Adventures on the Florida Waterway

Adventures in the waterway are certainly different from those on the ocean. This morning we discovered a severe shortage of milk, eggs, and steak for the cockpit grill. Yikes! Capt. John swung into action--jumping into the dinghy, motoring to the shore to see if the natives have our needed supplies--what a guy! As it turns out, there wasn't a grocery store near, but the little corner mart had some half&half, eggs and--most importantly--the steak!

We've been traveling south on the Florida Waterway for four days and have been enjoying the sights. Huge rookeries of mostly pelicans are a common sight--and an awful smell. Who knew? I guess all those big birds and no sanitation system--not even holding tanks for goodness sakes--makes for some pretty bad odors. We've started holding our breath when we motor past an island of birds so we can enjoy the visual.

Manatee--what's up with those guys (and gals too)? I think we've been spoiled by the little athletic dolphins who rush up to the boat to play in our bow wake. Dolphins seem so happy and agile--one never has to look out for them--they just play and stay out of your way. Now manatee--perhaps you already know--are quite the opposite from dolphins. They are big and slow moving--if they move at all. Apparently they spend a lot of time sleeping just below the surface and if you don't look out for them you can crash! We haven't had a collision--manatee or anything--yet and we're pretty slow moving ourselves, but we have had to maneuvre around a few huge manatee snoozing near docks. We are being careful not to do any damage with our big 4 horsepower dinghy outboard. Manatee are probably pretty nice animals--we just haven't encountered a conscious ones yet. 'Nuf said.

What other adventures are being had on the waterway? Well, there was the morning I spent hand washing underwear. Just as I headed up to hang them on the lifelines, Capt. John inquired if I was interested in rolling out a little sail. So the laundry waited while we rolled out all the sails and had a very exciting sail down the waterway--5 to 6 knots putting the rail in the water when the gusts came--fun! After about an hour and a half we took down our sails and went back to motoring. It was too late and there was too much salt spray to hang out the laundry, so we devised a line in the salon--aah--such an adventure.

Last night we anchored next to the city marina in Ft. Pierce. The city did a 3 hour sound and light Christmas show in the park. I don 't know how it looked on shore, but it was pretty spectacular from the boat.

Here are random pictures of our adventure:


This is the great Tiki Bar from our anchored boat--pretty nice--huh!

This is our boat from the Tiki Bar.

Aah--one of those impressive rookeries. They're everywhere along the waterway.

And this my friends is my clothesline in the salon. Not sure you can appreciate that it is actually 4 lines wide. It did the job--we're back in clean underwear!


Oh Boy--this island of pelicans was a particularly smelly one!

Baking bread is possible as we travel along the waterway--yum!


Florida has lots of bridges, but we are happy to report that most of them are high--very high--rise bridges. The few bridges that have to open seem to be very responsive to our requests for openings. The operators answer quickly, pleasantly and usually have the traffic stopped and the bridge open by the time we got there. When we call back to thank them, they chirp such pleasantries as "Have a safe trip," or "have nice day." Wow, we're impressed--thanks Florida!

We've been flying our little Beaufort flag and we're trying to be nice and polite too so don't worry about us giving the hometown a bad name.

This is Capt. John steering us down the waterway. You can see what a strenuous job it is. That little shiny grill to the starboard will be cookin' us dinner tonight.

Tis Christmas Season in Florida and we're enjoying it!