Welcome to the land of Money

Welcome to the land of MONEY
February 27 Monday
    Friday - We anchored here in lovely quiet Key Biscayne late Thursday night and woke to a peaceful empty anchorage.  We had some fog rolling in, but the sun was breaking through and the water was like aqua blue glass.  From here there is a beautiful view of the Miami skyline.  Did I mention how quiet it is here.   Well not for long.  By 1300hrs the big boats started rolling in.  I’m not talking big as in 45 foot sport fish, I’m talking big as in 60-80 foot mega yachts.  All of them fully loaded with young adults (if you want to call them that) on the decks dancing to very loud music.  By 1500 there was maybe 30 boats here all playing different music and loud.  But once the sun started setting, they all scurried away like rats.
    Saturday - We decided to check to see how our fuel and water tanks were doing and if we needed to start making water.  When we open the floor boards we found a lovely mixture of water and diesel fuel sloshing around on top of the water tanks (NOT GOOD)  When we filled up on fuel in Ft. Pierce we fill them to the top and the port tank is only used for the generator so it was still very full.  The day before we left Peck Lake it rained all day and we were filling our tanks with rain water, so the we also very full.  Let me back up a moment.   This fall we cleaned our water tanks and did not seal them with caulk, The captain thought the thick black seal gasket was enough and this was the same for the fuel tanks, (WRONG).  When we sailed offshore thursday, we were healed over about 20 degrees most of the day.  We now have fuel in our water tanks. Not a lot, just enough to make the water smell and taste like diesel.  So we spent all morning saturday cleaning under the floorboards and properly resealing the view ports on both water and fuel.  The generator ran most of the day and we did three loads of laundry and hung them out so the smell did not come through on the clothes.  This was to try and bring down the water and fuel levels to work on them.  We keep 10 gallons of drinking water on board separate from what is in the tanks so we are fine on drinking water. 
    It is now about 1300hrs and we have had lunch finished cleaning the floor boards, and are going on a dinghy adventure, while we wait for Hazel and Tom to arrive this afternoon.  The boats are just starting to come in.
    Hazel and Tom have arrived, it's now 1500hrs and this place is packed with mega yachts and little boats, it is so loud and the sea is choppy, due to the boat traffic.  Hazel is overwhelmed by all the craziness, I guess we are kind of use to it, after yesterday. 
    I guess this is a major party spot, we almost got in our dinghy with a bottle of rum and headed to one of the big party boats. We then came to our senses and did our own party on board Serena Rose or as Tom calls her the Mother Ship.
    Sunday was the same big party scene, we figure there is at least a billion dollars worth of boats out here.  But it's very entertaining during the day, but nice and quiet in the evening when they leave. 
    We plan on crossing to North Bimini, Weds or thursday, depending on the weather, then on to the Berry Islands to check in.

Sorry this is so long, but we have not had any internet or wifi service till now.  This will be my last blog post until we cross and find a place with wifi.  So don't worry if there is no post for a few weeks.  If you are worried, you can always watch our progress on our tracker. Just go to http://share.garmin.com/kevinwalters.

Sail To Miami

Friday February 24th. 
    We set sail thursday morning from Peck Lake and headed to Lake Worth Inlet.  After several bridges and a peaceful motor down the ICW our arrival at Lake worth was around 1100hrs, then headed straight out the inlet.  We found the waters to be very calm.  Winds were 10- 12 knots out of the SSW and seas were maybe 1-2 feet, if that. These condition stayed the same until about 1730 and we cruised any where from 6.3 to 7.7 knots.  Around 1730 the winds started gusting and then holding 16-18 knots, seas began to build a little and became 4-5 feet.  So now we are sailing over 7 knots the rest of the way.  It was well after dark when approaching Miami’s Government Cut Inlet.  The skyline was beautiful at night, but finding markers with all the planes landing, and flashing lights on land as well as sea, we had to rely more on the radar and gps then our vision.  So all and all it was an awesome day for sailing offshore. We anchored in Biscayne Bay at 2200hrs had a hotdog for dinner and went to bed.
Today is very foggy but calm, we are waiting here until our sailing buddy Hazel on “Wave Dancer” and her new sailing buddy Tom Neilson on “Happy Healer” get here.  Being that they are both single handling, they will make the run over two days.  Both will stop in Hillsboro inlet to this afternoon and then meet up with us the following day.  Happy sailing my friends.  May the wind and sea angels watch over you both.  Remember, you can always follow our progress on http://share.garmin.com/kevinwalters

In Holding Pattern

We have been sitting at anchor for a week now waiting on serveral different components.  First a good weather window, second another boat that was going to cross with us and last but not least. We are waiting for Hazels crew to show up for the crossing.   It has been a very interesing week here in tiny little Peck Lake world.  On the weekends it is very busy and crowded, but during the week is very quiet.  If you go to the little beach in the cove there is a short walk path to the beach.  One day we made our way south in the dinghys and found a boat ramp where we could drop of our trash.  It is south to marker 23 the you turn right and then another right into this side creek which takes you to the boat ramp and a nice area to go walking.   Yesterday morning when Hazel was making her way over to our boat (by dinghy) she stopped by the boat anchored behing us with the name " Happy Healer" from Cocoa Beach.  Turns out it is another massage therapist she has know for many year "Tom Neilson" .   We all decided to venture off the boats for the day and got an Uber into town.  Did some shopping, laundry and had lunch.  All and all it was a nice change of pace. 
The offshore forcast has been all over the place.  We thought friday would be a great weather window, untill it closed yesterday.  So the next plan is to possibly just sail down the coast to Biscayne bay and hang there to cross.  Its all still up in the air, the joy of boating.
We have had several people ask if our tracking system was broke, since it has not change our position.  Well it works fine, we have not changed our position.  For those who dont have access to it, here is the link.

What a wild ride

The last 48 hours have been crazy.  Wednesday morning we left anchor at the islands in Grant and started heading south, with Hazel on "Wave Dancer" about an hour ahead of us.  We figured on making it to Ft. Peirce.  Well that didn't happen.  Only about 45 minutes into our journey and the engine over heated to 240 degrees.  We turned around and back track to the nearest island and anchored, Hazel continued on.  Our first check showed no water in the fresh water coolant system for the engine.  After waiting a few hours to let the engine cool down enough to work on it we tried just filling it with about 6 gals of water.  Every time we filled, it just ran right out.  Finally we found a broken hose clamp just under the tank where is goes into the cycling system.  Changing the hose clamp did the trick, by this time it was about 3pm so we just spent a lovely evening anchored behind the third island. (this looks like a nice place for future pirate scrambles. the island is clean and big enough for good NE coverage).  Hazel made her way down to Vero Beach Marine and grabbed a mooring for the night.
Thursday we had NW winds 12knots gusting to 20.  We sailed almost all the way to Ft. Pierce, cruising at 5-5.5 knots.  1430 Hrs we made it to Harbor Town to top of Diesel and Water.  This was during low tide and we had to wiggle our way to the fuel dock.  After filling up, we headed back out going south to anchor at Jensen Beach.  The water level was an extreme low tide, due to the full moon. We hit bottom several times in the middle of the channel but made it through, slowly.  AFter anchoring we enjoyed a beautiful sunset.  Hazel sailed down about 2 hours a head of us.  She ended up having to sail into anchor, due to a broken hydrolic line on her outboard steering cable.
Friday 0130 (1:30am),   We were awoke by load banging noices from the anchor and I felt like we were healing over.  The wnds had picked up to 28-30knots in the middle of the night.  Kevin thought our snubber had broke lose from the anchor chain and was being knocked around.  We got up just as our phones rang.  It was Hazel asking where we were , that she could not see us.  Well we couldn't see her either.  The snubber did come off the chain and had caught around our anchor ball. It then procedded to pull the anchor lose every time we had a could gust of wind.  We found our selves on our side on a 3ft. shoal and the wind was pushing us farther up on it.  So Boat Us to the rescue.  He arrived around 0300 and pulled us off.  We were pulled off about 30 minutes later and were able to re-anchor and finally settle down around 0400.  It was definately a wild ride.  We plan to stay here in Jensen Beach, till the winds shift and then we will venture a little farther south.   The snubber is not being  used for the next few days.

Our first week of relaxation

We have been on the hook (anchored), for almost a week.  There has been a lot of action around here for being away from land.  We left our slip Wednesday Morning (Feb 1st) and motored to the SE corner of Pineda Causeway, in the ICW(intracoastal water way).  Thursday late afternoon we had our dear friend Robert Wicker come over.  He was showing me how to setup my leader lines and use my new lures for offshore trolling.  We then had a lovely dinner of steak and Sushi seared tuna (yummy).  Friday was spent doing some last minute sewing and tinkering around the boat.  Saturday I made bread just in time for Bruce and KIndra to come raft up beside us.  We then had Roland, Gary and Shaza sail up and raft on the otherside, then Ed and Sherry about an hour later.  Rolands crew only stayed for a few hours then went home. The rest of our merry men stayed the night, with lots of drinking, eating and laughing.  It was sad to see them all leave on Sunday.  This was our final good by with lots of hugs and many tear shed.  But we will be back my friends to party another day.

Monday 2/6/16, We had a lovely leasure sail to the islands down in grant and then met up with our sailing buddy Hazel, on board "Wave Dancer". Tuesday is a day of rest for both boats and to prepare for a few days of long travel to make it down the West Palm Beach.  The plan is to leave Weds. morning to make Fort Pierce or Jenson Beach (depending on how fast we run).  We will probably stay in Jensen beach for a day, then proceed down the Lake Worth Inlet on Thursday.