Joy Ride

Approaching the WPB Inlet.  Welcome back to the Unites States!!
If we had broken down, GS was prepared to swim the rest of the way in...

Just inside the West Palm Beach inlet is a huge anchorage area, Lake Worth.  It is bustling with freighters, cruise ships, barges pushed by tugs, tour boats, sail & motor boats and pleasure craft of all persuasions.  Marinas line its shores; posh ones for the superyachts, facilities for racing boats, marinas for regular folk and heaps of yards.  Everyone who has a waterside home along the ICW seems to have a dock and some kind of watercraft too.  Boating is big business in the US.  

Looking south from our anchorage in Lake Worth

Lake Worth is also busy with hundreds of sailboats and motor cruisers either waiting for a crossing window to the Bahamas/Caribbean or just sitting out winter in Florida’s sunshine.  Luckily, we found a decent space not too deep into the waterway, set the anchor in waters unaffected by ocean swell and celebrated our arrival watching the sun set.  A Margaritaville Cruise (a 3 day, booze, food and casino getaway) headed offshore and trains arced up those compulsory, loud, lonesome, night whistles that can be heard all along the ICW.  

Water Tank near our lunch stop

Our plan was to visit Immigration & Customs at the Port in the morning, settle our cruising permit, then have a long lunch sitting in the sunshine by the dock at the Tiki Bar, renown for it's Mexican food and giant cocktails.  We looked forward to easier motoring/sailing conditions heading north along the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway (ICW).  A quiet Vero Beach Marina mooring, 2 days away, was in our sights for a week of repairs, rest and recovery.  Well, that was the plan… 

Shallow Minded

X-ing File #6_A Gulf Stream Crossing & the Atlantic ICW

Ridin' the Ditch: West Palm Beach to Vero Beach

(A speedy number, built to impress for sure.  Typically Floridian in style.  Mostly driven with a sense of purpose.  Watch out for them at the Blue Heron Bridge!)  

Sunset over the port of West Palm Beach.  Still no Green Flash...

The slog across to West Palm Beach from West End in the Bahamas was not too bad.  We did have wind on the nose for the first few hours for a bit of a bumpy ride, then these conditions subsided to a quiet but overcast 55 nm run.  We made an uneventful entry through the inlet luckily missing a vast cruise ship billowing smoke and taking up most of the channel.  We didn’t argue. 

Finding an anchorage was not so easy, and our first attempt at Peanut Island, now full of mooring balls, lead us into “skinny” water and a near grounding.  Welcome to the ICW.  A second attempt, amidst confusing channel markers for both the Port and ICW, led us to quickly drop anchor outside the big ships turning bay.  We could cope with the ships but not the fast-flowing current, so in the morning moved to a deeper, more protected spot; all the better to admire some Palm Beach mansions.  After a few days of chores - clearing in, refueling (by jerry can if you please, in the heart of an all-American big smoke), hamburger tasting, some shopping at an enormous supermarket, and laying low for a few windy days, it was time to move on up the ditch.

Back to the ICW.  There are bridges to negotiate.  Ooh! Just missed that one...

All sorts of other boats float along the ICW too.
 This one's a tiki-bar barge complete with water slide!

This is our FINAL X-ing file for this journey – approx a 1200 nm run inside barrier islands along rivers, canals and over lakes, all in day hops.  Three cheers for the ICW!  As many of our stops will be similar to 2009, we’ll (generally) only add information on new places we visit rather than repeat-post!   There will still be photos from our hike along the waterways, so plenty yet to see of our journey.  

Post titles will be somewhat obscure as we're awarding them to boats with (ahem!) interesting names, along each section.  A very difficult choice indeed with just so much to choose from.  As always, internet connectivity is the critical factor; fine in metropolitan areas but not so much in out of the way backwoods or up reedy creeks. 

Wildlife is never too far away.
Osprey (seahawk) near Peck Lake

We’ve called an initial halt at delightful Vero Beach City Marina for a week, firstly to visit "Mysterry" (Jim & Tammy) and to arrange to sort out our ongoing electrical miseries.  Currently, we’re rafted up on a mooring with a French boat, "Noulica" (Francoise et Patrick), who are also headed for the Chesapeake; just waiting for the snow to melt, oh dear...  Vero Beach City is a very convenient and cruiser-friendly marina with a free bus to shops (and West Marine), a nice big laundry and a book swap; handy whilst we wait for the new electrical part to be couriered in.  We might never leave…

And plenty of reminders to stay within the Channel Markers