The Journey is over for now

Once we left La Belle we continued down the Caloosahatchee Canal and River. The river is broad, lush with vegetation, and deep with a slight current carrying us on our way. It really was one of the prettiest rivers we have been on.

As we got closer to the next and final lock the water turned green and seemed covered in pollen or something like that. As we went through the water the wake turned almost flourescent green - very odd.

As we locked down another few feet at the Franklin Lock we asked the lock tender and he said it was an algae bloom caused by the phosphate runoffs from the adjoining farmland - not good. We were now back at sea level and except for the occasional bridge we had clear motoring.

As we got closer to civilization, Ft. Meyers being the next big town, the local tourists started showing up. I don't know where these guys we going but they were making good time.

After Ft. Meyers we finally turned north and went through Pine Island Sound past the large islands of Sanibel and Captiva and the smaller ultra-ritzy Useppa Island (I think you have to be a billionaire before you can land there) and Cabbage Key - which is famous for its restaurant that is lined with one dollar bills. The custom is to sign your boat's name on the bill and tack it on the wall; every few years they take them down, donate the money to a local charity and start anew. You can have your "Cheeseburger in Paradise" there!

Pine Island Sound is also home to 'fishing shacks' that are built on stilts in the open water - nice way to get away from the bugs.

After that long stretch from Daytona Beach, the subsequent near panic of the engine leak, and the nerve wracking crossing of Lake Okeechobee, we felt we deserved a break so we arranged for a slip at Gasparilla Marine in Placida just off the waterway. Oh joy, hot showers for as long as you want, a bar that served Margarita's on ice, and a sit down dinner at a table that didn't rock! The wierd thing is that after several days on a boat (I hadn't been off the boat for three days) you still feel like you are rocking.

Lazy morning and just made it to the 9:00 opening of another swing bridge and then up the waterway to our old stomping grounds and a nice anchorage by the De Soto monument.

Hernando De Sota landed here in 1536, probably claimed everything in sight for Spain, and dropped off 10 Jesuit priests to convert the locals. He also lost a few pigs in the bushes and apparently this is the beginning of the pork industry in the US - seriously! This is also the site of a pre-historic Indian village dating back to 350 BC.

Up the next morning for a very lumpy ride across Tampa Bay to Salt Creek Marina to be hauled out. They called us about 45 minutes from our arrival, told us the hoist was ready with the slings in the water, and to just drive it into the haulout slip. At about 9:30 we arrived and 15 minutes later we were off the boat and it was being hauled out for a pressure wash and blocking on land. Jeez - that was fast! Kind of disconcerting - the journey is over. We made it.

We went 1,266 miles on the waterways and another 70 or so on the Cheasepeake. We put just under 200 hours on the engine; in a car at 50 miles an hour that's equivalent to roughly 10,000 miles so you can see how slow we were going. The ICW is an amazing feat of engineering and maintenance: we went through miles and miles of rivers, channels, bays, sounds, canals, bridges, day markers (keep the red on the right) and locks. All of this is maintained by the US Coast Guard and US Army Corps of Engineers. Pretty neat. We're almost ready to do it again.

Thanks for reading all this - I hope it was worth your time.

Finally, La Belle FL

So Daytona Beach was a lot of fun. We spent most of the following morning taking the sound shield off the generator, which was toatally covered in soot, to discover that the exhaust elbow (which mixes raw water with exhaust gases) was totally cracked, and the water impeller pump (which cools those gases) was also shot. Bear in mind this is a very cramped space, lots of wiggling around, and a LOT of sweating and cursing. Lined up a mechanic to bring parts and install the next day - whew.

Next up was a new head (toilet) for the aft cabin. Luckily a West Marine (boat supply store) was actually on the premises! And I had a credit card! What luck?

So Wednesday (the 1st) was a rainy day but buddy showed up on time with all the parts, fixed everything up and then I gave him my check book. After that fun we installed the new head and now we really have to leave; we're having way too much fun.

Off early the next day. but first a stop at the fuel dock where I give them my wallet (check book is gone) and off we go down the Indian River and Lagoon headed south. Long pretty uneventful day to get to a an anchorage just south of Dragon Point and the swing bridge.

Up early the next morning to make it a long boring run down the Indian River to Stuart where we make the turn west to the other coast. Quite wide and lots of fixed bridges.

Even Rumor is getting tired of steering. "Are we there yet?"

Finally made it to a nice anchorage a few miles south of the Stuart cutoff, called Peck Lake. You can go ashore and then walk past that sign for several hundred feet through the woods and then you are on the Atlantic ocean.

There is a large tower next to that sign where kids were jumping off it. It's always nice to see parents take their little kids to a tower marked Danger and then encourage them to jump off it.

And we of course had the usual derelict boat with someone actually living on it.

The next morning the real fun began. Upon checking the engine oil (which we do every morning) I discovered about a quart of oil in the catch pan under the engine; now what? Valerie took Rumor to shore for a walk while I removed all the engine hatches and while running the motor I finally discovered a small leak by one of the small oil lines. So, based on my many years experience as a mechanic and with a bit of BFI (Brute Force & Ignorance) Tim the Tool Man grabbed his trusty 14mm wrench, gave it a little twist to tighten it up, and promptly snapped the line. Now I have oil spurting all over the place! A quick slither out of the engine room to shut of the engine and it was time to realise we had a major problem: we are miles from anywhere and the engine was out of commission. Valerie came back to the boat and after rummaging through all the bits and pieces of junk the previous owners had left on board she found the ideal fix - a foot long piece of 3/8" rubber gas line. With that and a few hose clamps I borrowed from the generator we were back in business. Whew, that was a close one.

Underway by 10:00 and then up the Okeechobee Waterway though Stuart and on to Lake Okeechobee.We stopped briefly in Stuart for some fresh groceries; we had lots of time because the next lock was under restriction and only opened at 9:00AM and 4:00PM. We got to the lock area early and saw seven large male manatees all trying to mate a lone female. We have never seen anything like this before.

It was pretty hard to tell if any of the males had any luck but this one looked rested.

The it was time to go up throught the St Lucie lock (up about 4 feet) and then were shocked to see the docks where we have stayed before; they were high and dry, no way you could use them.

.And then further along the canal were boats mired in the mud. They will be there for months if not years.

 Lake Okeechobee is about 5 feet lower than its normal low and this could take a long time to replenish. And this is why were are nervous about crossing it; there is about 4 feet of water in the shallowest part and we draw 3.5 feet. We went throught the final lock into the lake about 7:30PM; not really much of a lock, he just opened one gate and let us through, the difference was less than an inch. We decided to tie onto the dolphins (large cluster of pilings) at the entrance and promptly went aground. Great way the end the day. Managed to get off that and had a peaceful night. On the advice of the lock tender we kept to the far left of the channel going out into the lake and didn't have any trouble. Pretty boring crossing of about 25 miles but we did see some white pelicans which are not common.

On the far side of the lake we had almost 10 miles of channel to go through that fluctuated between 4 and 5 feet with the occasional 3 foot sounding just to scare me. The Clewiston lock was wide open.

And then along the rim canal which was a real relief - it had 10-15 feet of water.

And it was also swarming with alligators. This one had us all lined up.

Then through a couple of locks, one open, the other a drop of about 7 feet.

And then finally to an anchorage in the river next to the small town of LaBelle. Just slighty over 1,000 miles of waterway done. We're on the home stretch. 

Savannah to Daytona Beach

We left Thunderbolt Marina late in the morning and moved just a few miles downstream to an anchorage near a Publix grocery store. You really rely on the various guidebooks you buy to give you this local knowledge. You also learn to appreciate an air-conditioned car - which we obviously weren't in! It was hot and steamy lugging two large boat bags full of groceries back to the dinghy dock ($10 to tie up!) and then row back to the boat. Thunderstorms threatened all around us so we elected to stay there for the night.

Off the next day through the Georgia lowlands. Miles and miles of twisting narrow channels through what is basically swampland.

Many of the channels are very narrow and you have to use range markers to keep in the middle. The idea is to line up the two signs as you proceed up the channel; we must have used 15-20 of these during the day. As you can see we didn't always get it right.

The other fun part of the swamp is the hordes of horse flies. So one of us steered and the other swatted flies. Here's one days crop from just the upper helm area.

We made about eighty miles and anchored across from the Fort Frederica National Monument on St. Simon's Island. The Fort was constructed by Colonel Oglethorpe in 1736 to defend the town of Frederica from the nasty Spaniards who lived in St, Augustine. Not much left of it now.

 Hot night again so we started the generator to power the air conditioning; that lasted about an hour when we started to smell some fumes and the damn thing shut itself off. Great - more fun the bilge. But that will wait for another day.

Off early on Sunday, May 29th, back onto the ICW, through St. Simon's Sound, past the once ultra-elite Jekyll Island (owned by the Vanderbilts, Morgans, etc.), then Kings Bay (the USN nuclear sub base) and then Fernandina Beach - that's where the fun started. It's Memorial Day weekend and everyone with a boat is on the water, going as fast as they can and as close to us as possible just to see us rock and roll in their wakes. That went on for miles until we finally called it quits and anchored across from a public boat ramp. Here's part of the herd heading for the ramp.

The next day we crossed the St. John's river which leads to Jacksonville and then crossed Cumberland Sound with it's abandoned lighthouse.

And then through St. Augustine, founded in 1565 and the oldest established settlement in the US.

With it's Castillo de San Marcos fort built by the Spaniards.

And it's huge lighthouse which you can go into and climb up to the top.

Then a long afternoon run to Daytona Beach where we got a slip at the Halifax Harbor Marina. The next few days will be work days as we replace or repair both heads and figure out what went wrong with the generator.
We've gone almost 900 miles so far and figure we have another 400 to go.