!
After Wrightsville Beach we went down the Cape Fear River and out to sea. Again. For the second year in a row flooding in the Carolinas made the bridge clearances too low for us. This year it was Mathew's fault. We had a decent overnight at sea. Not great but okay. We went in up the Savannah River to rejoin the ICW following the same pattern as last year. We were at Cumberland Island, GA planning to go out to sea again but the fog was way too dense. After a couple of hour wait we started to crawl out in hopes we were right in our 'slightly clearing' guess. We weren't but once we got to the St Marys River entrance things suddenly cleared and off we went. We went in at St Augustine having learned that just the day before the USCG had placed the channel buoys to mark the entrance. The buoys had wandered off during Mathew. The late start meant we really had to rush to get fuel, showers and dinner before bedtime.
From there it was all ICW until we got to Ft Pierce. We anchored in our usual spot in Faber Cove but our friends, Mike and Carol, were away on a cruise. We rented a car to drive to Cape Coral on the west coast of Florida to attend my Aunt Bonnie's 100th birthday party. She is doing amazingly well in spite of only very recent slowdowns due to age. Very recent. After Mike and Carol got home we were able to visit a bit, do some shopping, and get X-Rays on broken bones before moving on as noted at the beginning of this blog entry.
Now we are here in Marathon and starting to get into the rhythm of our winter home. Long time resident, 94 year old Cap't Jack, passed away the day before we arrived. The marina moorings are nearly full, much earlier than normal. Must be a good economy. Thanks, Obama.
The weather right now is terrific. Very dry and crisp. Almost like New England in the Fall except it's nearly 80 degrees. Since we got to Ft. Pierce we had a few days of passing showers but no real storms. We had some light rain on our overnight from Ft Pierce but nothing bad at all. The winds were light and/or behind us so the seas were not an issue. We went outside on our passage past Miami for the first time. Had some issues with the reefs and crab pots but we didn't hit anything hard enough to do damage.
