Central Florida
The trip through central Florida was pretty uneventful. However, the weather was pretty breezy. Every day the wind speed was about 20 knots and the Intra-Coastal Waterway (ICW) has been pretty choppy. Normally we would not travel in this kind of weather, but the wind direction was from the north. This means, when travelling south, the wind is at our back so we did move further south in smaller segments.
Mile 747.5 to Mile 778.6 (31.1 miles): We left Palm Cove Marina near Jacksonville Beach at 0820 hours and motored about 31 miles to St. Augustine, FL. where we picked up a mooring ball ($20/night). St. Augustine is a really good stop with lots of historical sites to see. We stopped here for a couple days for Thanksgiving in 2003. But since we lost so much time with repairs in St. Simons Island, GA and Jacksonville Beach, we decided to stay one night and continue moving south.
Motor-sailing south on the FLA ICW
Mile 778.6 to Mile 830.7 (52.1 miles): We dropped off the mooring ball at St. Augustine Municipal Marina at 0740 hours and put in a long day motor-sailing to the Halifax Harbor Marina in Daytona Beach, FL ($1.70/foot plus electric). This marina is a very large and modern marina on the west side of the ICW near downtown Daytona Beach.
We met some interesting people here. The person in the boat in the slip on our port side was a wheat farmer from northeast Montana. He gave us a book about his life as a wheat farmer. The person in the boat on our starboard side was a gentleman who worked his entire life in Texas. He now lives in Nova Scotia, Canada in the summer and takes his boat to the Exumas in the Bahamas in the winter. He has been doing this for 10 years. You meet all kinds of people on the waterway.
Since the weather was so windy and cold on this day, we went to eat at a nearby Greek restaurant and turned in early. We took on 8.3 gallons of diesel fuel at this marina so we could travel another 150 miles down the ICW.
Motor-sailing in FLA ICW near Daytona Beach
Mile 830.7 to Mile 846.0 (15.3 miles): We left Daytona Beach at about 0930 hours. The weather was pretty breezy and forecasted to get even more so. Since there were no suitable anchorages or marinas for the next 30 miles after New Smyrna beach, FL, we decided to stop at the New Smyrna Beach Municipal Beach Marina ($1.25/foot plus electric) just off the west bank of the ICW.
Since we had a short day, this allowed us time to walk east across a bridge over the ICW and walk through the old section of New Smyrna Beach to the beach. New Smyrna Beach is one of the few places on the east coast that allow people to drive their car on the beach. However, we did not get to see this unusual site as this day was a Saturday and apparently they do not allow cars on the beach on the weekend.
Mile 846.0 to Mile 878.2 (32.2 miles): We left the New Smyrna Beach marina at about 0850 hours and experienced the windiest day yet on this trip. The wind was blowing a consistent 20 to 25 knots. This was only tolerable because it was hitting us from behind (i.e., from the north). We motored-sailed with our headsail reefed about halfway out and we made our best time yet. We averaged about 6.8 knots on this segment of our trip which is very fast for us.
The ICW was choppy but luckily was a following sea. However, when we arrived at Titusville, FL we decided the nearby anchorages were not protected enough from the wind and the anchor holding in these areas is only fair. So we decided to pick up a mooring ball at the Titusville Municipal Marina ($14/night).
The Titusville Marina’s mooring field was completely exposed to the winds from the north. When you pick up a mooring ball, you must turn the boat into the wind. Have you ever tried to pick up a mooring ball pennant line in 20 to 25 knot winds with the water very choppy? Well, it is not easy to do. You must motor right up to the mooring ball and try to pick up the 10-foot pennant line with an 8-foot boat hook and try to feed your mooring line through the mooring ball pennant line ring and tie it off to your boat before the wind pushes the boat away from the mooring ball. When the wind is heavy, you only have a few seconds to do this. It took us three attempts but I managed to get us tied off on the third attempt.
Vero Beach Marina Mooring Field
Needless to say it was a very bouncy night in Titusville, FL. In fact it was so bouncy that I attached a second line to the mooring ball pennant line for extra security. When you are below deck you hear every sound of the mooring line as it pulls against the bow cleat and chock when the boat moves back and forth in the wind and up and down in the waves. My wife commented that we might as well anchored off the beach on the ocean side. But at least we did not have to worry about the anchor dragging.
Mile 878.2 to Mile 914.7 (36.5 miles): On this day it was still very windy (about 15 to 20 knots from the Northwest) and my wife was not interested in spending the day bouncing around on a mooring ball. So we dropped off the Titusville Marina mooring ball at about 0830 hours and motor-sailed about 36 miles to Melbourne, FL. We got a slip at the Waterline Marina ($1.50/foot plus electric; however no WIFI). We stopped here because we were to meet Dena’s nephew who lives in Melbourne, FL. He was holding our mail forwarded from Maryland to Melbourne, FL for our pickup.
We had a nice evening with Dena’s nephew, wife, and two small children.
Mile 914.7 to Mile 951.7 (37.0 miles): We left Melbourne, FL on another very windy day at 0800 hours and motor-sailed 37 miles to Vero Beach, FL arriving a couple days before Thanksgiving.
We were very glad to reach Vero Beach, FL in one piece as we will stay here a few days to relax, re-provision, and perform some maintenance tasks. From here we only have a couple more days on the ICW before we get to North Palm Beach where we will pick up our delivery captain to take us over to the Bahamas.
Vero Beach is one of the best stops for cruisers on the ICW. I will describe Vero Beach in a little more detail in my next post.
Relaxing on Odyssey at Vero Beach Marina
We left Annapolis, MD on 2 October. We arrived in Vero Beach, FL on 20 November. This means we spent 49 days traversing the ICW to date. We did lose 7 days due to Tropical Storm Sandy. We lost another 7 days due to boat repairs. But we made it.
In another week we will make the jump across the gulf stream to the Bahamas…….weather permitting of course.
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