Riding the washing machine sector…
After three fun but long weeks in Cape Canaveral (as it was just so hard to find places to get to land in the dinghy without a sketchy dinghy ride or landing), time was pressing and we learnt yet another valuable lesson on our adventures. You can either tell someone where you might be, or give them a date as to where to meet. But you can’t have both. You should not say ‘ I will definitely be in Miami area by Christmas time’ even if you think it is weeks away. Because the weather gods are likely to screw you, and you end up letting people down, or you end up making decisions about a passage that you will regret.
We needed to get to the Miami area to meet my sister and her family for Christmas and had, several weeks earlier, thought it would be no problem to get there. But the funky weather gods of 2023 had other ideas, and we were still well north of that destination with a week to go. Hence we decided to get further south as we were desperate to do, and took a weather window that was definitely not dangerous (as we wouldn’t have done it!) but we knew was going to be really uncomfortable. And it was - literally like being in a washing machine for 24 hours, you couldn’t sit without being flung around, you couldn’t lie down without rolling, it was just horrid. Our passage was Cape Canaveral to West Palm Beach, where at least by getting there just before Christmas there was only a taxi ride from Miami to meet up. Pete took most of the night shift as I was struggling on this one, but by 5am was starting to hallucinate as to what he was seeing (or thought he was seeing) on the land a few miles away so sent him to bed for an hour. Just as we entered the already busy harbor entrance of West Palm dodging fishing boats and cargo ships coming in from the Bahamas, a massive squall came over and basically removed what little visibility we had but we got in safely, and ensconsed ourselves into the busy anchorage to the south of the entrance, right next to Merit, one of the original Whitbred Cup boats from the 1980’s designed by Farr.
There we got to spend a few days recovering and seeing family, whilst we took yet more learnings under our belt.
With family then on board over Christmas, Santa still made it to the boat and we had some fun - however the weather still grey and decidedly un-Florida like, so we went down the ICW for the next part of our passage. Not something we are able to do often with a boat of our size but the 16 bridges between West Palm and Fort Lauderdale were all opening bridges so we spent a fascinating day after Christmas heading down there, with just mile after mile of multi-million dollar houses lining each side of the channel. Made a welcome change from the grey of the Atlantic ocean swell a few days earlier, and lucky we did it as managed to swing the toddler (cousin) on board past an urgent care to diagnose an ear infection on the way!
We also used the time with my brother in law on board to surge ahead on the ‘last’(if that were even a thing :) ) of our big boat projects that would help drive us out the US, which was to install our watermaker. Having picked up all the kit from SeaWater Pro a few days earlier, it involved many hours down the hole that was the old starboard forward crew cabin, and provided a great challenge for the men on board to work through together. And now nothing more satisfying than creating your own water and making your own power from the solar panels we already had. Quite the off grid family we have now become!
Some lovely memories made with cousins on board as we had a lovely sail out the hell that is Ft Lauderdale, south to Biscayne Kay and No Name Harbor. The water continued to get bluer and bluer through our escape hatch inside, Annabelle finally got brave enough to put the hammock under the bow and climbed down there as we sailed along. The kids found it a wonderful feeling getting a wet butt like that as we did 8 kn! Arrived to a glorious sunset overlooking the boat from No Name Harbor in Biscayne Bay, the first of the Florida Keys, as we had a sundowner.
