Day 7:  March 2, 2015

Sunrise at Lake Francis

Ah what a fine day of sailing.  This day is the epitome of what this trip is to be.  We awoke at our usual 5:00 hour and began our day with sausage gravy on a tortilla.  It was bright and clear and the sunrise was the kind that people travel to Key West just to see.  It was beautiful.

We straightened up the boat, sponged bathed our bodies and headed out.  About a mile downstream from the entrance to the feeder creek for Lake Frances we encountered our first draw bridge.  We are used to the procedures of passage.  When you are about ¼ mile away from the bridge, you call the bridge tender on the VHF radio and very politely request permission to pass.  The guide book tells you if the bridge will open on command or if you need to wait for an appointed time.  We have found that the majority of the time the

What we spend a lot of time doing on the ICW

bridge opens on an own unpublished schedule.  The first several opened on request and although all of the others said the same thing, the rest had their own schedule.  The first one we came to with a schedule was due to open in about 7 minutes of our arrival so that one worked out fine.  The next one was to open 25 minutes after our arrival so we swung over towards a sandy beach where we planned on dropping the anchor to wait.  The water depth was consistently 10 feet deep and then we were dragging the bottom.  We raised the keel and motored out a bit further and dropped the anchor. 

The next bridge we came to had a strong tidal current flowing with us toward the bridge and we had to wait about 10 minutes.  It was hard to hold the boat but we kept circling until the time to go.  The bridge started up but was moving very slowly.  We were getting dangerously close so I put the motor in reverse to hold it.  The current pushed the dinghy into the motor and the rode that we use to tow the dink got wrapped in the prop.  The motor died immediately and the current and wind was pushing us toward the bridge pilings.  I was able to skull the rudder and gain enough headway that I could steer her to the end of a marina finger pier located right at the bridge.  

The little boat my friend Lori is considering
for her trip down the Intercoastal

The rope was wrapped tight enough that I had to get in the dinghy and loosen the prop to get it untangled.   I got the job accomplished in time to make the next opening of the bridge.  In all, we figure we passed through about 6 bridges on our trip south.

Traveling down this section of the waterway, there are so many huge expensive homes and mega yachts that we got tired of taking pictures.  One of our guide books describes the lawns of the homes as appearing to have been mowed with hand sheers by skilled beauticians. 

One of the "too many to count"

We arrived at the entrance to the Lake Worth Inlet at about 2:30 and proceeded to head on out through the passage to check out the ocean.  The waves appear to have moderated to about 3 to 4 feet and the wind was clocking around to the east south east.  The weather forecast shows favorable winds and waves for at least the next two days.

So, we have decided that tonight is the night to head out to West End, Grand Bahama.  We were able to make between 4.5 and 5 knots speed over ground so at that clip, it will take us about 13 hours to make the crossing.  It is recommended that we arrive in the middle of the day due to the fact that the shallow waters of the Bahamas mandate that you have a high bright sun to navigate into the various harbors.  Our plan is to leave at about midnight and hopefully arrive around noon or 1:00.  We have contingencies in case the trip takes significantly longer.  We can anchor outside of the harbors and await more favorable times of entry.

Our first ship.  A beauty, wouldn't you say?

Back in the Lake Worth/Palm Beach area, we dropped anchor just outside the inlet so that we could pull up the hook and be on our way without the amount of hassle.  We took the dinghy over to a local marina and topped of our fuel and water tanks and picked up a block of ice.

Back at the boat, we stripped all of the hardware off of the dinghy and I pulled her up onto the front deck where I deflated, packaged and snubbed her down. 

Meanwhile, Janine prepared a wonderful braut mashed potato meal.

I am sending this blog out this evening because we will probably not have internet service on a regular basis for the next several weeks.  I will keep writing and will send them forth when I have the service.

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