Well, the first mate wasn't feeling well, but the winds were up, so I got Bubbles ready for a day of sailing. That took a while as she has really been set up for living and going up and down the ICW. Finally got her out of the slip about 11 under a hazy sky with winds blowing 10-15 out of the South. Motored a bit (as I was doing some checking with the throttle cable) but got the sails up pretty quickly to sail down Langford Creek into the Chester. Tacked back and forth down the creek and into the river till I got to the point where Eastern Neck Island begins on the west shore and Piney Point is on the east shore and then I turned to a broad reach and headed back. A few other sailboats were out, but it seemed that Bubbles was going faster than them - catching up with them even though they had quite a head start. Great day of sailing - got back into the slip about 3!
Century Club: Tom Dean
Wanted to go out on a sail today - as winds were forecast to pick up in the afternoon, but the first mate was feeling lousy and hadn't moved from the settee, so decided to go for a a paddle instead. Went all the way down Davis Creek fighting a pretty good wind at times. The paddle back was much easier. Been a while since a paddle - in fact, Boot Key Harbor, so I was happy to get back on the SUP again!
5/14 - Picked up anchor at 9:15am after fighting with the engine (wouldn't start) for a while and headed to San Domingo Creek - back door of St. Michaels where we anchored with quite a few other boats. Got in about 6pm having motored most of the way (got a headsail up occasionally!)
5/16 - Left San Domingo Creek at 7am and headed for the South River - Harness Creek to anchor right outside of Quiet Waters. Went through Knapps Narrows and didn't really see any skinny water till coming out the west side - and then the lowest we saw was 6 feet. Arrived in Harness Creek at 1:15. Had a big storm come through in the evening - dragged a few boats in the anchorage.
5/18 - Left Harness Creek at 9:40 am bound for Annapolis - hoping to get a mooring ball in Spa Creek - which we did. A bit gnarly out with a west - northwest wind coming at us. Had some sails up, but had to drop once we turned towards Annapolis harbor. Dinghy overturned in the wind - dragging that slowed us down quite a bit. Stayed for 4 nights.
5/22 - Left Spa Creek at 9am (first bridge opening after rush hour), fueled up at Annapolis Harbor Marina and headed for Swan Creek to meet up with some friends. Got a mooring ball at Swan Creek Marina #8 for the weekend - getting on it about 1pm.
5/24 - Dinghyed around swan creek for a bit - seeing different things and eventually headed over to spring cove to check in with friends. Had a wonderful meet up - but a very, very wet ride back to the boat!
5/29 - pulled off the mooring at 10;35 and headed for Lankford Bay Marina - our summer home. Arrived at 4pm managing to sail part of the way before the wind just completely died off.
Sunday, May 4th - Water Taxi Rides from Portsmouth to Norfolk and then back
Monday May 5 - Sailed from Portsmouth to Yorktown where we stayed at the Riverwalk Docks.
Wednesday, May 7 - Sailed from Yorktown to Jackson Creek near Deltaville - anchored way back in the creek.
Thursday, May 8 - Sailed from Jackson creek to Reedville where we stayed at Buzzard Point Marina
Saturday, May 10 - Took the ferry over to Tangier Isoand and returned
Sunday, May 11 - Sailed from Buzzaards Point Marina to Solomon's Island Maryland. At first we stayed at our favorite anchorage across from the sailboats - then went to Safe Harvor Zanheissers and took a mooring ball for 2 nights.
4/20 - Fun Sailing Day with Daughter and her new Beau on the Stono River - spent 4 hours sailing! Very Fun
4/21 - Left St. John's Harbor marina, sailed out Charleston Harbor and out into Atlantic ocean headed for Cape Fear
4/22 - arrived Cape Fear and headed into Carolina Beach
4/23 - Carolina Beach to Mile Hammock Bay Anchorage for the night
4/24 - Mile Hammock Bay to Beaufort NC
4/25 - Beaufort NC to Oriental NC
4/28 - Oriental NC to Belhaven Marina in Belhaven NC
4/30 - Moved from Belhaven Marina to Belhaven City Docks (no room at the inn)
5/1 - Belhaven through the Alligator River up to an anchrage on the north east end - South Lake near Baranges Point
5/2 - South Lake anchorage to Great Bridge Free Dock - in between bridge and locks (Chesapeake VA)
5/3 Great Bridge, VA (Chesapeake VA) to Portsmouth and Mile 0 of the ICW
3/31 - Sailed from Boot Key Harbor to Rodriguez Key
4/1 - Sailed from Rodriguez key to No Name Harbor on Key Biscayne
4/2 - No Name Harbor to Bakers Haulover Inlet
4/3 - Bakers Haulover Inlet to Sunrise Bay
4/4 - Sunset Cove to Coconut Grove on the South Side of Flagler Memorial Bridge
4/5 Coconut Grove to Ft. Pierce City Marina
4/7 Ft. Pierce City Marina to Pineda Causway North Anchorage (at bridge)
4/8 Pineda Causeway North anchorage to Whaler Factory Anchorage just south of New Smyrna Beach
4/9 New Smyrna Beach to Halifax Harbor Marina
4/10 - Halifax Harbor Marina to St. Augustine Mooring field
4/11 - St. Augustine Mooring Field to Fernandina Beach via the Atlantic Ocean (12 hours)
4/12 - Fernandina Beach to Jekyll Island
4/14 - Jeckyl Island to Whahoo River 1
4/15 - Wahoo River 1 to Cooper Creek
4/16 - Cooper Creek to Racoon Island on Edisto River
4/17 - Racoon Island Anchorage to St. John's Marina in Charleston SC
upon our arrival in Boot Key harbor we began listening to the morning nets where we discovered lots of interesting things! One that we participated in was the dinghy drift at the full moon. Everyone gets in their dinghy's and meet at the mouth of Sisters Creek where it meets the Atlantic Ocean. The dinghy's tie together and slowly drift on the incoming tide down the river as the sun sets and moon rises. Sounded like fun, so we joined in. A real party atmosphere and a fun couple of hours getting to know our mooring neighbors and others in the harbor!
SS United States
SS United States
SS United States
2/1 - Boot Key Harbor... still waiting for mooring ball - paddled from the harbor to Sombrero Beach and back. Lovely paddle that took several hours.
2/2 - Moved Bubbles from the anchorage up to the mooring ball.
2/9 - Another Long paddle day - through the whole anchorage/mooring field
2/12 - Another long paddle through the anchorage/mooring field, In the evening participated in the full moon dinghy drift - lots of fun!
2/23 - Another long paddle. This time down Sisters Creek quite a ways.
2/26 - Another long paddle - first heading towards sister creek and then around the mooring field.
2/27 - Went on a friends catamaran - Gone South - out to see the SS United States as it passed by the Keys on its final voyage to be prepared to be sunk as an artificial reef. Managed to get within 2 miles of it - massive vessel!
Continuing South on the ICW
1/5 - Left Halifax Harbor Marina for Titusville Marina
1/6- Left our mooring ball at Titusville Municipal Marina and headed south. Stopped at Cocoa Village Marina as weather was getting a bit gnarly.
1/7 - Traveled from Cocoa Village Marina and anchored out near the Pelican National Wildlife area along the Indian River.
1/8 - Left the Pelican National Wildlife area and traveled to Jensen Beach where we took a mooring.
1/9 - Left Jensen Beach mooring and traveled down to Lake Worth, anchoring pretty far south in the anchoring field as it was very full. Had a bit of an issue anchoring at first, but finally found a good spot. This is where we began hitting all of the bridges...
1/10 - Lake Worth/Palm Beach to DelRay City Marina. This was a lovely spot and so we decided to stay for the weekend!
1/13 - DelRay Beach to Sunrise Bay. Again, lots of bridges!!
1/14 - Interesting day. Went from Sunrise Bay, stopped at Publix which has a large store with dock in Hollywood and then continued on to Bakers Haulover Basin at Oleta River State Park. Such a lovely area, we decided to stay for an extra day!
1/16 - Traveled from Bakers Haulouver Basin to No Name Harbor at Key Biscayne. Delightful harbor - but became rather tight. Stayed for the weekend as too many nutcases out on the water!
1/19 No Name Harbor/Key Biscayne to Steamboat Creek anchorage in north Key Largo. Dragged anchor a bit in the early morning, but it reset itself.
1/20 - Steamboat Creek anchorage to Tarpon Basin Anchorage in Key Largo. No real shore access although there were some mangrove tunnels that we paddled through. Got stuck/grounded coming in - TowBoat to the rescue. Stayed for a couple of days - weather got bad and going the back way through the keys...we were concerned.
1/24 - Tarpon Basin to IslaMarina in Islamarada. Overpriced marina with little to no service, but first mate needed a marina!!
1/26 - IslaMarina (overpriced and underserviced marina) to Lignumvitae Key State Park and used a free mooring ball.. Stayed an extra day and paddled around the key.
1/28 - Lignumvitae Key mooring ball to Boot Key. Couldn't get a mooring ball right away - so dropped the anchor just east of the Bridgt to Nowhere and got on the waiting list. 6 days later we got our mooring!!
Departed the mooring at Fernandina beach on the 14th a little later than we wanted - dropping the mooring about 11. We quickly ran into a couple of issues- the first being a coolant leak - easy to fix, after I found the hose that was leaking and then disconnecting the battery to battery charger I had installed for it was making the instruments go crazy - tach and voltage. We ran into some places where the current was so strong we could only manage 3 knots which made for a long day and not getting as far as we wanted to get. We crossed Nassau sound and were hoping to anchor just south, but a trawler was where we wanted to be and we couldn't get the anchor to hold (first time for that on this trip) so we kept going and finally anchoring in sisters creek about 6:30 (well after dark). We're hoping that the free dock had room, but alas it didn't... it would have if two big powerboats hadn't left as much room between them.
friday the 15th we continued south to St. Augustine where we picked up a mooring in the north field. We stayed here for 6 days leaving on the 21st.
Thursday the 21st we headed south again - this time to marineland Marina where we stayed for two days before leaving on Saturday the 23rd for Halifax Harbor in Daytona where we will stay until December 28.