We must have been very tired because we both slept in till almost 6:00am...unheard of. After a quick brew of some morning coffee a sunrise over the Atlantic seemed in order. So we crossed the street and over to the beach to enjoy the morning wonders. Erik tried his 'time lapse' feature on his phones video. Not bad for a first attempt.
Back at the marina and on the boat Erik dug into the engine room to try and figure out where/why we were getting a gasoline odor (not a good thing to have!). It was discovered that the rubber washer for the fuel sending unit (sends reading of fuel level to gauge on dash) on top of the starboard side tank was leaking. After trying to tighten the screws to get a better seal it still did not seam to seal completely. So, at it has a bilge diaper (essentially a really study paper towel) around it and we are not filling that tank to the top for the time being until we can get a new washer.
We departed Ft Lauderdale to head to Stuart at about 8:30am. The cruise for today is indicated as about 82 miles. This was to be another hot and sunny ride! The first several hours of the day was mile after mile after mile of nice homes and nice boats on the ICW. It was fun to look at these nice homes many with beautiful landscapes, water features and infinity pools, but, it got kind of old pretty quickly. Also, a good portion of these first few hours was spent either just above idle speed (~6 mph) or at a standstill waiting for lift bridges to open for us. Our air draft is ~13' to the top of the fly bridge and ~16' to the top with our bimini up. There are tons of low bridges going from one side to the other of the ICW in this area. There were at least four of them that were too short for us. They typically open only every half hour. Most waits were not too bad, but we did have a couple that were 15-20 minutes each of sitting still in the hot sun. As we exited one of the last bridges that needed to be lifted for us we came upon 45's Mara Largo resort. We were too slow with our cameras to get any pictures.....not that we really wanted one anyhow!
Second attempt at time lapse
lift bridge opening for us to go through
And another video of a regular draw bridge going up and us traversing through
About half way through the 80+ mile day the landscape changed significantly from all concrete walls to a much more open waterway that was river like at some points but also had multiple large bays to traverse. The houses were still very nice and became much more varied in size and style most with very large yards that led down to a beach like approach to the ICW rather than walls. This area was much more appealing and interesting. As we rounded a corner of the ICW where there was a great lighthouse we were looking over at the many people swimming in the now crystal clear blue water on the beach banks close by. Suddenly a large manta ray came flying up out of the water just about 30 feet away from our boat. That was exciting and very cool.
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| We love the lighthouses! |
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| This particular one was very nice and had a beautiful landscape/setting had we taken this shot a few seconds later it would have also caught a manta ray jumping up out of the water |
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| Aquaholic resting gently after another good days work getting us to port safely |
We walked over to a restaurant adjacent to the marina and had a nice but pricey dinner of pasta. We thought we would be wise and split a dinner in order to save room for our favorite desert since some folks we were talking with on the docks told us where an excellent ice cream shop in town was :-) As usual, even splitting the dinner we were stuffed to the gills. We didn't let this stop us though and we took a nice long walk through the streets of the quaint town with many shops and restaurants. While walking we came upon man singing in an amphitheater along the waterfront. He tried to stop for the night but another couple made some requests. He sang a few more country songs and we danced the night away! Most of the shops had closed for the evening but fortunately the one we had our sights set on was open till 10pm and we made it there just before closing! Rather than get cones we bought a $15 quart of mocha chip ice cream to bring back to the boat so we would have it for the next couple of nights . It was very good, but not sure about good enough for $15 a quart??
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| Fountain in the town square of Stuart |
Thursday 6/11/2020 - Stuart to Ft Pierce
Two days in a row we slept in till after 6am....this is some kind of a record! After our morning coffee and a few small boat chores we set out on foot to get some breakfast. We haven't had opportunity to get to a store in a few days and had diminished all our breakfast food....nothing that a diner serving blueberry pancakes and biscuits and gravy can't fix! It was good but we were again stuffed. Seems like we will need to do a LOT more walking or biking today to burn some calories. The shops had started opening so we went into a few of them to browse. Renee got snagged by a lady outside the doors of a cosmetics/facial shop and was treated to a skin peel on her hand and a REVOLUTIONARY facial under her eyes to get rid of wrinkles! It did actually seem to have a good effect but for the $299 sales pitched price she decided to pass. The price suddenly came down to $199 but it was still a hard pass for the frugal Renee. We will still love her even with her perfect wrinkles!
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| Unique roof lines to this house we saw on our morning walk We thought it was pretty cool looking |
We departed Sunset Marina in Stuart at 11:30am. The trip planned for today was only to be a little over 30 miles. The sun was up but it actually felt a bit cooler than the last couple of days had been. Just a few miles into the trip Renee (The Navigator) informed Erik (The Captain) that he was needing to immediately slow down and take a hard turn to port to remain in the channel. The Captain saw things differently on the Navionics chart he was viewing and a small tiff was had between the Navigator and Captain which after a few words had the Captain slamming the throttle down to full speed and the Navigator tossing his phone down at his feet and leaving the bridge for a spell. A few miles later we pulled into a marina to fuel up and the Captain came to his senses enough to apologize for his listening skills and behavior.....life is not roses ALL of the time on the boat! The occasional thorn is well worth the beauty of the garden though :-)
We made good time for the remainder of our cruise and fortunately it was practically a straight line with no tricky navigation of channels. We got into Ft Pierce Municipal Marina at 2:30pm. We had much more energy than after the long hot cruises of the past couple days. After checking in and paying for our slip we got the bikes down from the bow. The rust on both bikes chains and sprockets has been quickly re forming. We used what was left of our bike chain oil on them but they were still having some issues so our first stop was at an ACE hardware to procure some more oil. After being lubed up they both started riding in an acceptable (far from perfect) manner. Erik's bike has developed this crazy high pitched squealing sound that no amount of listening, searching and lubricating of every part of the bicycle has been able to fix. It is the big mystery that will likely drive him insane before the trip is through.
We had been given a recommendation from a guy in the marina for where to go to be most likely to see a manatee. It was a fairly long (maybe 4 miles) ride to the end of the causeway which took us over a really tall bridge that we will be traversing under tomorrow.
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| View from the top of the very long bridge we rode over looking down/back at the the marina we are staying. This bridge was not only very long, but we're also convinced going up it likely brought us to the highest point in all of Florida! Whew....it was a leg burner |
All along this ride there were beaches along the side of the ICW where it was preparing to feed into the Atlantic. The first place we stopped did not make sense to be a location to see manatees so after a looking at the map we found the likely location. So, we determined we needed to ride on. We got to the end of the road where there were 'jetties' on both sides of the channel leading out to the open ocean. The surf was high and rough out there so we were very glad we had chosen to take the inside route(ICW) rather than the outside route(Atlantic Ocean). We would have been very tired and wet had we gone outside today. As we started walking out on one of the jetties one of the many people fishing pulled in a pretty good size jack fish (pretty fish with a bright yellow tail). Walking on out toward the end we were looking for any signs of a manatee. It was looking like we would have to settle for observing the hundreds of pelicans and gulls dive bombing for their dinner when all of the sudden Renee shouted "I think I saw one". It took a few more minutes of staring in that location to determine whether she really had or just had an active imagination. As we were preparing to leave, in that same spot as before, another sighting! We stood there for ten minutes or so and watched as the manatee surfaced in the exact same location every few minutes.
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| Hundreds of pelicans were dive bombing the waters just off the of jetties that formed the channel out of the ICW and into the open Atlantic Ocean |
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| And there it is! A manatee. Hard to get a good picture that shows much but we were excited that we had fulfilled our mission of sighting one |
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| Coming back over the bridge riding back to the marina view from the top of the other side of the ICW that we will be traveling tomorrow |
The temperatures and humidity seem to have fallen nicely this evening and after sunset it was very comfortable with a nice ocean breeze. After showers it was time to sit and catch up on a few work things as well as blog and do some homework for school. Oh yea...and ice cream of course....duh!!
Tomorrow we are planning for an even shorter jaunt of only about 17 miles up to Vero Beach which we have also heard some really good things about. The shorter day on the water will give us more time and energy to explore the area.
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