We stayed Monday at Harbortown Marina so we could welcome John and Deni back to their boat. They said when they left Iowa that it was snowing. Well the temps in Fort Pierce were the mid 80’s so that was good for them. We went to a nice restaurant, Chucks Seafood with John , Deni, Brent and Susan and had a great time.
The cruise up from Fort Pierce was nice. Although the wind was fairly strong, it was pushing us so that was no real problem. There was a lot of boat traffic but very few large power boats making big wakes. We have been traveling anywhere from 7.5 to 10 mph depending on the tides coming in or going out and where the inlets are. Anyway we were not rocked to much.
This section of the ICW is fairly wide with lots of conservation areas. There are a few narrower sections but for the most part we had wide open water with just a narrow channel to follow.
As we moved further north the clouds were starting to thicken. The morning was warm and they were predicting isolated showers later today. We talked about possibly going to Cocoa Beach for the night but then I looked at the radar and there was a line of heavy rain coming in from the northwest. We were able to get into Melbourne, get tied up and take Candy for a walk and still had a little time before the rain started. It only lasted maybe an hour but it was pretty heavy at times and a lot of puddles around. It was a good thing we were not out on the water.
We are in a slip right in front of some condos. It is nice to look out the back of the boat and see grass, just like Pine River Club. Candy only has a 30′ walk to grass instead of the 300′ or 400′ down the docks we had at Harbortown.
We are next to a large sailboat, Valkyrie, that is from Maryland. They can only travel on the ocean because their mast is too tall for the bridges on the ICW. In this area most bridges are 64′ to 65′ and maybe a little more depending on the stage of the tide. Their mast with instruments and lights are at 66′. I am not sure why they put themselves in that position, but they did.
This morning the winds are blowing, the sky is gray and the temp is about 59. The winds are out of the northeast so we will be going into them today and the ICW stays wide for most of the day.