Waiting Out the Weather at Hilton Head Island, South Carolina

August 03, 2021

We left Brunswick on a cloudy Thursday afternoon and this time, we had no fuel issues. Actually, we had no issues whatsoever. Before leaving, we once again topped off our provisions, water tanks, and fuel, this time adding more of the new Fuel Right treatment. I’m happy to say, knocking on wood as I say it, that all seems well with the fuel system.

It’s been a while since we traversed the Intracoastal Waterway in Georgia, and we were once again happy to become reacquainted with its natural and largely undeveloped beauty. Due to the fuel tank and fuel issues we had just dealt with, we needed to burn through most if not all of the fresh fuel in the tank, and staying in the waterway gave us the opportunity to do just that. We had been watching thunderstorms build to our west as we snaked our way through the various rivers, creeks, and sounds which make up the waterway. As we passed the very northern end of St. Simons Island, we watch as one monstrous storm crossed in front of us. On our way through Buttermilk and Altamaha Sounds, the storms inched ever closer. Our luck in dodging them was running out.

We had timed our departure to arrive at the mouth of the Little Mud River near Darien at a couple of hours prior to the high tide. Little Mud River is notoriously shallow, and for some vessels, impassable at lower tide levels. JO BETH needs a minimum of five feet of water to float, and at low tide we wouldn’t get through. We hoped the storms would at least spare us until we were out of the Little Mud and into the deeper waters of the North River and Doboy Sound. We got our wish.

Not more than five minutes after we left Little Mud in our wake, the walls of rain closed in upon us. The rain was cool and a relief from the heat of the afternoon, but in short order, became cold and stinging as it blew under our awning in the gusty winds. Our visibility was quickly reduced to mere feet, and we relied on the navigation screen of our chartplotter and the AIS system to warn us of approaching vessels. As the rain began to lighten, a simultaneous blinding flash of light and explosive thunderclap made us jump as a bolt of lightning struck in the nearby marsh. Fortunately, the rain soon eased into a light summer shower and then a soft sprinkle as we crossed the choppy waters of Doboy Sound, making for the entrance to the Duplin River, where we planned to be anchored for the coming three days. There was no more thunder and lightning.

We entered the mouth of the Duplin, speeding along with the incoming tide, and found our spot to anchor about a half mile north of the ferry landing which carries island locals, scientists, and the occasional tourist to Sapelo Island. The University of Georgia maintains a marine biology research station on Sapelo. The skies soon cleared and a light southerly breeze filled in as we settled in for the night.

The next three days were bright, sunny, and hot as we lazed around JO BETH, getting back into our ‘underway’ routines and generally adjusting to life underway. Cell signals were decent in the area, so Lisa was able to do some work and I was able to get weather briefings and updates. We watched a lovely and intensely orange full moon rise from the pine and oak forests of Sapelo on Friday evening. Dolphins swam in and out of the river feeding on schools of small fish and shore birds were everywhere. Pelicans wheeled overhead, diving headlong into the river and ospreys gracefully swooped low and plucked unsuspecting fish from just below the river’s surface with their needle sharp talons. The Duplin River is one of our favorite anchorages along the entirety of the southeastern US coastline.

On Sunday morning, July 25, we weighed anchor and left the Duplin, bound for an anchorage in Buckhead Creek, on the northwestern tip of Ossabaw Island. The anchorage lay some 35 miles to our north and was approximately 25 miles south of Savannah. Sunday was hot and humid, true to a coastal Georgia summer, as we moved past beautiful pine and oak forested islands, with the marsh an ever present vibrant green all around us. Soon we entered the choppy waters of Sapelo Sound, and were slowed by a fierce incoming tidal flow to a mere three knots at times. Sapelo Sound separates the islands of Sapelo and St. Catherines, and soon we were riding the incoming tide into Johnson Creek behind St. Catherines Island. After a while of snaking through the twists and turns of Johnson Creek, we entered the wide and deep waters of St. Catherines Sound. The incoming tide was a bit less fierce now, and we slipped past the popular anchorage areas of Cattle Pen Creek and Walburg Creek, and entered the Bear River.

The Bear River is relatively wide and quite deep in spots, and makes gentle turns and sweeps through the coastal landscape. Late in the afternoon, as the waterway made a sharp turn to the north, we continued east into Buckhead Creek. Buckhead Creek is also wide and deep, and we pushed in a mile or so until we found a reasonably shallow spot in which to anchor. By ‘reasonable,’ I mean a spot less than 20 feet in depth at low tide, the time of which was rapidly approaching. We found a spot around 16 feet deep and anchored. We really enjoyed our time in Buckhead Creek, seeing only one other boat while we were there. It’s an anchorage we’d definitely use again.

When we anchor JO BETH, we follow a strict methodology of getting the anchor to set in the bottom and stay put, regardless of what wind and tide may do. The anchoring system is one of our most critical pieces of safety gear. It must keep us in one place, even as the tide and currents may shift 360° twice every 24 hours. We rely on our anchoring skills to keep the boat, (and us!), where we want to be, and safe and secure in all weather.

Monday morning dawned gray and full of rain sprinkles as we upped anchor and headed back to the waterway channel. After entering the Ogeechee River, rain began to fall steadily. Fortunately, this time there was no wind or thunder and lightning, but the rain was super heavy and visibility quickly went from a few miles to a few feet. A small crab boat, working pulling his traps to our west, quickly vanished in the curtain of rain. Seabirds settled onto the water around us, and we motored onward through the deluge. After about half an hour, the rain moved to the northwest, leaving us in a flat calm as we approached the dreaded Hell Gate passage.

*This ‘Local’ Swam by While We Were Anchored in the Herb River*

Hell Gate is a ‘land cut’ through a small island which the waterway follows near the confluence of the Ogeechee and Vernon Rivers as they flow into Ossabaw Sound. The cut is notorious for shoaling and has to be dredged frequently; it’s another of those waterway stretches which demands a skipper’s respect and attention. We always timed our passages through it for the high tide, and this time was no exception. Of course, we made it through just fine. Under clearing skies, we made the turn toward the southern neighborhoods of Savannah which border the Intracoastal Waterway. In the early afternoon, we set our anchor in the mouth of the Herb River, just south of the small town of Thunderbolt, GA. We made plans to move to Thunderbolt Marina the following day, as we needed to do laundry and pick up some mail the marina was holding for us. The Herb River is familiar to us, as we used to spend nights anchored there in our first little sailboat some 30 years ago. Now, the area is much more developed and the boat traffic there has increased ten-fold. Minor wakes from passing boats were a common occurrence.

Heavy thunderstorms with rain moved over us most of the night. Tuesday morning dawned gray and rainy. At noon, we weighed anchor and got underway for the marina, less than a mile north of our anchorage. Once secured, we gathered our dirty and wet clothes and towels and did laundry, taking much needed showers later in the day. We can shower on the boat, and did as we made our way north, but we must be mindful of the water consumption since fresh water is limited to what we can carry. Still, nothing can take the place of a long and unlimited proper shower! And, the marina delivers a fresh daily half-dozen Krispy-Kreme Doughnuts to the boat every morning!

*We Had an Amazing Light Show While Anchored in the Herb River Just East of Savannah*

While we were anchored in the Herb River, Lisa’s aging laptop finally died…or so it seemed. The machine became non-responsive save for a colored sequence of flashing lights. According to multiple Google searches, the light sequence we were seeing indicated a failure of the motherboard – the CPU – the brains and nervous system of the machine. She promptly went onto the Dell website and ordered a new machine, paying for overnight delivery. The next day, we met our friend Paul for lunch and a ride to the local Publix to top up our provisions. (Thanks, Paul!) Once back at the boat, Lisa checked the status of the computer delivery and was shocked to see that shipping was scheduled for August 23rd!

Lisa called Dell and, once Dell confirmed the shipping info was correct, cancelled the order. She then called Dell again and ordered a different computer that was in stock, again paying for overnight shipping with delivery to a friend’s house on Hilton head Island, SC, our next planned stop. This time, the computer arrived two days earlier than promised!

We left Thunderbolt Marina Thursday at noon and motored the 25 miles north to Hilton Head Island under a hot summer sun. About an hour before sunset, we were anchored in Skull Creek on the northern end of the island. We knew a week of bad weather was approaching and accordingly, made plans to go into Skull Creek Marina on the upcoming Sunday. Skull Creek flows around two unnamed marsh islands, and we were anchored in the east channel of creek. The waterway channel follows a longer route on the west side of the islands. We soon discovered the spur of the creek where we had anchored was used extensively as a short-cut by a great number of local boats. Repeated wakes became an annoying fact of life – more on that in a bit.

Another reason for our stop in Hilton Head was to meet with a couple of shops about a big canvas project we’re planning. That’s largely the subject for an upcoming post, but the gist of it is we’re planning to design and build a full enclosure for JO BETH’s cockpit.

In spite of the wakes, the days in Skull Creek were largely quiet and enjoyable, but it was incredibly hot. Fortunately, we had a persistent southwesterly breeze blowing the entire time. In the shade of the cockpit awning and at night, it was reasonably comfortable to be outside. The cabin though, was another matter, especially in the daytime. Our poor refrigerator and freezer were working overtime, and by early evening on Friday, the freezer temperature had crept up to 31°. The solar panels were putting out plenty of power, but simply couldn’t keep up with the demand on the batteries, mostly because the refrigerator compressor was working overtime. Accordingly, we made the decision to come into Skull Creek Marina a day early so we could plug into shore power.

*Sunset Over Skull Creek, Hilton Head Island*

As I mentioned above, the days anchored in Skull Creek were spent rocking about in the near constant stream of wakes from passing boats. Fortunately, the wakes lessened considerably after dark. Virtually all of these wakes were from small fishing boats; most of which are privately owned, and a few were commercial charter boats. A small handful were smaller commercial fishing boats. The private boats were operated by their local owners or tourists; and for the latter, the boat was very likely included with their condo or Air BnB rental, or rented to them.

The problem is that very few of these boaters, and perhaps most of them, aren’t familiar with the common courtesies and rules for boat operation. By law, the operator of the boat, as well as the owner, are responsible for damages caused by their wakes. In our situation, the wakes were not damaging, but were definitely a nuisance. When passing an anchored vessel, a boat is required to slow to idle speed until past, then once past, may resume a normal safe speed. To be fair, a good number of vessels did slow their speed, but not enough. This caused the boat to push more water aside than it would had it remained at speed on plane, thus causing a larger wake. Also, many of the commercial charter boats, whose professional captains certainly know the rules, were among the worst offenders. Many of these boats weren’t properly trimmed, causing them to plow through the water bow high, creating a much larger wake than if the hull was fully planeing across the top of the water as it’s designed to do.

In addition, many boats passed far too close to us. Skull Creek is plenty deep right up to the shore in many spots. Some roared past us literally 15 or 20 feet away, and several passed unnervingly close to our bow, from which our anchor chain and snubber line – a sort of shock absorber – are rigged. The only large boat which passed us, a commercial shrimping vessel which does need deep water to float, went out of her way to give us a wide pass.

There are certainly those captains and boat owners that take a perverse delight in ‘waking’ anchored or moored boats, especially sailboats, I don’t have a sense of ill intention being at work here. Most operators and captains were friendly and waved as they passed by, even those that came uncomfortably close. I feel their behavior is most probably due to a lack of boating experience, ignorance of proper seamanship, or in most situations, a combination of both.

We plan to be in Hilton Head for a week or so. Not only did we need to pick up Lisa’s new laptop computer, but we have some fairly severe weather approaching, which by mid-week, is forecast to be affecting the majority of the US east coast. Heavy rain, severe thunderstorms, and strong winds are forecast to persist through at least Thursday or Friday of this week. We are a client of Marine Weather Center, which issues detailed weather forecasts designed specifically for sailors around the world. The forecaster’s message since last week for moving along the US east coast almost all of this week has been: “Squalls become more numerous and prevent reasonable travel for the entirety of next week.”

At the moment, after listening to this morning’s weather briefing and chatting with a forecaster, it’s looking like Sunday or Monday next week may be our best days. We may take a chance with Saturday, but we’ll see how things play out. Until then, we’re enjoying having A/C, catching up with friends here on the island, both sailors and not, seeing some interesting boats, and getting a bit of rest.

Brunswick, GA to...???

July 20, 2021

Dirty diesel tanks are no fun. Before you read this post, I want to say that we were extremely careful about filtering every drop of fuel going into our fuel tank, and treating the fuel with biocides and stabilizers. We closely monitored our fuel filtering systems. In spite of our best efforts and good intentions, we still were shut down because of tank sludge. We’re hopeful that the experiences we share in this blog will help other sailors to avoid the messy, stinky, problem that a dirty fuel tank presents. If you’ve dealt with fuel tank sludge in your boat, feel free to share your own ‘dirty fuel tank’ experiences with us.

*Brunswick Landing Marina, Brunswick, GA*

When we arrived in Brunswick, GA in middle April, we expected a six-week stop before continuing north to somewhere in New England, leaving Georgia the week prior to the Memorial Day holiday. We were both looking forward to being out of the blistering southern heat, and in an area where tropical storms and hurricanes are much less frequent. Of course, we should be accustomed to this by now, but things did not go as planned…

In fairness, that’s not a 100% accurate statement; a good number of things did go as planned. For instance, we were able to secure an appointment for our COVID-19 vaccinations within a week of arriving, and were finished with both rounds by mid-May. We also completed our physicians’ check-ups and dental hygienist appointments as scheduled and were able to get some of JO BETH’s important safety equipment inspected, tested, and serviced. I acquired new glasses and completed my annual eye exam. We also were able to sell our car at the last minute to another cruising sailor we met in Brunswick. Beyond those things however, there were a few ‘bumps’ in the road.

One of Lisa’s doctor’s appointments required certain tests to be done, which could not be scheduled until the first week of June. And a few days after our dental cleanings, I broke a tooth. This required a trip back to the dentist for repairs to the damaged tooth, which would end with the fitting of a crown. The initial work was done very quickly, with the crown promised to be ready for ‘installation’ the week prior to Memorial Day. However, the crown didn’t arrive until the week after Memorial Day and wasn’t fitted until the second week of June. While waiting for the crown, I was afflicted with a condition called ‘Bell’s Palsy.’ Bell’s Palsy is caused when a nerve in the facial area is attacked by a virus, apparently one of the very common virus types which cause the common cold. It sometimes occurs after a dental procedure, usually on the side of face where the dental work was done. The result is a partial facial paralysis. I looked as if I was having or had had a stroke as the right side of my face drooped noticeably. It isn’t serious nor is it contagious, but it is incredibly annoying. Fortunately it resolves fairly quickly on its own over the course of a few weeks, but I went back to the doctor anyway. After a week-long round of steroid and antiviral meds, I was more or less back to normal.

And then, Lisa and I both became sick with sinus infections. Let’s not forget Tropical Storm Elsa, which passed just west of Brunswick on July 7, bringing blustery conditions for a few hours. Finally, after the passage of Elsa, things appeared to be settling down. The weather was good for us to start planning our departure north, and we planned to leave on Monday, July 12, bound for Block Island, Rhode Island, a passage of approximately 850 miles. In fact, we’ve never had such a stable and expansive window for sailing, and we were confident we would be well into the southern New England area before the window would begin to close.

*Another section of the GOLDEN RAY in the Port of Brunswick*

At 11:30am on Monday July 12, we backed out of our slip and turned into the marina channel with the outgoing tide. Our friends Bill and Margaret from MARGARETA and Jesus and Mia from LOLOTA assisted us with line handling. I commented to Lisa that I couldn’t recall ever having so many help us to get out of a slip! Soon we were motoring down channel and past the port of Brunswick, passing the latest towering section of the shipwrecked GOLDEN RAY being readied for disposal. I commented to Lisa I had forgotten to raise the Ensign in all the excitement of departure, and went below to get it from the chart table. As I came back onto deck and started to attach the ensign to the aft flag halyard, I noticed the engine sounding odd. A quick glance at the tachometer confirmed the RPM was dropping. I asked Lisa to increase throttle as I watched the RPM continue to decline. Then, the motor shuddered to a stop.

On Tuesday of the prior week, we had performed a complete motor service with the help of a friend, Marty, a retired commercial fisherman and diesel mechanic. (Honestly, Marty did pretty much all of the work!) We had an issue that appeared to be air in the fuel lines, although we thought we had resolved the problem during that service. Naturally, air in the fuel line was my first thought for the reason the engine had stalled.

With the engine stopped, we were now drifting down the channel with the tide, but being pushed back slightly toward the marina by a light breeze. I removed the cabin engine compartment hatch and loosened the fuel bleed screw on top of the engine fuel filter housing. I then reached around the side of the motor to find the fuel lift pump lever and began pumping. I thought it odd, but didn’t consider the cause, that there was zero pressure or resistance on the lift pump lever. There should be a small bit of pressure in the pump, even with the lines full of air.

Lisa remained in the cockpit and on the helm while I was crouched below in front of the engine. From my perspective, it seemed we were getting closer to the barge on which the massive section of the GOLDEN RAY wreckage was secured. Lisa, from her perspective, could see we still had plenty of room around us. By this time, several minutes had passed and I was getting no fuel to move with the lift pump. I quickly passed my cellphone to Lisa and asked her to call Jesus and get him to come out in his dinghy to tow us in. I was also considering dropping the anchor, but we were transiting a commercial harbor, and that’s a big no-no unless we were in serious trouble. We had a problem for certain, but were not yet in ‘trouble.’

“Jesus and Mia are on their way out,” Lisa said as she handed the phone back to me. We had met Jesus and Mia, (everyone knows Jesus by his nickname, ‘Hey-Hey.’) when they volunteered to send Mia up our mast to weave some fishing line around an opening in our RADAR mount in which Mockingbirds were aggressively trying to nest. We’ve become good friends with them during our stay here.

I tossed the phone onto a seat cushion and continued my scan of the engine; searching for a broken fuel line, leaks around the big, external fuel filter housings, but finding nothing. In what seemed to be a too short time-span, I heard an outboard motor close alongside and Hey-Hey’s voice calling out to Lisa. Soon, Hey-Hey was aboard and down in the cabin with me. Mia stayed in their dinghy, now tied alongside and towing JO BETH. Hey-Hey tried actuating the lift pump lever as well, and was also surprised to find zero resistance.

*JO BETH Uses These Racor Series 500 Diesel Fuel Filters for Fuel Filtration and Water Separation*

Jo Beth is fitted with dual Racor Turbine diesel fuel filters. The engine typically only uses one filter at a time when running, though it can use be used to draw fuel through both. In this instance we were pulling from the rear filter. Hey-Hey asked if I switched to the ‘not in use’ filter to see if that changed anything. I told him I hadn’t, as it required me to remove a deck hatch in the cockpit where Lisa was standing and steering because I didn’t have the arm length to reach over the top of the engine to the filter selector lever. Hey-Hey thought he could reach it, and he did - just barely. Once the lever was on the other filter, I resumed working the lift pump lever. There was pressure, and in short order, fuel spurted out of the bleed screw port, completely devoid of bubbles. I asked Lisa to start the motor, and it roared to life. She put the motor in gear and increased throttle. We began to move.

However, the RPM began to precipitously drop once again. In a matter of seconds, the engine shuddered to a stop. Hey-Hey looked at me.

“What do you want to do?,” he asked.

“Let me call the marina and ask if we can return to our slip. If we can, can you guys tow us in?” He nodded and called out to Mia.

“We’re gonna tow them in.”

*The Filthy, Dirty, Fuel Pick-up Tube in Our Diesel Tank - the Ball of Diesel Sludge on the End of the 1/8” Diameter Tube (lower center) Brought us to a Full Stop in Short order*

Once secured back in the slip we had just left, the investigation into the problem began. I called Marty to ask if he had any ideas about what was causing the stalling. He said he was close by and wanted to stop and take a look. When he arrived we began another round of diagnostics. All indications pointed to an obstruction of fuel; the engine simply wasn’t getting enough fuel to run properly. Either enough fuel wasn’t moving through the system or being pulled from the tank. The dual Racor filters are fitted with a vacuum gauge. This shows the amount of ‘vacuum’ in the fuel system, or the amount of ‘pull’ the fuel pump is doing to lift fuel from the tank and get it to the engine; the higher the vacuum, the harder the engine is working to get enough fuel. This is typically used to indicate when the fuel filters are ready to be replaced, but in this instance, the fuel filters had been replaced during the recent engine service and when checked, we found them to be pristine. The problem, whatever it was, lay elsewhere in the system.

*One of the ‘Nuggets’ of Sludge Removed From the Tank*

JO BETH had been prepared for multiple days at sea, and now all of that had to be undone. Lisa spent much of the afternoon getting access to the fuel tank and re-stowing the cabin while Hey-Hey and I began to track down the problem. While Marty was aboard, he and I had discussed the possibility that the fuel tank vent line – the line which allows air to enter or leave the tank as fuel is pulled from the tank or added to it – was blocked. A quick check on the suction line to the Racor filter housing revealed a tremendous amount of vacuum in the system and confirmed the vent and vent line to be clear. The most likely problem was inside the fuel tank with the fuel pick-up tube, or in the line between the fuel tank and the Racor filter unit. After an hour or so of working to free the seized inspection plate cap, the tank was open and we began the process of removing the fuel. Hey-Hey had designed and built a ‘portable’ fuel transfer and cleaning system for his boat after having a similar problem, and we used the transfer pump to remove the fuel from our tank and put it into portable jugs on the dock. As this was being done, the cause and scope of the problem became obvious.

The tank was filled with diesel sludge. Diesel sludge is actually the decaying remains of an algae that lives and grows in water trapped in diesel fuel systems. Water in fuel is a fact of life in diesel systems, but there are ways to combat it. There were a couple of causes for our contamination, which I’ll discuss in a bit. But for now, we had layers and clumps of the stuff to remove from the tank bottom, sides, and baffles. The fuel pick up tube, which is a small, 1/8” copper tube, had a large ball of the stuff blocking the suction end. It looked like a ‘Tootsie Pop’ lollipop from Hell. Problem found.

*The Fuel Tank After the First Wipe-Down…*

We wiped down as much of the tank interior as we could with the fuel/oil absorbent pads, also known as diapers, already on board JO BETH. Both Hey-Hey and I could get one arm into the tank, (not at the same time!) but his reach is longer than mine, and he was stuck with wiping out the far corners of the tank as well as the front and back walls.

The next morning, in a borrowed truck, Hey-Hey and I went to the local West Marine to purchase additional fuel filters with a smaller pore size, a lot of fuel/oil absorbent pads, and other things needed for the stinking, dirty task ahead. We also went to the local Dollar Store and purchased a few cheap toilet brushes from which we fashioned cleaning tools.

The inspection port on the tank is 4” in diameter and fitted in the center of the tank. To do the most thorough job we could, we had to get creative, and taped two of the toilet brushes together by the handles, making a ‘two headed tank scrubber.’ By early afternoon, we had the tank wiped as best we could, with probably close to 95% of the sludge and other contaminants removed. It would not be possible to get all of it.

We treated 5 gallons of the removed fuel with a diesel biocide at a ‘severe shock’ dosage and reintroduced it to the wiped tank. We then used Hey-Hey’s fuel transfer pump to ‘wash’ the complete tank interior, touching as much of the tank’s surfaces as was possible with the shock treated fuel. The tank was capped and allowed to soak for several hours. When we pumped the fuel from the tank in the early evening, it was nearly black – the type of diesel we use is dyed a bright red color! The tank was wiped clean once again, and this time, 15 gallons of fresh fuel was added and treated with a new type of diesel biocide, also at a ‘shock’ level.

Diesel biocides come from a variety of manufacturers and essentially all do the same thing: they prevent the growth of algae in fuel tanks. They are exceptionally harsh chemicals and can damage the delicate inner mechanical workings of fuel injection pumps and injectors if overused. I had been lectured on this many times by multiple diesel mechanics and as a result, I wasn’t using enough to properly ‘dose’ the fuel. We always try to by our diesel from busy facilities which sell a lot of fuel. Diesel fuel should be treated on most every fill-up unless it is consumed from the tank on a very consistent basis. In our case, we often go for long periods without ever running the engine, whether we’re in a marina or sailing. Even though we filtered every drop of fuel going into the tank, and kept the tank full to ward off condensation inside the tank, which is a common source of contaminating water, we simply didn’t consume the fuel quickly enough. Now that we’re out and sailing, and minimizing long marina stays, we hope it will bring about a healthier fuel system.

*Hey-Hey Getting Ready tro Introduce the First Dose of Shock Treated Fuel*

As mentioned above, I wasn’t using enough diesel biocide to keep the fuel in the tank toxic to the algae over the long term. The dosing directions for diesel biocides can be difficult to follow, as they are usually super concentrated. In the case of the product I had been using, a 16oz bottle would treat nearly 1,600 gallons of fuel! We carry 30 gallons, and often ‘top up’ the tank with only 12 or 15 gallons. In these instances, getting the correct dose can be a challenge. It’s primarily for this reason that I’ve changed the diesel biocide we use to a product called Fuel Right. This came from the recommendation of a professional mariner friend, also a harbor pilot for the Port of Brunswick. It’s mostly used in commercial/industrial applications, such as in railroad locomotives and tugboats. Purportedly, it breaks down algae/sludge, water, and other contaminants to such small levels – two microns or smaller, so that it can be burned through the engine and not build up as waste in the tank and lines. Other biocides and fuel additives on the market, including the one we were using, kill the algae but don’t remove it from the system. If the Fuel Right additive performs half as well as claimed, and as we’ve been told by those using it, we’ll be thrilled.

(If you’re interested in checking out the line of Fuel Right products, and learning more about them and how they work, their website link is: www.fuelright.com)

Of course, the fuel system issues brought about a change in our trip departure plans. We lost the weather window we had to make it far enough north to get to the southern portion of New England as quickly as we had hoped, even though the long range forecasts indicated all along we might have to stop at the Chesapeake Bay area to wait for favorable conditions. Being in Brunswick as long as we have has put a real dent in our goal to cruise New England this summer. We’re still planning on going north, but simply may not have enough time to make it as far as we had hoped. At the moment, we’re placing our efforts on getting to the Chesapeake and then seeing what the remainder of the season looks like before it’s time to start heading south once again.

*Clean, Fresh, and Biocide ‘Shocked’ Diesel Fuel in the Tank*

And now, we need to burn through the bulk of fuel in the tank, then refill with new fuel and treat it at a maintenance level.

Accordingly, we’ve decided to take much of the upcoming week and motor through the Georgia Intracoastal Waterway, spending a few nights at anchor along the way. This will give us some time to calm down from all of the trip preparation and fuel system episode stresses. It’ll give us time to relax and get back into our shipboard routines. Yes, we live aboard, but living aboard being secured to a dock and living aboard while underway are two very different worlds.

With this in mind, we anticipate making the first leg of the trip from Brunswick to Sapelo Island, some 30 miles north. After a night or two there, we’ll continue north to another quiet anchorage, and then to another. Once at Savannah, we’ll replace the fuel consumed with clean, fresh, and properly treated fuel, and start planning for the next weather window to open for an offshore jump to the Chesapeake.

Port Canaveral, FL to Brunswick, GA - Part II

May 05, 2021

The weather began to deteriorate, and while we never experienced any heavy squalls, the northeasterly wind picked up significantly and the temperature dropped rapidly. We arrived at the New Smyrna Beach City Marina on Thursday morning, April 1 and from Friday afternoon through Saturday night, we had wind gusts well into the 30 knot range, and were glad to be secured in a well-protected marina slip. We even turned on the heat Saturday morning when the temperature dipped into the low 50’s! Once we had dug the few warm clothes we had on board out of their lockers, we walked into town in search of breakfast, and then walked through the local farmer’s market.

*Dawn Departures - commonplace, when transiting the Intracoastal Waterway*

Lisa needed to pick up a prescription refill, so on Saturday afternoon, we took a Lyft ride across the Coronado Beach Bridge to the beach side of New Smyrna Beach. A friend of ours had recommended we try dinner at a restaurant called Garlic, but when we went by on the way to Walgreen’s, we saw it was absolutely packed. Our driver quickly suggested we just walk across a side street from the Walgreen’s and have dinner at Boston’s Fish House. We took his advice, and wow, what a meal! No disrespect to all the fabulous seafood we’ve had in all of the various places we’ve been to and lived in – but this was, hands down, the best seafood meal either of us had in recent memory. Lisa ordered grilled, wild-caught Scottish Salmon, and I had swordfish steaks, also grilled. It was absolutely fantastic. We will certainly try Garlic, given the opportunity, but our first stop when back in New Smyrna Beach will be Boston’s. No doubt.

For those of you who don’t know us, Lisa is the church goer in the family, and I’m the Pagan-Heathen of the family. Sunday in New Smyrna Beach was Easter Sunday, and while we were at Boston’s the evening before, Lisa declared she wanted to go to church for Easter services. The weather was calming and we were both anxious to be moving again, but if she was going to get to church, we would have a very late start. New Smyrna Beach is around 18 miles south of Daytona Beach, so before our drinks arrived at the table, I had made reservations at Halifax Harbor Marina in Dayton Beach for Sunday night, as decent anchorages in the area are minimal. As it turned out, there were no Lyft or Uber drivers available Easter morning; even the local taxis weren’t running. Lisa never made her church service, but she did watch Easter Services from her ‘home’ church in Atlanta via the church website.

We enjoyed a leisurely motor run from New Smyrna to Daytona Beach Easter Sunday and were secured in our marina slip by three in the afternoon. We took some time to walk around a portion of the downtown Daytona area, which was completely quiet, and were back at the boat within an hour. Lisa made a lovely chili dinner and we were soon fast asleep, planning an early morning departure for St. Augustine.

Shortly after 7am Monday morning we were underway once again. We had a long day ahead, though not a difficult one, as the Waterway here is more or less a canal, following a relatively straight path between the barrier islands and mainland coast of central-north Florida. The northerly winds were light, but still on the nose. We glided through the small communities of Flagler Beach and Palm Coast, and past various historic sites such as Ft. Matanzas, the site of a Spanish fortification dating back to the 1740’s. We arrived in St. Augustine in the late afternoon, and sped towards the Bridge of Lions drawbridge, desperately hoping to make the 4pm opening, as the bridge would enter lockdown for rush-hour traffic at 5:00. Lisa called the bridge tender on the radio who told her, “as long as you’re in position to make the opening, you can go through.” I opened the throttle a bit more on our small Yanmar diesel. Fortunately, we had the outgoing tide with us and made the opening with little trouble, though we were the last boat through.

*Our lovely anchorage, just north of St. Augustine, Florida; the Trawler Yacht TRANSITIONS is visible, anchored in the distance*

We had hoped to stop for the night at the St. Augustine mooring Field, but no moorings were available. A scan of our charts and cruising guides showed two viable anchorage areas further north of the city, with one at about 10 miles distant and the other at 12 miles. We opted for the closer spot, provided there was sufficient room when we arrived. We needn’t have worried, once we were there, there was only one boat anchored, a small trawler-yacht we recognized from Halifax Harbor the night before. The anchorage was, however, filled with numerous crab trap marker buoys. After motoring around and checking depths, we settled on a 12’ deep spot and set the ‘hook.’ It was a beautifully quiet and calm night in a lovely setting.

We were underway early the next morning, munching peanut butter and jam sandwiches for breakfast in the chilly and damp morning air as we motored back into the Waterway channel and began meandering north. By having anchored north of St. Augustine, we had a 10 mile advantage on the day, though we still needed to make nearly 60 miles to Fernandina Harbor Marina, in Fernandina Beach, FL. We have friends living in Fernandina Beach with whom we wanted to visit, as well as some FaceBook sailing friends, whom we’d never met face-to-face, staying at the marina. We also had to cross the St. Johns River, crowded with commercial and military ship traffic. The river crossing is quite confusing, with established security zones around various naval and coast guard vessels. There were also massive cargo ships maneuvering in the main river channel, and a mish-mash of navigational aids marking different routes and crossings. Soon we were across unscathed, though chastised by a navy security boat for getting too close to a navy vessel in dry-dock. Now, we were busy navigating the twisting, shallow waters of Sister’s Creek and Sawpit Creek.

When we left our anchorage that morning, our trawler yacht neighbors were still anchored, but they caught up with us soon after we entered Sister’s Creek. They hailed us on the radio and we had a pleasant conversation for several minutes. We never found out their names, but they are a retired couple from somewhere in New England, and are making their way north after spending time on the southwest coast of Florida this past winter. We also found out they had made a 10 year circumnavigation of the globe during the 1980’s and ‘90s on their 48 foot sailboat, which they nearly lost in a typhoon in the South Pacific. Their trawler yacht is named ‘TRANSITIONS.’

Soon enough, we entered the waters of Nassau Sound and TRANSITIONS passed us and moved ahead. Now, we had the incoming tide with us, and we sped through the sound and into the waters of the Amelia River, adjacent to Amelia Island. By 4:30, we were secured alongside the face dock at the Fernandina Harbor Marina and on our way to much needed showers. Once we were scrubbed and clean, we joined our FaceBook friends John and Lizzy on board their gorgeous Cabo Rico 56 sailboat QUETZAL for drinks. (We enjoyed some amazing Costa Rican rum, apparently only available in Costa Rica!) Later that evening, we walked into town for dinner with our friends Rusty and Phyllis. We were back aboard by 10pm, nearly dead to the world.

*Motoring over a glassy calm sea, approximately 10 miles east of Cumberland Island, GA*

The next day dawned bright, sunny, and warm. We were away from the dock by 8:30am, and while the forecast was good to be offshore for the last 30 or so miles to Brunswick, complete calms were the dominant forecast of the day. It was one of those rare times when the forecast was 100% accurate.

We motored out the St. Marys Channel, and between buoy numbers six and eight, turned our bow north on a course of 020°. The sea was like glass, and seabirds of all manner dove and fished around us. Dolphins swam with us for short moments, and we saw cannonball jellyfish by the hundreds. We even saw a couple of sea turtles.

*The massive operation surrounding the wreck removal of the M/V GOLDEN RAY in St. Simons Sound*

Shortly before noon, we could clearly see the twin spans of the Sidney Lanier Bridge near Jekyll Island, and in the early afternoon, the massive derrick like structure of the salvage apparatus over the foundered GOLDEN RAY cargo ship was clearly visible. At 3pm, we entered the St. Simons Sound Channel and with a push from incoming tide, jetted along at nearly eight knots into the sound. Once inside, we had to navigate around the wreck of the GOLDEN RAY.

*M/V GOLDEN RAY in approximately 2017 - Marine Traffic File Photo*

The GOLDEN RAY is a behemoth of a cargo ship laying on its starboard side just at the mouth of St. Simons Sound; more than two football fields in length and over 115’ wide, the ship weighs in at nearly 72,000 tons. It could haul more than 7,000 cars across oceans at speeds approaching 25mph. The ship was just two years old and loaded with slightly more than 4,000 cars bound for the Port of Baltimore, Maryland when in September 2019, it capsized and grounded in St. Simons Sound, while outbound from the Port of Brunswick. The cause of the accident is still under investigation, though stability, or lack thereof, would appear to be a major player in the event. The ship’s ballast control system is reportedly being given significant consideration as a direct cause. Miraculously, no one was killed or even seriously injured as a result of the massive ship rolling over. The majority of the crew and the local harbor pilot were rescued within hours. Three crew members were trapped in the engine room for several days and eventually rescued. The GOLDEN RAY and her cargo were quickly declared a total loss. As it sits where it was run aground in the sound, the ship is now being cut through like a loaf of bread from deck to keel, and slices are carried to the Port of Brunswick by barge for disposal.

Golden Ray 2.jpg — *M/V GOLDEN RAY, capsized in St. Simons Sound*

By 5:30pm, we were secured along the fuel dock at Brunswick Landing Marina. We walked into town for burgers and beer, and soon enough, were back aboard and fast asleep. The next morning, we formally checked into the marina, topped up our diesel fuel tank, and moved to our slip-home for the next few weeks. Time to start new maintenance and repair projects and plan our trip to points north in more detail.

*JO BETH, in her ‘in-port’ configuration at Brunswick Landing Marina, Brunswick, GA*

Port Canaveral, FL, to Brunswick, GA – Part I

April 27, 2021

After our arrival at Cape Marina, Cape Canaveral, we moved from our temporary spot on the fuel dock to the T-Head of Dock C. From here, we had a full view of the surprisingly small and busy port. Two tug boats busied themselves about a mass of large pipes suspended between small steel barges as they assembled and moved the equipment to an area of the port where bottom dredging was underway. On the day we arrived, a large number of cruise ships left the port and headed for other spots to moor and dock as they awaited an end to the pandemic. They’re traveling only with a bare complement of crew and move around to spread out the incredibly high costs of docking, which for an average sized cruise ship can approach $15,000 per day, or so we were told.

*At Cape Marina, Port Canaveral, awaiting repairs…*

Prior to moving from the fuel dock, I began calling local mechanics and electricians, as well as a refrigeration repair service. One advantage to stopping in a busy port is there are an array of services available to service the needs of the port. It was Friday morning and while we were under no illusion of finding anyone available for that day, we were pleasantly surprised when we were able to speak to a mechanic who scheduled us for a Tuesday appointment, and the same with a refrigeration technician. Once I described the issue with the refrigerator to the service office, and gave the fault code sequence I had observed, (along with a cell phone picture of the manufacturer’s information plate), they ordered the replacement part that same morning.

With those things accomplished and JO BETH secured in her new temporary spot on C-Dock, we headed out to meet our friends Janet and Chris from the yacht AFRICA for lunch. We walked for about a mile to a local waterfront restaurant called ‘The Grill.’ Massive cheeseburgers, fresh salads, and cold beer were the order of day. The burgers were so big that Lisa and I declared that having had ‘linner,’ lunch and dinner, there would be no dinner that evening. So be it!

Have I mentioned we had found another small issue aboard? Sometime during our trip, we noticed the fresh water system pump was running intermittently, approximately once every five minutes or so for a few seconds. We carry fresh water for drinking, cooking, etc., in two 40 gallon tanks. A single electric pump operates on demand to pump water from either the forward or aft tank to the galley, head, etc. We can also use a manual operated foot pump to pull water from the aft tank for the galley sink. The system holds approximately one gallon of water in an accumulator tank under pressure so that the pump need not run continuously when in operation. Water lines also run from the engine to the electric water heater tank so that we can use heat from the engine to have hot water available when we’re away from the dock and not plugged into shore power.

Somewhere in this system, there was a leak. It was a small leak, but enough of a leak so that the accumulator tank could not hold enough water at sufficient pressure.

Saturday would be the day we would spend searching out and repairing the fresh water system leak, wherever it was. I didn’t have to look far. I went to the starboard cockpit locker, which is where the tools we carry are stowed. It’s also where the water heater is located. When I opened the locker lid, I was greeted with a rush of very warm, humid air. Just like that I had found the source of the leak.

One of the containers of tools, which is quite heavy, had slid into the water heater outlet line and cracked the fitting connecting it to the water heater tank. Very hot water had been dripping from this crack and into the locker, soaking just about everything stowed and secured in the locker. It was quite a mess.

Mostly, it was our spare lines (rope) which had gotten waterlogged – and we carry a lot of line, but the bottom of the bag storing our power tools had also gotten wet. The first thing to do was to shut off the water system and then empty the locker and lay everything out in the warm Florida sunshine and spring breezes to dry. Fortunately, nothing was damaged. With the locker emptied, we clipped an oscillating twelve volt fan to the locker frame and turned it on, leaving the lid open, to dry the interior of the locker. It took nearly a full roll of paper towels and several rags to mop up all of the leaked water.

In the middle of all of this, our friends Ed and Nancy, whom we knew from our earlier days at Brunswick Landing Marina in Brunswick, GA, showed up Cape Marina! Nancy had seen our posts on FaceBook and decided to make an appearance. This was quite fortuitous as we needed to get to a hardware store to purchase a replacement fitting for the water heater. Ed and Nancy happily volunteered to drive us around wherever we needed to go. After changing from my smelly, sweaty T-shirt into a cleaner one, we piled into their car and headed to the local West Marine store.

West Marine has generally become known for maintaining woefully inadequate inventories of materials. The situation with COVID hasn’t helped. I needed a 90° elbow, ½” female thread to ½” male barb. Nope, not there. I was not comfortable taking advantage of Ed and Nancy’s generosity by having them chauffeur us hither and yon to look for plumbing fittings. Time to ‘MacGyver-Stein’ something together using what I found: a ½” female straight coupling with ½” male barb, a 90° elbow, with dual male barbs, and a straight ½” male barb coupling. That, plus four inches of ½” reinforced nylon hose and a handful of hose clamps, did the job. We also re-stowed the gear differently in the locker once everything had dried, so that the connections to the water heater and other components in the locker are better protected from any shifting gear. Of course, we thought we had done that already. It only took a couple thousand miles of sailing to find a flaw in the system.

The bright spot of that day was being able to spend time with Ed and Nancy. They’re a semi-retired couple, though Nancy is still actively working in nursing, spliting their time between their home in Ohio on the Great Lakes and Cocoa Beach, FL. They knew of a delightful local spot where we enjoyed some fabulous fish n’ chips with cold beer for lunch. Once cruisers, they’re now ‘boat-free,’ though Ed continues to work summers as harbormaster for their small marina in Ohio as he has for many years.

On Monday, the investigation of the battery charging issues began in earnest. The mechanic we had found, Sean of Coral Reef Diesel, called and said that he had an afternoon appointment cancel and that he would be by JO BETH shortly after lunch. The refrigeration repair shop also called, said they had received the replacement fan and motor, and that they would try to be out that afternoon as well. Things were looking up.

As it happened, the refrigerator tech couldn’t make it until Tuesday morning, but just as well – once Sean arrived, JO BETH became quite crowded. Fortunately, it didn’t take long for him to find the source of our charging woes – the batteries themselves. I had already mentioned this to Lisa as we headed towards Cape Canaveral. She said, “don’t mention that to anyone we call about it. We don’t want to give them any bias towards selling us batteries we may not need.”

Sean began methodically testing the batteries with the largest battery testing device I’d ever seen. It was easily eighteen inches long, and had two thick cables, one red and one black, emerging from what looked like a cheese grater. At the end of each cable were two large spring clips, also red and black. A small metered scale and a digital readout were at the bottom of the tester housing. After I unpacked the locker where the engine starting battery and one of the banks of house batteries were located, Sean began his work.

Experience has taught me that, when a mechanic is huddled over whatever thing it is being examined, hearing them mutter a quiet “oh wow” is not generally a good sign. After the second “oh wow,” I thought maybe I should ask.

“What is it?” I said.

Sean pulled his head out from the locker and peered at me through breath fogged glasses, caused by the face mask he wore. (Sean explained he always wore a mask, as his wife was due any day with their first child. He had requested Lisa and I be masked when he was aboard.)

“How old are these batteries?” he asked.

I thought for a moment. “Three, three and a half years. They were replaced in 2018. Part of Hurricane Irma repairs.”

He stood up, the battery tester dangling from the cables and gestured into the locker.

“These three, all of them, are only holding 12 volts, and just barely.”

He glanced around. “Where’s the second bank?”

I pointed to his feet, at the deck hatch he was standing on.

“Under here, in the engine compartment. All the way aft.”

Once we had the hatch removed, Sean folded himself into the space and handed me the battery tester.

“Hang on to this, and tell me what the readings are when I clip on the terminals. It may get a little warm, but that’s normal.”

Have I mentioned that, to me, electricity is dark magic? I hesitantly accepted the cheese grater device, noting it was presently cool to the touch.

This time, I could see the news wasn’t good. Whichever battery he was clipped to was reading a measly six volts.
“This time, it was me who muttered, “oh wow.”

“What’s it reading?” Sean asked.

“Six volts. Maybe even 5.9.”

“Oh wow,” came the muffled reply.

He clipped to the other battery.

“What’s this one?”

It wasn’t much better.

“Between 11.8 and 11.9.” I sighed. “So, basically, dead, right?”

Sean unfolded himself from the engine space, and stood sweating in the cockpit. He fluttered his shirt to catch a bit of the cooling breeze.

“Yeah, your batteries are shot. Those three,” he said, gesturing to the first bank in the cockpit locker, “might go another little bit, but…they all really need to be replaced before I can check for any other issues.”

He wiped his forehead and then pulled his glasses off and wiped them across his shirt.
“But I’m thinking this is likely the problem, based on what you described. The alternator regulator is getting all sorts of bad data from the batteries and is kind of freaking out. That’s why you’re seeing crazy charging voltages. After the batteries are swapped out, I’ll check the rest of the system, but I’m pretty sure this is what’s causing it. These AGM’s generally make it three to five years, especially when used heavily like they are on a boat.”

Lisa offered Sean water. Sean gladly accepted. He looked at both of us.

“Do you want me to find you new batteries?”

There’s an axiom in boating, that ‘boat’ stands for ‘break out another thousand.’ Lisa’s adopted it to ‘Bill owes another thousand.’ Just like that, we were in a couple thousand for new batteries.

*On the left are four of the five new batteries, ready for installation; the battery on the far right is one of the recently deceased…*

Remarkably, Sean was able to return the following afternoon with the new batteries, literally fresh off the truck from the factory, having been delivered to his shop that morning. After three or so hours’ worth of grunting and sweating from both of us, the new batteries were in. Testing of the charging systems showed everything to be fine. Yay! The refrigeration tech had also showed up earlier the same morning and swapped out the compressor fan. We were making ice once again. Another yay!

That afternoon, with JO BETH functioning more or less normally, we headed out to the grocery store to re-provision. Unfortunately, we had to throw away most of our frozen and refrigerated food, in spite of packing the refrigerator and freezer with bags of ice daily. This included a wide array of frozen meats – chicken, salmon and other fish, a couple of pounds of ground beef, a pork tenderloin, and so on. A lot of refrigerated items got the boot as well. We took a taxi to the local Publix and came back with a cart full. We always try to avoid grocery shopping while hungry, so we pulled the ‘linner’ card at a Mexican restaurant, situated a few stores away from the grocery store.

All of our time in Port Canaveral had cost us our weather window to Brunswick before the next cold front and accompanying northerlies were forecast to arrive. The forecast for our departure was for light and fickle winds, mostly from the south. Getting offshore again would take many hours, as the entrance into Port Canaveral is quite long, and flanked by shoals and Cape Canaveral itself. As we had just replaced the batteries, and the weather forecast wasn’t stellar, we decided to continue our trip north via the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway. This would mean dealing with drawbridges, and stopping to anchor at night or to stay in a marina, but it would get us moving again. Not to mention if we had a serious issue with the batteries, which in all truth was highly unlikely, we would be closer to assistance. However, we first had to get out of Port Canaveral, and that meant an east to west transit of the Canaveral Barge Canal and the Canaveral Locks. I had wanted to leave as early as possible, as our planned stop for the night, New Smyrna Beach, lay some 55 miles north, but the first drawbridge on the Barge Canal was locked down for morning traffic from 6am to 8am. We motored to the fuel dock to top off our main diesel tank and fill the one deck jug we had used on the trip up from Marathon to make use of the delay. Once that was done, we got underway just after 8am.

Our passage through the Barge Canal and Lock was uneventful and at approximately 9:30am, we turned our bow north into the Indian River. We slipped past the towns of Cocoa Beach and Titusville under graying skies and increasing westerly and then southwesterly winds. By the time we transited the Haulover Canal and passed through its lonely drawbridge and turned into the Banana River, we were being pushed along a lumpy sea and squared waves by 20+ knot winds from the southwest-west. Soon, a brief but fast moving rain squall overtook us, and after it had passed, the skies began to clear again. The cold front was approaching as predicted. By the time we arrived in New Smyrna Beach, the winds were solidly from the West-Northwest.

Daylight was fading as we passed under the fixed 65’ South Causeway Bridge at the southern end of the New Smyrna Beach harbor area and began looking for an anchorage. Due to the incoming weather, most of the already crowded anchorage areas were full, but we motored slowly around and through the most protected of them looking for a spot. After a few minutes, we noticed a dinghy speeding towards us with two men aboard. They came alongside, but maintained a respectful distance.

*At the Free Dock, New Smyrna Beach, FL*

“Are you looking for a place to anchor?” the older of the two called out.

“Yeah,” I replied.

“It’s kind of tight here,” he said, gesturing at the small off channel basin we were scouting. The younger man sat in the bow of the dinghy, not making eye contact, and not saying anything.

“Why don’t you go to the free dock?” the older asked. He thumbed over his shoulder to the mainland. “There’s no one there and it’s totally open.”

We had passed the free dock on our way in, but saw signs indicating docking was restricted to four hours within any 24 hour period. Plus, there were bigger yellow signs posted which read, “Dock Closed for City Event.” I mentioned this.

“Nah,” the older guy said. “They have those up all the time. Keeps people from tying up and not leaving.” He smiled.

“You’re good there for a few nights, probably. Definitely OK for a night or two. No power or water, but secure.”

I looked at Lisa. She shrugged. “Why not?”

Lisa pushed the tiller, making the turn to port and back into the channel.

“What’s your names?” I asked our two new friends.

The older said, “I’m Richard.” He pointed to the young man in the bow of the dinghy. “That’s Miles, my oldest. He’s quiet.” Miles cracked a slight smile. “We both live in the anchorage up there,” he said with a gesture of his chin over his shoulder.

“We’ll meet you at the dock and catch your lines,” he called out. Before I could say ‘thanks,” or make our own introductions, Richard whipped their dinghy around and sped away towards the free dock.

True to his word, Richard and Miles had tied up to the small dinghy dock and were waiting for us along the fixed dock platform. A lot of towns along the Intracoastal Waterway have ‘free’ docks, generally for overnight use. They rarely offer any services other than a place to tie up, and are usually located in an area where sailors can walk to grocery stores, hardware stores, pharmacies, restaurants, and the like. This particular dock was situated behind the small civic center.

Once we were secured, we offered Richard and Miles a couple of warm beers, which they politely declined. “We like helping other sailors. Cruiser Karma. Paying it forward, ya know?”

We thanked them again and introduced ourselves.

“So,” I began, “we’re ok to be here overnight?”

“Yeah, it won’t be a problem,” Richard replied. “It’s not the weekend, and there’s no events happening, so you’re fine. If there is something planned while you’re here, the security or maintenance guys will tell you. But they’re cool. They’ll give you a day or two notice.”

He and Miles started toward their dinghy, when Richard turned.

“There’s a great pizza place a few blocks up the road. On the left. Panheads Pizza. Something like that. Really good. Goodnight.”

And with that, Richard and Miles were off.

Lisa started on dinner while I adjusted our lines for the rise and fall of the tides. This was our first time taking advantage of a free dock anywhere, and we were a bit unprepared for the experience. The area was surrounded by high rise waterfront condos and apartments. It was a hive of activity. There were people fishing, walking their dogs, riding bicycles, kids on skateboards, and so on. A good number of them stopped to talk, asking us about the boat, where we came from, where were we going, were we scared being out on the ocean, did we get seasick, etc. It was a bit like being on display, and most of my answers to their questions melded into a short presentation on sailing and cruising. Several people who stopped to chat lived aboard their boats in the various anchorages and used the dinghy landing to get to and from jobs, etc. I have to admit, our hearts and pride swelled with all of the compliments we received for JO BETH! One of the more memorable encounters was with a little old lady and her two tiny, shivering, bug-eyed dogs. She saw our hailing port of Savannah and said, “I have a grandson in Savannah. He sails too. His name is David. Do you know him?”

I hesitated for a moment, honestly trying to remember if I knew anyone in Savannah named David who sailed. I decided I didn’t.

“No ma’am, I never met anyone named David in Savannah who was a sailor.”

Her smile faded, and I quickly added, “but we’ve been gone for several years.”

“Well,” she added, “he’s a nice boy. Maybe you two will meet when you get back. Maybe he could take you sailing.”

As we settled in for the night, I mentioned to Lisa that while we were motoring north from the Cape, I had noticed our solar panels weren’t behaving properly. While she uttered her assurances that it was likely something simple, I explained the panels were generating power, which the electronic charge controller for the panels was seeing, but it wasn’t doing anything with the power. As we had been motoring all day, the batteries – our brand new batteries – were fully charged. The solar charge controller should have sensed the full charge and essentially ‘turned off’ the panels, showing 0 volts being generated. It hadn’t. I was confident it was something to do with the new battery installation, but I was too tired to do anything about it that night. We had gotten another weather forecast and the approaching cold front was now forecast to be a bit more intense, although its approach had slowed. With potential solar charging issues, and a stronger front coming, we decided to move to the New Smyrna Beach City Marina the next morning to figure out what was going on and to wait out the coming weather.

*The ‘missed’ unconnected cable, now reconnected…*

The night passed uneventfully and the morning dawned gray and blustery. Winds had already swung to the northwest and conditions indicated the front had once again picked up speed. We were able to secure a slip at the new Smyrna Beach City Marina, though we couldn’t arrive prior to 11am. Also, and this is a sure indication I’m officially getting old, my right knee was killing me whenever I knelt down or squatted. I had no idea why. I felt fine when we went to bed last night, and I was up once to check docklines. It wasn’t bothering me then. Walking was fine, going up and down the ladder from the cabin to the cockpit and deck was fine, but kneeling down or bending my knee past 90° was excruciating.

At 10:30am, we started the engine and prepared to move to the City Marina slip. The wind was a solid 15 knots now, and more north-northeast, which made getting off of that free dock a less than graceful departure. We made it with only a few scuffs and by 11:15, we were secured at the City Marina. After showers, we walked under gloomy skies and dropping temps to the Panheads Pizza, the spot Richard had told us about. It featured a variety of unique and tasty pan pizzas, all named after classic rock songs – ‘Simple Man,’ ‘Whole Lotta Love,’ etc. In a first for us, we ordered a ‘flight’ of four different pizzas, all of which were quite good.

That afternoon, I started looking into the solar charging issue. My first thought was that we had ‘popped’ a fuse when the new batteries were installed and powered up. It was worth checking before calling in a marine electrician. In spite of my view of electricity as ‘dark magic’, I do have a basic understanding of it. I started with the solar controller installation; all of the fuses were intact and clean, with no corrosion on the terminals, and all of the controller wiring was connected and tight. And so it was for the remainder of the fuse blocks I checked, five in total. However, when I went to check the last block, I notice an unconnected positive cable and terminal on the #1 house battery bank. The cable was buried beneath a bundle of other cables. It clearly had been overlooked when the new batteries were installed. I sent a text and picture to Sean in Port Canaveral, explaining the situation, and asking if this could be the cause. Needless to say, he was embarrassed at having missed the connection, but he agreed emphatically that would cause the issue. After powering down the twelve-volt electrical system and digging out the necessary tools, I had the terminal reconnected. A test of the system showed the issue was fixed. Yay again!

Stopped in a Space Port – Port Canaveral, FL, March 2021

April 02, 2021

We managed to leave Marathon on Tuesday, March 23 on a brilliantly sunny and windless day. As we wound our way through dozens of anchored fishing boats and watched flying fish startled by our approach skitter over the silky smooth sea, I noticed our refrigerator temperature was warmer than it had been a few hours before. Then I noticed the fault code light flashing: two rapid winks of the yellow LED light translated to a failed compressor motor fan.

*Leaving Marathon and the Florida Keys on a glassy blue sea…*

Less than five miles from Marathon, and something was already broken. Truthfully, I have no idea when the fan failure happened. It certainly could have happened before we left our slip, but still. After some heated discussion, Lisa and I decided to carry on. The refrigerator was cold and the freezer frozen, conditions that certainly should last the three or four days it would take us to reach our destination of Brunswick, GA.

On the up side of things, our alternator/battery charging issue, mentioned in the prior blog, seemed to have been repaired. From our prior blog post:

Going the opposite direction, we had a lovely broad-reach sail back over the reef and into Hawk Channel. As we were approaching the anchorage area, I began the process of bringing down the sails and Lisa started the engine. She soon yelled to me, “the battery light is staying on.” I went back to the cockpit to look. The engine was running, and sure enough, the battery light was glowing red. I stuck my head into the cabin to check the voltage meter at the electrical panel. It was showing 14.3 volts, a typical level of charge for having just started the engine. I looked at the panel again, and the light was off.

Once the anchor was set, we checked again. The engine started and ran normally, but the battery light stayed on. A quick glance at the electrical panel meter and the battery monitor display showed the alternator was hammering the batteries with well over 14 volts, which should have quickly eased to 13.3 or less after a few moments as the batteries were fully topped up from the solar panels. But, it didn’t. We stopped the engine.

That night over dinner, Lisa and I discussed the issue. We decided to head back into Marathon to get the problem checked. Ignoring it was not an option; at a minimum, it could damage and even destroy several thousand dollars’ worth of batteries. At the worst, it could cause a fire and we could lose everything. The next morning, we called Marathon Boat yard, but they were full and couldn’t accommodate us. Marathon Marina had not yet filled our old slip, so back we went. It took a few hours to trace; with the help of a professional marine electrician the problem was found: the connection of the alternator temperature sensor wire to the alternator regulator was bad. After what was literally a 30 second fix, the problem looks to be solved.

Onward we went.

By late afternoon, we were passing S-SW of Alligator Reef light tower and picking up a little push from the western edge of the Gulf Stream current. We ate a simple supper of Pimento Cheese sandwiches and crackers. The wind was still nonexistent and the sea a flat calm as the sun set on the western horizon. In the last glow of dusk, we passed Tavernier Creek and continued on towards Key Largo.

The forecast had called for exactly the conditions we were experiencing, and for the wind to fill in during the night at a gentle 5-10 knots from the SE, and then become 10 knots during the next morning. However, as we passed Ft. Lauderdale just after sunrise, we were still powering through a flat sea.

More worrisome though was the fact the battery charging issue once again reared its ugly head during the night. While I was on watch, I caught a flash of red out of the corner of my eye from the engine control panel. I peeked below at the electrical panel volt meter and saw the alternator was hammering our fully charged batteries with nearly 14.8 volts! Good grief! I sat back in the cockpit and looked around. There was no traffic, save a tanker about 12 miles east of Jo Beth. I watched the meter through the night and decided if I did see the charge reach 15 volts, then I would shut everything down and call for a tow. There was still no wind to speak of, and now we were pushing against a counter-current off the Gulf Stream; if I shut everything down and we began to drift, the risk of our little boat being pushed onto the reef was very real. Fortunately, the voltages settled down, albeit still too high. We kept powering on.

Florida’s Gold Coast slipped past as we continued north. By middle afternoon, as we were passing the ivory towers of Boca Raton, south of Palm Beach, we felt a stirring in the air…wind! Within a half hour, we were sailing along under a full mainsail and headsail. Finally, we could shut the engine off. The quiet without the drone of the diesel motor was absolutely lovely.

For the next 10 or 12 hours, we slipped along north under a brilliantly starry sky on a long and even swell, at a speed of five, and sometimes six knots. I went to bed around 8 pm, leaving Lisa to take the first watch. When I relieved her at midnight, she updated me on our position: we were just passing the St. Lucie inlet and the yacht haven town of Stuart, FL. The wind had dropped somewhat as had our speed, but things were good. She had also adjusted our course slightly more NE, to give a more comfortable ride as were now in a minor cross swell; that is to say the waves were now coming from two different directions. The batteries seemed to be behaving. She retired below, and I settled in to listen to a podcast from the NPR show, “This American Life.”

As my watch wore on, the wind dropped even more and the cross swell stayed the same, causing us to roll and the sails to slat and bang. Lisa came up at around 3am to help bring in the headsail and then went back to bed, leaving me to continue under the mainsail. The motion of the boat did ease, but now we were moving further than we had wanted to the NE. A large pod of dolphins swam alongside Jo Beth for nearly 45 minutes. I could see the ones closest to the boat in the bright moonlight, and could hear the others all around, whistling and clicking their secret language. Lisa relieved me at 5am, and I slept until around 8, when I relieved her and she went below for another nap. We gybed the boat around, bringing her onto a new course to close a bit more with the coast in the ever decreasing winds. Soon, we were barely making way to the W-NW at a scant 1.5 knots.

While Lisa slept below, I sailed onward, listening to the morning news on the stereo. However, the battery charging issues were being to worry me. I was beginning to think that perhaps the issue wasn’t with the alternator or the alternator charging system, but possibly with one or more of the batteries. Aboard Jo Beth, we have five Group 31 batteries, comparable to what powers a full-size pick-up truck. Four of the batteries are divided into two banks of two, for ‘house’ operations. These are the batteries which power our interior and exterior lights, stereo system, refrigerator freezer, and from which the inverter can draw DC current and covert it to AC current, such as when we need to charge our laptop computers. The remaining battery is a dedicated engine starting battery, which can be incorporated into the house banks if needed, and vice-versa.

If one or more of our batteries had failed, or was failing, it could literally ‘confuse’ the charge regulation systems with bad data. Of course, there are other things which can cause similar issues, but the problem was remarkably inconsistent to the point of consistency – that is, we were seeing a similar pattern of bizarre, seemingly inconsistent behavior from the batteries and charging system which made no sense, but we were seeing it consistently.

We had another issue we were dealing with, and that was our fuel consumption. The weather forecast was wrong, no surprise there, but we were burning through our fuel at an alarming rate. And now, because we were moving so slowly in the almost non-existent winds, our refrigerator was warming and the food we hoped to save would be lost. That morning into afternoon, under sail alone, it took over six hours to go five miles. When Lisa woke from her nap, we snacked on trail-mix in the cockpit and came to a decision: we would motor sail into Port Canaveral for fuel, to repair the refrigerator, and to track down the battery issues once and for all.

The afternoon before, we emptied one of our spare fuel jugs into the main tank. After some quick calculations and plotting a new course, we confirmed we had enough fuel to make it to Port Canaveral and would arrive at sunset. As we began to close on the coast, a target appeared on our AIS system. AIS, or Automated Identification System, works like an aircraft transponder for boats and ships. When we see an AIS target appear on our navigation instruments screen, we can click it and get vital information – things such as the boat’s course and speed, what type of boat or ship it is, and so on. Most vital though is information pertaining to CPA – Closest Point of Approach. This lets us know how close we and the target will be to one another, provided we both maintain our speed and course.

*The morning after our arrival at Cape Canaveral…*

In this instance, the AIS target turned out to be friends Chris and Janet, aboard their yacht AFRICA. AFRICA is a 38’ Hans Christian cutter rigged yacht. AFRICA was also headed into Cape Canaveral and we called her on VHF radio. Unfortunately, they were having a problem with their radio; they could hear us, but we could not hear their responses. We found this out through a series of text messages, and agreed to contact each other when we arrived and were secured.

I called Cape Marina on my cellphone and secured a slip for the next few nights, explaining our problems with the refrigerator and battery charging. We were instructed to come into the marina and secure ourselves on the fuel dock, and then check in at the office the next morning. Shortly after we arrived, Janet from the yacht AFRICA called to ask where we were and what our plans were. We agreed to meet for lunch the next day after we got showers and had a full night’s sleep. The next day would also start the search for an electrician or mechanic and a refrigerator technician. After our showers, we enjoyed steaming bowls of clam chowder with crackers and then we immediately collapsed into the V-berth.

False Start...

March 19, 2021

The past few weeks have been spent preparing Jo Beth and ourselves for our departure from America’s Out Islands, otherwise known as the Florida Keys. An engine service, inspection of the mast and rigging, repairs to damaged varnish and the laying on of fresh varnish, and the replacement and updating of other gear and spares have kept us moving. A leaking lid on the forward water tank was repaired and the foredeck sun awning was modified to be more useable in rainy weather. It’s been a busy February and March.

*The Florida Keys were starting to feel like our second home…*

We arrived in Marathon in 2018, late in the afternoon on Christmas Eve. The plan had been to enter Boot Key Harbor and find a spot to anchor and spend a quiet Christmas, and later on, move to a mooring. However, we stopped at the Marathon Marina fuel dock to top off our fuel and water tanks and wound up taking a berth for two nights. On the morning after Christmas, we moved into the harbor anchorage area to wait for a mooring ball assignment from the harbormaster’s office. We would stay in Boot Key Harbor until May of 2019.

As Lisa and I were both working, and thus heavily dependent on Wi-Fi, life on a mooring was difficult. Particularly so, as Lisa had clients in Europe and was engaged in video conferencing before COVID forced the business world into Zoom life. My work involved uploading large photography and video files for clients. Hot spotting through our phones just wasn’t working, and while the City Marina and Boot Key Harbor offered excellent Wi-Fi in the harbor community room, it was only available from 8-5 daily. We hadn’t planned on staying in the Keys through another hurricane season, as there were reminders of Irma all around us, but we were both busy with work and decided taking the time off to move north would put too much of a dent in the income. So, we stayed in 2019, and planned to depart in the spring of 2020.

We all know what happened in the spring of 2020…

Fortunately, we were able to secure a slip in Marathon Marina, and it has become our home for our home throughout the mish-mash that was 2020. In truth, we could not have been in a better place for a pandemic, shutdowns, and all that was 2020. For us, 2020 was a time for re-evaluation of plans, making decisions, and drawing lines in the sand. Accordingly, I have ‘retired’ as of the start of 2021, shifting more from my marine surveying work to consulting, photography, videography, and writing. Lisa is still working, but trying to limit her time to 20 hours per week. We are, more or less, debt free. The time has come to start sailing.

As the dozens of tasks necessary to ready the boat for sea are completed, we’ve turned our attention to the weather forecasts. As sailors, weather rules us. We watch for ‘weather windows;’ those gaps between frontal systems in which winds are more favorable for passage making and the weather overall is more settled. In our case, we want to make the first leg of our sail north from the Keys to Brunswick/St. Simons Island, Georgia, in between the cold fronts which traverse the southeastern US every ten days or so, between November and April. If we play our cards right, or at least reasonably well, we should have a pleasant, mostly downwind sail from the Keys to St. Simons. The truth is, we don’t know until we go. Conditions were looking good for a departure from Marathon this past Sunday. As ocean passages go, it’s not far – approximately 500 miles – and should take around 4 days or so to complete. However, once we got out close to the barrier coral reef, we found there was simply too much East in the wind, and that our course would put us on a direct head to wind path for approximately 18 hours.

No thanks. Sailing close hauled, or at a slight angle off the wind is certainly exhilarating – salt spray flies, the boat heels, and water rushes along the side decks at seemingly breakneck speeds. It certainly makes for exciting pictures and videos for sailing magazines and YouTube posts. In reality, ‘beating to windward,’ ‘sailing to weather,’ whatever you call it, is extremely hard on the boat and her crew. Most sailors avoid slogs to windward whenever possible – and we did the same. We turned the boat around and headed back to the western end of Boot Key to anchor and wait. A departure on Monday still had us in good weather all the way to Georgia.

Unfortunately, we have officially missed our weather window. A cold front is approaching, and we’ll have strong northerly and easterly winds for the next week or so. We had enough of a window to make it north to Miami, or perhaps Palm Beach, before the expected northerly winds would press against us once again. Since we were here, and in a familiar spot, we decided to wait. When the south winds fill in once again, we’ll make another go of it.

Once we arrive in Georgia, there’s plenty to do. We’ll spend a few weeks catching up on COVID delayed doctor and dental check-ups, sorting out some personal business matters, and swapping our clothes from what’s good for a tropical climate to what’s needed for more temperate conditions. We’ll visit with friends and family, and begin preparing for the next leg of our cruise along the eastern coast, from Georgia to New England.

*Without a doubt, we will miss the Keys…*

Leaving these islands and our friends is bittersweet, for sure. But it is time. We’re not getting any younger. Lisa and I have a running joke between us, that we’ll never leave the slip. She says that for me, the boat will never be ‘perfect enough,’ or ‘fixed enough, so that nothing breaks.’ I say that for her, ‘we’ll never be rich enough to break away, and we just might run out of money.’ The past year, and all of its losses and heartaches has taught us two simple things: what will break is us, and what we’ll run out of is time.

It’s time to make way…when the weather permits.

Tropical Storm Eta - November 2020

November 16, 2020

Tropical Storm Eta, which formed in the western Caribbean in November, 2020 and caused significant damage in Nicaragua and Honduras, passed directly over the Florida Keys during the nighttime hours on Sunday, November 8, only a rainy and breezy shadow of its former self.

Still, there were some impacts; minor flooding occurred in some areas, and power outages in others, and a few boats drug their anchors. Some kayaks and canoes were lost. All in all, it wasn’t so bad in the island chain. North on the mainland, however, was a different story. Stupefying amounts of rain fell in southeastern Florida, particularly in Broward County, which is where Ft. Lauderdale, Hollywood, Pompano Beach, and so on are situated. One region of the central western portion of the county received a mind-boggling 15 inches of rain on Sunday night as Eta coasted overhead. Miami-Dade County had its share of flooding, with nearly 10 inches of rainfall.

Eta was an annoyingly slow moving system, particularly after it crossed over the Keys and into the Gulf of Mexico, where it promptly stalled, keeping the lower Keys and Key West in rain bands and gale force gusts (winds up to 39mph) until about Wednesday. Here in Marathon, we experienced a few gusty squalls following Eta’s transit, and by Thursday were under clearing skies.

Lisa and I stayed aboard Jo Beth for the event, rarely seeing more than 30-35mph winds Sunday evening through Monday evening. We never received the crazy-heavy downpours so many others saw, and really never had any issues. The only things we were remotely concerned about were tidal surge and losing power…no air conditioning! Fortunately, we never lost power, internet, or cell service during the storm. The internet was down for about 12 hours following the passage of the storm, but power stayed on.

Tidal surge happens when ocean waters are pushed and shoved ashore by a storm’s winds. The surge can be aggravated by the timing of the tides as well, and in our case, any surge which was likely to occur was going to be around the time of the high tide.

A screenshot from our navigation wind instruments page; the number in the upper left corner is the wind speed in knots - 17.4 at this moment - in between Eta’s rain bands as the eye approached; here, the wind is coming from just west of north as ind… — A screenshot from our navigation wind instruments page; the number in the upper left corner is the wind speed in knots - 17.4 at this moment - in between Eta’s rain bands as the eye approached; here, the wind is coming from just west of north as indicated by the yellow arrow in the center of the screen

Winds in Marathon were predominantly from the northeast as Eta approached. Remembering that cyclonic storms – such as a hurricane – rotate or spin counterclockwise in the northern hemisphere, we knew we could expect the winds to shift from the northeast, to the north, then northwest as the storm drew closer and moved over our location. As the storm’s circulation passed, we watched as the winds shifted to the west, then southwest and finally south. Once Eta’s center had moved fully west of Marathon, the winds would settle in and blow from the southeast.

This is all well and good, save the fact that the winds most likely to cause a tidal surge headache for us would be the winds from the west and southwest – and those winds would be very close to the timing of the high tide. We did see a rise of water above the normal high tide of roughly one to one and a half feet. That was it.

We had prepared Jo Beth well and felt ready for Eta. We firmly lashed and secured the sails and removed loose canvas covers which could be blown around. We added extra fendering to protect the hull from the dock and took a breast line from an amidships cleat across the empty slip to our north. The northerly winds would push Jo Beth into the concrete dock structure hard, and the breast line was there to ease the pressure of the hull against the pier. The aft spring lines, which keep Jo Beth from moving forward in the slip, were tightened. The water tanks were filled, the food lockers stuffed, and the laundry done. There really wasn’t much else we could have done.

We did help some friends ready their boats, and kept in touch with our neighbors in the marina as well as friends in Key West who would be riding out Eta on their boat. The rector from Lisa’s church in Marathon called, concerned that we were staying on the boat until Lisa reassured her we were thoroughly prepared. In the end, all was well for us.

*The calm in the 85 mile wide eye of Eta, Monday morning*

Now, Hurricane Iota is forecast to make a landfall in nearly the same exact location along the northern coats of Nicaragua. Unlike Eta, all indications are Iota will dissipate over the mountainous terrain of Nicaragua and Honduras. And there is yet another area of low pressure, which may form another tropical cyclone system, in that same region of the Caribbean. The long range forecast models are taking whatever this newest one will become, if it becomes anything at all, south and over Panama and into the Pacific. A sure reminder that Hurricane Season 2020 isn’t over yet.

It's Been a While...

November 02, 2020

To say it’s been a while is an understatement. To say it’s been one hell of a year, well, that surpasses ‘understatement.’ This year has been like no other.

We are still in Marathon, in the Florida Keys, and still in our slip at Marathon Marina. Like everyone, our plans were changed as were our lives. Our plan had been to leave Marathon in the spring of this year, and sail north, spending time in Georgia before heading north to New England for the summer months. Next, around this time of year, we were to sail south again and ready ourselves for another trip north, this time to Canada. After spending most of summer cruising the Canadian Maritimes (Nova Scotia, Newfoundland) we were planning to cross the north Atlantic to England. Our European sailing adventures awaited.

Then came the pandemic. The Novel Corona Virus. COVID-19. And life changed.

As shutdowns and stay-at-home orders became prevalent, the same was happening here, with quite devastating results. The economy of the Florida Keys is tourism driven and quite suddenly, tourists had vanished – literally. The results were not hard to miss. But Keys folk are resilient and soon, servers, bartenders, etc., were pulling shifts at the local Publix and Winn-Dixie grocery stores, at Home Depot, and at other essential businesses which remained open. Many restaurants also maintained a decent carry-out business. Though different, it seemed things would be OK in the Keys.

There is one road in and out. The only other ways to get to the islands are by boat and by airplane. At the start of April, the Florida Keys were officially closed to everyone except residents, property owners, and workers traveling to and from the Keys from the mainland. Overnight, and in the downhill slide of the peak tourist visiting season, the Keys grew quiet. Surprisingly enough, we soon came to realize that by being where we happened to be – in a tropical, island environment – we had something of an advantage when it came to enduring a global pandemic. In the Keys, the climate is sunny and breezy, and a great many businesses, especially restaurants and bars, are mostly if not completely open-air.

*At times, it seemd we had the place to ourselves…*

Still, the Keys faced many of the issues as the rest of the country, and in some respects, the world. No toilet paper, paper towels, or hand sanitizer could be had for several weeks, even a couple of months. For a brief period, chicken was tough to find, as were eggs and yogurt.

Was it worth it? It’s tough to say. For us, it’s a resounding ‘yes.’ While there was a tremendous economic cost, and in truth, some people and businesses have never fully recovered, COVID cases and infections in the Keys remained remarkably low – well under a total of 500 in a population of over 70,000 by the start of summer, with around five or so fatalities. When the Keys ‘reopened’ on June 1, cases predictably surged and numbered well over 1,000 by mid-July. Thus far, we are and have been fine. Mask wearing is required anytime there is a roof over your head and physical distancing is not possible; medical facilities are well prepared; and people, at least most, are being courteous and considerate.

Lisa and I have not left the islands this year, except for once when I had to go to Ft. Lauderdale for a job. The summer has been hot and dry, unusual, as summer here is generally the rainy season, as well as hurricane season. We’ve had two near misses with tropical storms, Laura and Sally, both of which went on to make landfalls in the same area of the central Gulf of Mexico coast in Louisiana. Now, we’re wrapping up the summer, and the rainy season, although we seem to have gotten the entire rainy season in the single month of October, with nearly 10” of rain in just a two - three week stretch of time. We did haul Jo Beth from the water ahead of Tropical Storm Laura, as it indeed appeared to be a threat. Fortunately, it was (for us) only a rainmaker. While Jo Beth was hauled out, we repainted the bottom with marine antifouling paint and took care of a few other jobs over a week’s period of time.

While Jo Beth was out of the water, we couldn’t stay on board. St. Columba Episcopal Church, where Lisa attends and volunteers, offered a small house on church property for us to stay in. The house has been converted to an after-school care and daycare facility, and proved to be quite a surreal experience. We slept on a borrowed air mattress, and there was a dining room table with a couple of chairs. Otherwise, everything was kid sized; the refrigerator was chock full of apple juice boxes and chocolate milk, and the cupboards with animal and graham crackers. We did have a full size kitchen, and an endless number of board-games and puzzles to keep us occupied.

Otherwise, there simply isn’t much to report. We had hoped to use the quiet months to get some local cruising in, but life had other plans. While we both stayed healthy, Lisa injured her foot, re-breaking an old fracture from her college days, so that quashed any sailing plans. And the summer was brutally hot. My work remained steady, and just as Lisa’s foot was healed enough to go sailing, the tropical weather beset us and my workload went from zero to a hundred in a matter of days. All in all, and with consideration given to everything, it was a remarkably quiet summer.

We’ll be here until next spring, when we plan to sail north. Once the 2020 hurricane season is in the books, we’ll get some local cruising done, and start making videos and doing photography. We’ll also get our website fully up and running, and make blog posts on a much more frequent basis…exciting stuff is on the way!

Stay tuned, and thanks for sticking with us!

The Dry Tortugas - Part III: A Rough Way Home

February 06, 2020

Walking Among the Bones…

Once Lisa and I recovered from the news we had almost been the focus of a SAR, (Search and Rescue - see Part I for the full story.) by the Coast Guard and National Park Service, we set about exploring Ft. Jefferson. A very curious thing about this fortress upon the sea is that it is surrounded by a moat. The moat served multiple purposes. First, it was a ‘last’ defense against any force that managed to penetrate the ‘ring of fire’ of the fort’s armory, as well as the US Navy warships that would be stationed at anchor there; second, the outer wall of the moat served as a ‘sea-wall,’ a barrier against the pounding waves from the Gulf of Mexico; and third, it was to serve as the fort’s toilet. That’s right - the fort’s toilet - for nearly 2,000 people.

This third intended use was defeated by poor engineering and environmental design, as the premise behind the idea of the moat serving as a toilet was it would be ‘flushed’ by the twice daily high and low tides. This was flawed from the start, specifically because tides in the area are small – minuscule – when compared to the tidal ranges where the majority of the forts of similar design were situated along the Atlantic coast. For example, at Savannah’s Ft. Pulaski, the tidal ranges average between seven and nine feet, with two high tides and two low tides occurring every 24 hours. At Ft. Jefferson, while there are also two high tides and two low tides every 24 hours, the average tidal range is less than one foot. It’s not difficult to imagine the health disaster created by the warm and semi-tropical environment and lack of tidal flow.

The moat completely encircles the fort, and today is clean enough to have become something of a tidal pool environment. No swimming or snorkeling is permitted in the moat, and I can’t image why anyone would want to, as it is filled with jellyfish, sea urchins, stingrays, and other similar ocean critters. The top of the moat wall can be walked almost entirely around the fort, save a twenty foot section on the north side which has collapsed; the moat has completely silted in at the southeastern and southwestern sides. The breach now serves as the inlet and outlet to keep the water from stagnating.

Walking through the main entrance into the fort, the sheer scale of the place impresses itself upon you. The walls of the fort encircle the parade grounds, which today are used for meeting places for visitors from the ferry and seaplanes taking ‘formal’ guided tours. (Lisa and I eavesdropped on one of tour guides, and opted for the ‘self-guided’ option.) There are numerous signposts marking places and points of interest.

For its time in history, the fort was a technological marvel. The canons which ringed the lower and middle levels were retractable; that is, the canons would fire, then pull back from the gun port. As the barrel of the canon retreated, heavy cast iron doors would close to seal the gun port closed while soldiers reloaded. However, the ocean environment was harsh on all the materials which made up the fort, especially the canons, ammunition and anything else constructed from iron or metal. Many of the fort’s canons were scrapped and ‘repurposed’ or melted down for the manufacturing of materials needed during World War I and World War II. Of the original total armory, only 10 or so of the original canons remain at the fort.

*The top of Ft. Jefferson offers amazing views; that’s JO BETH anchored to the right of the frame*

Scattered around the parade grounds are the ruins of soldier’s barracks and officer’s quarters, as well as living quarters for the civilian workers and slaves, along with ammunition magazines and foundations for various other structures. Ever present in your mind, as you stroll among the bones of the fort, is that everything you can see which makes up the structure – everything – had to be brought out by ship. From the bricks and stones which provide the flooring, to the lumber, to the horses, mules, wagons, and carts, to the canons…all had to be carried to where it is now. An interesting after effect of some of the construction materials in the is that the fort is actually growing stalactites and stalagmites in the structure. This is result of so much lime being present in the mortar mix which holds the millions of bricks in place.

The winds were steady and persistent during our time in islands. The water was not as clear as it typically would be, and it was a bit on the chilly side, so our snorkeling was limited. Also, during our trip out while I was dealing with our stalled and fuel starved engine, I pulled a groin muscle. The idea of being in the water with fins on and kicking didn’t exactly appeal to my aching leg. The explorations of the fort were strenuous enough, and I would spend much of the afternoon each day the first four or so days we were there icing my leg. After a while though, we spent more time walking the beach on Bush Key and watching all of the birds which make the island group home.

There are gulls of seemingly every variety, as well as Brown Pelicans, Sooty Terns, Ruddy Turnstones, and Masked and Brown Boobies. The dominant bird in the sky, however, was the Magnificent Frigate Bird. With a wingspan exceeding seven feet, they soar on thermals rising from the sea and islands in all weather. The early sailors called them ‘Man ‘O War Birds’ as they are known for lying in wait (so to speak) for other seabirds as they returned from their feeding flights and harass them until they regurgitate their catch in a desperate attempt to flee the giant aggressor; the frigate birds then acrobatically dive and swoop to grab the seafood feast from the air. We saw them doing this to hapless gulls and terns on more than one occasion. The male and female Frigate Birds are predominantly black; the females throat area is white and the males have a throat pouch of brilliant red skin which they inflate during mating season to attract females.

Preparing for Weather…

On our third day there, the harbor emptied. We knew a cold front was approaching, and forecast to bring 25+ knots or more of wind, mostly from the west and then the north and northeast. For 24 hours or so, we were the only boat in the harbor. Late on the fourth day, while we were exploring the upper tiers of Ft. Jefferson, the yacht PRIVA-SEA V sailed in from Key West and anchored. On our way back to JO BETH, we stopped and introduced ourselves. PRIVA-SEA V is a Canadian boat, though she is moored in Key West. Her owner and crew are all Polish. We had a good time getting to know one another and swapping sea stories over wine and cheese. Thanks to PRIVA-SEA for a lovely evening.

The cold front arrived with a wallop mid-afternoon Saturday. Lisa and I had spent some time prepping JO BETH that morning, by rigging extra lines and preparing a second anchor at the bow, ready to go, in the event our primary anchor began to ‘drag.’ We sailors are a peculiar lot, as many would agree, and one of the more arcane sailor’s art is the setting of an anchor. Unlike large ships, the weight of an anchor plays a lesser role in the design and deployment of an anchor from a small sailing yacht. Instead of dropping something heavy onto the sea floor and depending on the sheer weight of the object to hold the boat in place, we modern sailors ‘hook’ ourselves to the seabed. Small boat anchors are designed to dig and bury themselves on the ocean floor in a variety of materials; sand, mud, clay, rock, and sometimes, a combination of everything. In the Dry Tortugas, the harbor bottom is mostly sand and sand/clay. The material connecting the anchor to the boat is also an important player in the equation, and in our case, it is up to 200’ of 5/16” galvanized steel chain, plus 150’ of heavy nylon rope.

An anchor can break out of the bottom and begin to drag when the directional forces on the anchor change, such as with a sudden change in wind direction and velocity. This can be further exacerbated by any bottom material which may ‘stick’ to the anchor after it breaks free, preventing it from re-setting itself.

As the system approached, the wind slowly veered from the west-southwest to west. With dark clouds crossing the horizon, the gust front blew in with a 40 knot blast of chilly air from the northwest. The skies darkened even more, and the winds dropped a bit to around 25 knots. Soon, a cold rain was drumming down, giving JO BETH a much needed fresh water rinse. Fortunately, our anchor held, as did PRIVA-SEA V’s, and the second anchor wasn’t needed. Jerzi, (pronounced ‘Jersey’), the owner of PRIVA-SEA V and I had agreed to stay in radio contact throughout the bad weather in the event either of us needed anything.

After three or four hours, the rain stopped and the winds actually decreased. Soon enough, they picked back again and for the next 24 hours or so, were a steady 20-25 knots from the north. The temperature dropped to a comfortable range and we eagerly opened the ports and hatches to get a steady cool and fresh breeze through the cabin. Overnight the skies cleared and our spectacular view of the stars and planets was restored.

A Rough and Tumble Ride to the Marquesas Keys…

The time was coming to plan our return trip to Marathon. Since the arrival of the cold front, we had been getting weather reports and forecasts from the park rangers and the ferry captains. We knew another cold front was headed our way and we had a narrow window of around 36 hours to make the return trip. We began to ready JO BETH, and two days after the cold front arrived, we added 10 gallons of diesel fuel to the tank, secured the dinghy and cabin, weighed anchor and headed out of the harbor. PRIVA-SEA V also left shortly after we did, taking a more northerly route back to Key West.

Given our prior experience passing Rebecca Shoals, we were determined to take a more southerly course back to the Marquesas Keys. A park ranger had taken a liking to Lisa after discovering they knew people in common from shared experiences in the tall ship world. (For those of you who don’t know, Lisa has crewed on two tall ships, the R/V WESTWARD, and the SSV CORWITH CRAMER.) He provided us with updated weather forecasts and agreed with our plan to keep Rebecca Shoals on our port, or north side, as we sailed east. Unfortunately, the weather forecasts proved to be just a little bit off.

An hour after sunrise, when we had cleared Southeast Harbor Channel and were approaching the park boundary, we turned our bow southeast. The plan was to put Rebecca Shoals several miles to our north, and then resume our easterly course to the Marquesas Keys. The weather forecast had promised north-northwest winds at 15-20 knots, becoming north and decreasing to 15 knots by nightfall. The waves were forecast to average between three and five feet. For JO BETH these were certainly manageable conditions; the north wind would be blowing across her beam which would allow us to sail on a beam reach, the most favored point of sail for most sailors, and the point of sail at which JO BETH sails her best.

We set all sails and were soon met with near headwinds of around 20 knots. In order to be able to ‘point’ high enough into the wind; that is, to be able to sail nearly upwind, we had to keep the motor running. The sea state was closer to five to seven feet, on average, with occasional waves a couple of feet higher. Once past Rebecca Shoals, we made our turn more to the east, and more into the direction the wind was coming from. We were able to continue motor sailing, but we were taking a beating. Soon, we took in the jib and staysail completely. We had hoped to average five knots of speed over the bottom, but at times we were only making three and a half or four knots. Then, a wave would slam into the bow, and sending spray flying, effectively stop us. JO BETH would shrug it off, and gathering herself, slowly build her speed once again. Having cleared the Dry Tortugas National Park boundary, we were, once again, back among the crab pot buoy markers. By 11:00am, PRIVA-SEA V (being a much larger vessel, thus able to make better way) disappeared from view over the northeastern horizon.

The autopilot could not cope with the confused sea state and poor Lisa steered the entire way. I was not able to stay braced on the windward side to steer due to my strained leg muscles. We would slam into the seas head-on, burying the bow in the waves, creating rivers of Gulf of Mexico water streaming down the side decks and out the overboard drains. Rise, fall, SLAM, and repeat. We had to keep a vigilant watch for trap marker buoys, which were often hidden beneath the rolling and pitching ocean swell. This was our day for the next 11 hours.

Around 4pm, we sighted the Marquesas Keys, the thin line of the island’s tree tops slowly coalescing into view from the lumpy ocean horizon. By 5:30, we had all sail down and I was on the foredeck preparing the anchor as Lisa steered us toward our anchorage. It had been a long day. We were both looking forward to having a cold drink in our hands and a good, hot meal.

“We have an engine alarm!” Lisa shouted from the cockpit.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I don’t know, I can’t see it in the sun,” came her reply.

I ran aft and looked. It was the high temperature alarm. I shut the engine down. I ran back to the foredeck to get the anchor down. We were in a bowl shaped channel of deep water, with a depth of 15 feet or so, but surrounded by coral heads and sandbars. The anchor had to get on the bottom and dig in. Quickly, it was set and we were stopped and secured. The motion of the boat settled somewhat, and just behind us, approximately 30’ away, were a set of trap marker buoys.

I went back to the cockpit and down into the cabin. I lifted the top portion of the engine compartment hatch and was greeted with the stench of distressed and heated rubber. The belt on the sea water cooling pump had shredded itself into fine and stringy threads. I looked and sniffed around the engine. I didn’t see any leaks, or any paint bubbled and blistered from the engine overheating. Aside from the belt failure, we seemed to be ok. I went into the cockpit and told Lisa what had happened.

“Well, we have another problem, “ she said.

“What is it?”

“We can’t steer. The tiller, it’s locked in place. I think the dinghy painter is pinched between the top of the rudder and the hull.”

The dinghy painter is the towing line we use to pull the dinghy when we tow it behind JO BETH. It’s made from nylon and polypropylene line, so it floats on the surface of the water, to keep it away from the spinning propeller when the engine is engaged.

“How’d that happen,” I asked, looking over the side. Sure enough, the painter was tightly snugged against the hull, disappearing beneath the water. Frankie, our dinghy, bobbed alongside, but at an odd angle.

“After we shut off the engine,” she said, “I was trying to keep the bow into the wind until we were anchored. I had the tiller all the way over to starboard and I think the painter settled on top of the rudder. So, when the anchor set I swung it back to the center and it jammed. I can’t move it now.”

We both slumped onto a cockpit seat. The sunset was beautiful. We could hear the steady drone of two or three small crab boats working their traps a mile or so to the northeast. We carried spare belts for the engine, so we could change the belt. But, we couldn’t steer now, so where would we go? We tried using the boat hook to free the painter, but without success. JO BETH was still rolling in the swell too much for either of us to safely get into the water and attempt to free it. Plus, it was getting dark.

“We’ve got to call for a tow,” I reluctantly said.

We were still too far away from Key West for the local Tow Boat/US operator to hear us on the VHF radio, and we had no cell phone service. We could, however, reach the Coast Guard station in Key West. I called the Coast Guard on the radio and asked for them to relay messages on our behalf to the towing company. (Fortunately, this is something they do on a routine basis.) We passed along all the pertinent information: our latitude and longitude, the boat name, a description of JO BETH, etc. By 10:00pm, a small tug boat was approaching and hailed us on the radio. When I told the captain our rudder was jammed, but on the centerline, he laughed and said, “well that never happens! It’s always jammed hard to one side or the other!” By 10:45pm, we were under tow and headed for Key West.

We had asked to be taken to Robbie’s, a boat yard on Stock Island, the island just east of Key West. At around 3:00 in the morning, we were slowing at the entrance to Stock Island Harbor. Fortunately, during the tow, the dinghy painter had freed itself, most likely during a period when the little tug had us going far too fast, at over 8 knots. I had to radio the captain and ask for him to slow to around 6 knots as the faster speed was too much for a sailboat like JO BETH.

The arrival at Stock Island was not without drama, however. As we were entering the harbor channel, the small tug dropped the towing bridle from our bow and moved to the starboard side of JO BETH to secure her alongside the tug. In doing this, the towing bridle became entangled in the tug’s propeller. This resulted in the tug’s deckhand stripping down to his skivvies and, light and knife in hand, going over side in the pitch black to cut the bridle free. In another half hour, we were secured to the bulkhead in the haul out slip at Robbie’s.

Stock Island and Key West…

At 7am, there was a loud banging on the hull. Once I explained our unscheduled arrival and situation to the bewildered and somewhat irritated service manager at Robbie’s, we were again taken under tow, this time by a much smaller tow boat, and moved to a boat yard service dock. With the sea water circulation pump out of service, we couldn’t run the engine, not even for short periods of time. We spent our first day there, exhausted from a lack of sleep and sore from our passage, securing a mechanic and finding something for lunch. We walked from the yard to El Siboney, a good Cuban restaurant on Stock island. We also knew about Roostica, a great pizza spot, also on Stock Island, but a little too far for our tired bodies to walk.

The engine issue was repaired after a couple of days, but not without stumping the mechanic for a short time. The problem was caused by the seawater pump pulley loosening itself on the pump shaft. As the shaft spun, the pulley wobbled, putting excessive strain on the pump belt. If I had put our spare belt on, we would have likely made it 10 or so miles before the replacement belt would have shredded. While we were anchored and after taking a closer look at things, I had assumed the pump shaft had seized, and this was what the mechanic said he had expected to see as well. He even disassembled the pump, anticipating a rebuild was in order, and was surprised to find it in nearly new condition, internally. It was only when he reassembled the pump that he realized the pulley was out of position on the shaft.

Another cold front was coming, and this one was forecast to be a good bit stronger than the previous one we rode out at Ft. Jefferson. Waiting out weather at Robbie’s is something of an adventure in itself. The service dock was quite rough, and surged back and forth against the dock pilings, which were old metal I-beams set into the bottom. The whole arrangement clanked and groaned at all hours, and the rough bollards and cleats on the dock chewed through our docklines. The yard service manager, whose own boat was out of the water for service, allowed us the use of his slip, which was slightly more protected than where we had initially been placed. The yard was also in the process of replacing all of the service docks and accordingly, was in a race with the coming weather to complete as much as possible. Once again, we were moved two docks down and secured.

Boat yards can be alien and strange places to the uninitiated, and even to experienced sailors. There were all manner of vessels hauled and blocked on the ground at Robbie’s: dilapidated and haphazardly assembled houseboats; retired military landing craft and other small boats; sailing yachts of every description and vintage; large and mid-size motor yachts and sportfisherman; and commercial charter boats which usually spent their days shuttling tourists to dive and snorkel on the nearby reefs. The formal name of the facility is Robbie’s Full Service Marina; but despite the name, Robbie’s is a boat yard. It is also one of the few ‘do-it-yourself’ facilities remaining in the area. The only service provided is the hauling, blocking, launching, and storage of vessels. All maintenance and repair work is done either by owners, crews, or subcontractors. The yard employees had adapted junked cars, box vans, and pick-up trucks to fit various appointed tasks around the facility, giving the place something of a ‘Mad-Max’ vibe as they bounced around the rough gravel and sand surfaces of the yard. Lisa found it all quite depressing.

Knowing we would be stuck there for at least a week, maybe more, we persuaded a couple of friends from Marathon to drive our car down for us in exchange for dinner. Since we had arrived and our phones reacquired cell service, we felt compelled to at least earn a bit of income while waiting on the weather. I also had lots of phone calls to return from concerned friends to explain why they had heard the Coast Guard on the VHF radio persistently calling for us and reporting us overdue. (See Part I of this tale for that story!) Plus, the engine repairs and boat yard fees were going to set us back quite a bit. Fortunately, the vessel tow was covered by our hull insurance. We also connected with our friends Forest and Krystal King and their orange marmalade cat Jeff, from the sailboat SANGUINE, who were kind enough to shuttle us around until our car arrived.

Finally, after nine days, we had a weather window to make the trip from Key West back to Marathon. SANGUINE was also sailing to Marathon, and then on to Titusville, leaving the Keys behind for a while. The winds were once again easterly, right on the nose, and forecast to be around 12 knots with a small swell of 2 feet or so. This time, the forecast was spot on. Leaving at sunrise, we motored the entire way back to Marathon, under brilliantly blue and sunny skies. Of course, we spent most of our time being vigilant for the ever present and annoying trap buoys.

By 3:30 in the afternoon, we were back at Marathon Marina, having arrived with something of a bang. Whenever possible, we try to top up our fuel tank before going onto a mooring or into a slip. We had planned to do this, and due to some miscommunication with the fuel dock personnel, went to the wrong spot on the fuel dock. At the last minute, we had to turn in the marina channel and go around to another side which would put our port side against the fuel dock if we came in against current, as one should. However, we already had the fenders and lines rigged for a starboard side tie in expectation of using the fuel pumps on the marina channel side; since this is also the configuration for docking in our slip, we lazily decided to make a circle in the harbor channel and dock starboard side to. We should have moved the fenders.

Lisa was on the helm, as she usually is when docking, and due to a series of miscommunications on my part, plus me blocking her view as I stood on the foredeck, the bow collided with the power and water pedestal on the dock. The pedestal fell with a loud ‘bang,’ breaking the potable water line and sending a geyser of fresh water 12 feet into the air. Soon enough, marina personnel had secured the water and JO BETH was secured alongside the fuel dock. To say Lisa felt horrible was an understatement, but Rick, the fuel dockmaster on duty, simply walked past the boat, paused and said, “diesel, right?” Once we had fueled up, we slipped away from the fuel dock and within 5 minutes were snug and secured in our slip. A few hundred dollars and a day later, the fallen pedestal was fully restored.

A Post Cruise Debrief…New Lessons Learned and Old Ones Reinforced…

Lisa and I enjoyed ourselves immensely at Dry Tortugas National Park. As with everything, there were lessons learned. For us, perhaps the biggest lesson came from our experiences with the weather. As sailors, our lives are ruled by weather. Now that we’re secured in our slip, and my leg is no longer aching, and we’re not feeling the literal beating to windward on the return leg from the Tortugas, it’s quite clear that we chose the wrong time of year to make the trip, at least from Marathon.

***Loggerhead Key, as seen from the inner harbor at Garden Key***

Had we waited until the late spring, we would have been finished with cold front passages and prevailing easterly and southerly winds would have filled in. This would have made the trip out much more comfortable, but the return trip would have still required careful planning. However, with the longer days of spring, we could have chosen a more southerly or northerly course angle on which to return, and that would have virtually eliminated the rough ride we endured. Also, the prevailing winds at the Tortugas would have shifted and weakened, allowing us to be able to explore and snorkel more from the dinghy. We had really hoped to visit Loggerhead Key, but due to the winds, it wasn’t safe to do so.

Another benefit of waiting would have been a reduction in the number of crab and lobster trap buoys as the seasons would have been finished or at least winding down. Believe me when I say, in spite of everything that happened, dealing with the trap marker buoys was by far the least enjoyable aspect of the trip.

One concern we had prior to our departure was conserving our water. The islands are called the ‘Dry’ Tortugas for a reason. We departed with both of our water tanks full and an additional 20 gallons secured in jugs on deck, for a total of 100 gallons. When we arrived in Key West on the return trip, we had only consumed 60% of the water in the forward tank. Our aft tank and the deck jugs remained full. While we were certainly aware of our water usage, and took steps to consume water carefully and wisely, we weren’t obsessive about it. In that area, we feel we did quite well. We even both took a shower on board.

In the end, the lesson that will definitely stick with us is how being tired and fatigued can affect our judgement and decision making abilities. Fortunately, we were never close to being in any situation which was genuinely dangerous; but were certainly in situations which were inconvenient and uncomfortable. When we had the engine issue on our return leg to the Marquesas Keys, we would have been perfectly fine to wait until daylight to call for the tow boat. Tow boat captains and crews make their living with an acceptance of risk. Weather conditions had calmed considerably when the tow boat arrived and took us under tow, but working at any task after dark, especially on a boat, and even more so on a boat under tow, increases the level of risk for all involved. Nothing would have changed by waiting, and with all things being equal, at least the tug deckhand wouldn’t have had to dive under the tug in the dark to cut the entangled towing bridle.

The Dry Tortugas - Part II: A History of Ft. Jefferson

January 20, 2020

The Fort Was Not a Happy Place…

Ft. Jefferson on Garden Key, The Dry Tortugas - Photo courtesy of Flickr — *Ft. Jefferson on Garden Key, The Dry Tortugas* *- Photo courtesy of Flickr*

The dominating presence in the Dry Tortugas is Ft. Jefferson. The massive brick structure rises from the vibrant aquamarine waters of the Gulf as you approach, the sheer scale of it an overwhelming presence upon the sea. To say it is impressive is an understatement.

The islands were first ‘discovered’ by Spanish explorer Ponce De Leon in 1513. He christened them La Islas Tortugas – Islands of Turtles – due the large numbers of sea turtles he and his crews observed in the area. For early sailors, as well as the indigenous peoples of the region, sea turtles were an important food source. The islands are also home to large populations of seabirds – including the Magnificent Frigate Bird, Sooty Terns, Brown Pelicans, Ruddy Turnstones, and a variety of gulls. And of course, the coral reefs surrounding the islands create a natural, deep water harbor and support an abundance of marine life. Soon after the islands were charted, the word ‘Dry’ was added to warn mariners that there was no fresh water to be found in the island group.

*Along the sea wall, on the western side of the fort*

After the Louisiana purchase in 1803, the United States government became ever more concerned about the Spanish presence in Cuba and Mexico. In 1825, a lighthouse was built on Garden Key to warn mariners of the dangerous coral and rocky shoals around the Islands. Soon, however, it became clear the location of the Dry Tortugas made them strategically important to protect shipping that travelled from the ports in the Gulf of Mexico, specifically New Orleans, to ports on the American Atlantic coast and beyond. In 1846, construction began on Ft. Jefferson in order to defend the Gulf shipping routes. The fort was envisioned as a massive gun platform, purpose built and designed to defend the Gulf of Mexico shipping lanes, and was part of an ambitious effort undertaken to fortify the coastline of the United States following the War of 1812. Unique to Ft. Jefferson, was that while ships could easily sail around the fort’s ‘ring of fire,’ which extended approximately three miles, it would be much harder to avoid the fast and nimble American Navy frigates which would be stationed in the harbor. The fort was also planned to be a resupply depot for passing American Naval vessels.

Construction continued on the fort for over 30 years, and remarkably enough, it was never finished. The structure contains over 16 million bricks, each of which had to be brought by ship, along with all of the other necessary construction materials. In relative short order, the huge structure began to crumble under its own weight, and due to the forces of the hostile environment in which it had to exist, such as being battered by hurricanes and passing cold fronts, the entire enterprise was doomed to failure. Ironically enough, it was the invention of the rifled cannon which formally rendered the fort obsolete, as the thick brick walls could then be easily penetrated by the ‘modernized’ projectiles. The fort was formally abandoned by the United States Army in 1874. During the entirety of its time as a military fortification, not one single shot was ever fired at – or from – Ft. Jefferson.

At its peak, 1,729 soldiers were stationed at the fort. To put this in perspective, the entire island of Garden Key, where the fort is situated, is about 16 acres of dry land, and the fort covers 11 of those acres. Disease was rampant at times, particularly yellow fever, and fresh water storage was a significant challenge. Virtually all of the fresh water was captured from rainfall and stored in massive cisterns; however, during the Civil War, two steam condensers were installed which could distill 7,000 gallons of fresh water from seawater per day. Most of the rainwater cisterns were located below ground and eventually cracked, causing the water contained in them to be contaminated with salt water. One of these cisterns, which is approximately 96,000 gallons, remains intact and is in use today to provide fresh water for the park rangers and other staff who reside at the park in rotational shifts of 10 days on, 10 days off. A small section of the fort is converted to apartments for the staff. In addition to auxiliary diesel powered generators, there is also a solar array for electrical power generation. Communication with the outside world is through satellite telephones or UHF/VHF radio.

During the fort’s heyday, many of the Army officers and other soldiers stationed at Ft. Jefferson brought their families with them. The Army also employed civilian machinists, blacksmiths, brick and stone masons, lighthouse keepers, and general laborers. There were also 22 African slaves at Ft. Jefferson. At its peak, there were nearly 2,000 people living within fort’s walls.

Perhaps Ft. Jefferson’s greatest claim to fame is its role as a prison for military deserters and the men charged with conspiracy or complicity in the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. Of these, the best known is Dr. Samuel Mudd, who treated assassin John Wilkes Booth for a broken leg following the death of Lincoln. Dr. Mudd had been sentenced to life imprisonment at Ft. Jefferson, but eventually received a presidential pardon from President Andrew Johnson in 1869 for his role in treating the sick during multiple yellow fever epidemics which swept through the fort due to poor sanitation practices. Interestingly enough, Dr. Mudd tried, unsuccessfully, to escape the island on board a visiting supply ship early in his sentence.

*Interior of Ft. Jefferson, ground level*

Perhaps the most dangerous element with which the people at Ft. Jefferson had to contend with was boredom, which included a lack of variety in their meals. During one of our chats with the employee running the small gift shop, we were able to read excerpts from a few diaries kept by soldiers. “Nothing at all happening after nine-fifteen this morning;” and, “it is very warm again,” were common notations. Another was, “we spend our hours watching the prisoners work, as that is all there is to do.” Other diaries bemoaned the awful ‘salted beef and pork,’ and the insect ridden loaves of hard bread produced by the bakery. Rats and mice were a serious problem as well. The arrival of a ship from the mainland, bringing fresh fruits, vegetables, and mail, was a time of joy and celebration. Another common entry in soldier’s diaries was, “a mail ship came today, but I got nothing.”

John James Audubon visited the Dry Tortugas in 1832 and spent several weeks there sketching the amazing variety of bird life the islands supported. While there, Audubon and his colleagues encountered ‘eggers’ from Cuba; egg collectors who raided bird’s nests, particularly the Sooty Tern for eggs to sell in the Cuban capital of Havana. Audubon himself wrote, “the eggs are excellent eating, and our sailors seldom failed to collect bucketfuls of them during our stay at the Tortugas.” Ernest Hemingway also spent time in the islands, fishing and spearfishing.

In 1935, The Dry Tortugas and Ft. Jefferson were declared a National Monument by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and in 1992, they were officially designated as a National Park.

Lighthouses of The Dry Tortugas

*Not a lighthouse staircase, but one of the bastion stair cases at Ft. Jefferson; both used nearly identical construction methods, though lighthouse stairs were usually made from wood*

The Garden Key Lighthouse was built in 1826, generally to warn mariners of the presence of the low lying islands and surrounding reefs. However, the lighthouse was too short and the light too dim, and when construction on Ft. Jefferson began, it was wholly incorporated in the fort structure. Still, it proved insufficient, largely due to the optics of the glass surrounding the light.

In 1856 a much taller lighthouse was built on Loggerhead Key, an island roughly three miles northwest of Garden Key. This new light was equipped with a ‘modern’ Fresnel Lens, which greatly amplified and concentrated the visible beam of light, making it visible for many dozens of miles in all directions.

A few of the original housing structures associated with the Loggerhead Key Lighthouse are still in use today, mostly by scientists and researchers. The first lighthouse keepers earned the princely sum of $600 per year for their life of solitude and isolation in the Dry Tortugas. The Loggerhead Key light was electrified in 1931 and became fully automated in 1988. The lighthouse was formally taken out of service in 2015, when newer navigational aids were placed around the islands. An interesting fact regarding the lighthouses of the Dry Tortugas is that they were the only American lighthouses to remain in operation for the entirety of the Civil War.

In Part three we’ll share our experinces visiting the Tortugas Islands

The Dry Tortugas - Part I: Getting There is Half the Fun!

January 13, 2020

Ready…Set…

Approximately 70 miles west-northwest of Key West, in the sub-tropical Gulf of Mexico, lies a small island group known as The Dry Tortugas. The Dry Tortugas consist of seven tiny islands; Garden Key, Loggerhead Key, Hospital Key, Bush Key, Long Key, Middle Key, and East Key. Of these, only Garden Key, Loggerhead Key, and Bush Key, are open to visitors. Garden Key is the center of the island group and is the location of the massive brick and mortar antebellum fortress, Fort Jefferson. The entire island archipelago and 100 square miles of the surrounding seafloor all make up Ft. Jefferson – Dry Tortugas National Park.

There are only three ways to get to the Dry Tortugas: by seaplane, either chartered or your own; the Key West based National Park Service Ferry, YANKEE FREEDOM III; or your own vessel. Of course, our manner of conveyance was our very own JO BETH. Most visitors choose to visit for the day, and opt for the ferry from Key West. Camping is available at the park and is restricted to no more than three days. Because of the islands extremely limited resources, the maximum number of campers allowed for any given period is approximately 30 persons using eight designated campsites. Dry Tortugas National Park is one of the most remote parks within the United States National Parks system. Camping here is a very primitive experience. The island group is called ‘dry’ for a reason – while there are sea turtles aplenty, (after all, the island name translates from Spanish as “The Turtles”), and a lot of other marine life in abundance, there are no naturally occurring sources of fresh water on any of the islands. All trash must be carried off the islands, and there is no store or any resources available to visitors. You must bring everything you will need for the duration of your stay.

Since our arrival in the Keys, The Dry Tortugas have been a place Lisa and I wanted to visit. We had made several prior attempts, but always had to cancel or postpone the sail for a variety of reasons: the weather; one or both of us would come down with a sinus infection; issues with JO BETH; and so on. When the timetable opened up for us to make the trip just after Christmas, 2019, with a decent weather forecast (more on that later) we began our preparations to sail west from Marathon.

Islas Tortugas, here we come!

*Our course from Key West to The Dry Tortugas*

Go…

After spending several days preparing and provisioning the boat, we motored out of our slip at Marathon Marina & Resort and pointed the bow west into a steep and choppy sea. We planned to break the trip into three days. The first day would be the shortest, from our marina to Niles Channel, which separates the islands of Ramrod and Summerland Keys. We would spend one night at anchor there, then make an early departure for the Marquesas Keys, a group of small islands approximately twenty miles west of Key West. We would spend the second night of the trip at anchor off of Boo-Boo Key in the Marquesas group, and on the third day we would make sail for the Tortugas.

Usually, Lisa and I prefer to make short offshore passages, like this one, overnight. We’d typically leave in the late afternoon from our starting point and sail through the night, arriving at our destination the following morning. However, thanks to the voracious appetite so many of us have for fresh seafood – and in particular, for stone crab claws and spiny lobster – sailing at night was not a viable option. The reason is all of the floats that mark the location of the crab and lobster traps. There are thousands – thousands – of them scattered throughout the Keys waters. Lisa and I were astonished to see them as far as the eastern most boundaries of The Dry Tortugas – Ft. Jefferson National Park, nearly 70 miles from the closest inhabited land. We had to maintain a constant and careful look-out for these floats, especially when we were moving under motor power. A single trap float line getting caught in the spinning propeller would cause significant problems, and could potentially damage the engine, transmission, and propeller shaft bearings. Anchoring at night and moving only during daylight hours was our best and safest option.

The winds leaving Marathon were on our beam and southerly, but had built up a steep and short chop in Hawk Channel. As we were in the process of setting sail, I became somewhat seasick and was soon sharing my breakfast with the fishes. Quickly though, the motion of the boat under sail steadied and I began to feel human again. The first day’s sail was short, and after about five hours, we had the anchor down in Niles Channel and settled in, nearly completely surrounded by crab and lobster trap markers. The winds built a bit more, close to twenty knots, and became more southeasterly. The weather forecast called for the winds to weaken overnight and shift more easterly, which they did. After a dinner of Chicken Tikka-Masala over rice, and a good night’s sleep, we awoke to near calm conditions, with the wind at 5 knots or so from the east-southeast.

We raised anchor at sunrise and motored away from Niles Channel into a much calmer Hawk Channel and continued west. By 11:00am, we were passing the Boca Chica Naval Air-Station, and by 1:00pm, Stock Island and Key West were fading in our wake. Soon, we were passing the islands which make up the Key West National Wildlife Refuge; Boca Grande, Man Key, Woman Key, Ballast Key, and the Barracouta Keys, all the while dodging and maneuvering around the crab and lobster trap marker buoys. These buoys are almost always made from Styrofoam or some similar material. They are usually painted in vibrant reds, yellows, oranges, and other bright colors, but some aren’t. We passed many that were painted black, brown, or dark purple. Worse though, were the ones painted in hues of blues and greens which almost matched the color of the sea. They were nearly impossible to spot far enough ahead to pass at a comfortable distance. Once or twice, we even mistook birds floating on the sea for the trap markers!

By 4:00pm on our second day, we were anchored with one other sailboat at Boo-Boo Key in the Marquesas Keys, once again surrounded by lobster and crab trap markers. We had left cellular and Wi-Fi signals behind in Key West, though we could still pick up the NOAA Marine Weather broadcasts from Key West on our VHF radio. The weather forecast had changed, and called for a weak cold-front to pass later the next morning, bringing with it, ‘freshening north-northeasterly breezes.’ The sea state forecast, which predicts wave heights and direction, was essentially unchanged. Under a spectacular sunset, we enjoyed a light dinner of spinach and cheese ravioli. After doing the dishes, I went into the cockpit and lay down on the portside seat. Out there, away from the light pollution of the inhabited Keys, the sky was breathtaking. The Milky Way was clearly visible and, as I gazed into it, a brilliant shooting star crossed my view from east to west. The quiet was startling and soon, we were fast asleep in the V-berth.

The next morning dawned overcast except for a patch of blueish-white low on the southeastern horizon. We weighed anchor and were underway by 7:00am. The sea was glassy calm; so much so, that it was difficult to distinguish the horizon. The sky and sea merged into one mirrored reflection in front us, seemingly placing the dreaded trap markers in suspense above the water’s surface. For a brief period, the overcast broke apart, giving us glimpses of blue sky. We passed by hundreds of Portuguese Man O’ War Jellyfish, some so small they were hard to tell apart from the bubbles in our wake. Once in a while we saw reddish-brown Moon-Jellyfish fluttering just beneath the surface. We also saw a sea turtle poke its head of the water, then quickly duck and dive after spotting us. Gulls and other seabirds fished around us. The National Park Service Ferry, Yankee Freedom III passed about three miles north of us on her way to the island park from Key West.

Soon enough, the newly forecast cold-front approached. A long, low, and dark gray band of clouds rolled along the sea surface to our northwest, bringing with it a light and noticeably cool breeze. The calm and glassy water now stirred, rippling beneath the moving air. The frontal boundary didn’t look that strong, but it didn’t necessarily look weak either. Within half an hour, we were pushing along against 15 knots or so of wind from the north-northwest, and debating about whether or not to raise sail. Small weather systems like this often exhaust themselves fairly quickly, and if this was going to be the case, we didn’t want to set the sails to only strike them again in an hour or two. So, we waited.

Although the forecast mentioned little change for the sea state, we watched as the seas built surprisingly fast. Within a couple of hours, we went from a glassy calm to three foot steep and closely stacked waves. Soon, they were up to four feet, with an occasional six footer rolling under us. We decided the wind was indeed going to hold and to set sail so as to take advantage of the breeze.

It is much easier for the crew and the boat if the boat is turned up into the wind when sail is being set or struck. This allows the air to (mostly) flow past the sails instead of catching in them as they are being raised and/or lowered. As it turns out, this is one thing for which we didn’t prepare well enough earlier that morning. When we anchored at Niles Channel, we fully secured the sails – meaning they were stowed and covered, their halyards disconnected and secured. What we should have done the morning we left Niles Channel, was reconnect the halyards and prepare for the sails to be raised quickly when needed. Instead, we motored to our anchorage in the Marquesas with everything stowed, and we left the anchorage earlier that morning with them still stowed.

Now that we had decided to raise sail, everything had to be done on a pitching, rolling, deck. I went forward and began connecting the mainsail halyard to the head of the mainsail, which meant I had to step up and balance on a section of the mast pulpit bars in order to reach the mainsail head. Once this was done, I began raising the sail. I succeeded in half a dozen pulls, getting about 1/3 of the sail up, before things came to a grinding halt. One of the sail battens, the thin, flexible, lengths of fiberglass which bend and flex to help the sail maintain an airfoil shape was catching on one of the lazyjack legs. (Lazyjacks are a network of small lines which serve to ‘catch’ a sail as it drops to prevent it from spilling onto the deck or worse, into the sea.) When raising the mainsail, the lazyjacks should always be retracted and pulled forward to move them out of the way of the mainsail – and I had forgotten to do this. Down came the scrap of sail I had hoisted, and forward went the lazyjacks. This time, when hoisting the sail, we decided to put a reef in the sail – meaning, the sail would not be fully hoisted, but shortened to match the wind conditions. As I attempted to secure the reef, the reefing line for the first reef – JO BETH has two reefs in her mainsail – wouldn’t budge. And it was then, that things became interesting.

When we left Marathon two days earlier, we had started with a full tank of diesel fuel. The amount of motoring we had done consumed 25% or so of that fuel. We weren’t concerned about this in the least; after all, JO BETH is a sailboat. Plus, we burn just slightly more than 1 quart of fuel per hour, and the tank capacity is 35 gallons. We also carry 15 gallons in jugs lashed on deck. However, all of the pitching and rolling in the quickly building seas sent the fuel in the tank sloshing about. This caused the fuel pick-up tube, which delivers fuel to the engine, to be exposed to air in the tank, creating air blocks in the fuel line. For this reason, the engine began to falter, and soon it sputtered and with a shuddering clank, come to a stop.

Another problem we faced was that when we turned into the wind in order to raise sail, which was from the north, we made a course change. As we were trying to raise sail, we continued to be propelled at 5 or 6 knots forward by the engine. When we decided to get the sails set, we were approaching Rebecca Shoals, a shallow area of coral reef which we needed to pass on either the south or north side. The south is the preferred course in northerly winds, and on our planned course, we would have passed south of the shoal. But because of the time we had spent attempting to get sail set, we now found ourselves north of the shoal – and in much rougher waters. Now, without an engine, the prospect of being set onto the shoal area was a concern. Fortunately, we were three or so miles north of the really shallow areas.

Regardless, we were about 20 miles from The Dry Tortugas and now, with the sails set and reefed, we were sailing along quite well. Still, the situation with the motor was a bit worrying. We could sail to the Tortugas just fine, but entering the harbor and the area where the park service preferred for yachts to anchor would be quite tricky under sail power alone. I ran over the possible causes in my head for the motor stopping; I checked for any sign of overheating and found none; the dual fuel pre-filters were full and clear and the fuel clean; and so on. After a bit more thought, I concluded that during all of the wild pitching, air had entered the fuel system. Once we were in calmer water, I would check the system and ‘bleed’ the air out. Bleeding the fuel system is simple, but it requires me to stick my hand between very hot hoses to operate the fuel lift pump manually, and in doing so, have my face inches from the motor as I watched for fuel without bubbles to emerge from the bleeding port on the primary fuel filter housing. It would have to wait until we were in calmer seas.

It Really Was a Simple Request…

Before leaving on the trip, we filed a float-plan with several trusted contacts. The float plan outlines the planned itinerary of the trip, and provides enough information about the yacht and crew for rescue services to be notified if the crew hasn’t checked in by the stated ‘overdue’ date. One of these contacts is a friend of mine in Key West, a professional captain. As we continued on our way, a sport fishing boat emerged on the horizon on a heading for Key West. I decided to call the captain and ask for a message to be relayed to our contact in Key West concerning the engine, in the event the issue was more serious than air in the fuel system. We were too far from Key West for our radio transmissions to reach the island. We would discover later that this radio call was to result in something a bit surreal.

I hailed the boat on the radio:

Me: Sportfisherman north of Rebecca Shoals, this is the sailboat on your portside, over.

No reply.

Me: Sportfisherman north of Rebecca Shoals, this is the sailboat on your portside, over.

The fishing boat slowed.

Him: This is the Yellowfin, is this the sailboat calling, over?

Me: Roger, we have a disabled engine and would like to make a request for a message relay, over.

Him: Roger, good copy, understand you wish to relay a message, over?

Me: Roger, we wish to do a message relay, over.

Him: Roger, good copy, switch and answer channel 74, channel 74, over.

Me: Switching to 74.

I went on to explain our situation with the engine, making it very clear I was quite certain the problem was as simple as air in the fuel lines, etc. I passed along our contact information, the name of our Key West contact, (who he said he knew well), and that we would assess the engine issues once we arrived in the Tortugas. I also advised we might be requesting parts be sent out by seaplane or ferry to make any repairs if the engine problem turned out to be something else than air in the fuel system. I assured him we were in no distress whatsoever, that we were healthy, had plenty of food and water aboard, and that we were continuing on to the Tortugas under sail, that we only wanted to make our Key West contact aware we might be contacting him upon arrival in the park. We even provided an ETA for our arrival at Tortugas Harbor. We concluded the call and continued on our separate ways, with the sportfisherman being gone and out of visual range inside of five minutes. I attempted to call Dry Tortugas radio to advise them of our ETA, but our hails went unanswered.

The sailing for the remainder of the day was uneventful. About three hours later, under clearing skies and calming seas, we entered the southeast channel for Tortugas Harbor. I began the process of bleeding the air from the fuel system, which was indeed the issue. It took three times, but by the time we had rounded Iowa Rocks and entered the channel for the inner area of Tortugas Harbor, the engine was purring along like a happy cat. It was New Year’s Eve and we found ourselves a spot among the eight or so other yachts already there. We set our anchor and settled in for our stay.

As we secured the mainsail, a park ranger approached in the small park security vessel. He greeted us, glanced over the boat, and gave us a run-down of the park rules; no fireworks, no loud noises, don’t harass the wildlife, don’t enter the fort after dark; told us where we could and couldn’t go, etc. We asked if we could wait until the following morning to go in and register and pay the park fee, which he said would not be a problem, and moved on to the catamaran anchored next to us. We grabbed ourselves a couple of drinks and sat in the cockpit, watching the last seaplane of the day arrive and collect day-trippers for the flight back to Key West. After a lovely sunset, Lisa made a pot of roasted red pepper and tomato soup. Once I finished the dishes, we read for a bit and were asleep by 8pm.

*Beach on Garden Key…Look Closely and You’ll See a Sail on the Horizon*

An Unintended Consequence…

The next morning, we prepped the dinghy to go ashore. We rode in and secured it on the beach, adjacent to the same area of beach used by the seaplanes to load and offload their passengers. We went to the small boathouse on the dock and filled out the boat permitting forms and paid our park fees. We took a quick glance at the posted weather forecast for the next few days and then set out to explore the fort a bit. We hadn’t gone two steps when we saw the ranger who greeted us the afternoon before. We said our good mornings as we passed, when he spun on his heels and said, “wait! JO BETH! You guys came in late yesterday, right?”

Lisa and I glanced at each other.

“Yes,” I said, “you came to the boat and talked to us.”

He walked closer. “Did you two know the Coast Guard was looking for your boat yesterday afternoon and last night? There was almost a search and rescue started.”

We were shocked. We stood there a minute before mumbling, “no. Why?”

“Did you talk on the radio to a guy in a Yellowfin sportfisherman yesterday?”

We told him we did and explained what we had discussed. Once we finished, he stood there a minute, studying us, before saying, “really? That’s it?”

“Yes,” we said, “that’s it.”

“What happened? Why was the Coast Guard looking for us?” I asked.

The ranger shook his head and chuckled.

“That guy,” he started, “he’s a worrier. He’s a ranger too, in Everglades, and he’s a friend of mine. He was out here visiting and fishing. I guess he got freaked out after leaving you guys out there. He called me, and asked if you were here, and I guess you weren’t when he called, ‘cause I said I hadn’t seen your boat. So he called our dispatch office, they asked us to start looking for you, and then he or somebody called the Coast Guard. But we didn’t go look for you, because we didn’t know where to look for you, and by then, well, you were here.”

We were dumbfounded.

Seriously? The United States Coast Guard almost launched a search and rescue…for us?

“So, it’s all cleared up now?” I asked. “The Coast Guard, they’re not still looking, are they?”

“No,” he said with a laugh, “it’s all clear.”

Then Lisa said, “but you came to our boat. Didn’t you see the name?”

He said, “yeah, but I wasn’t sure I was remembering it right. Besides, I didn’t even think it was your boat ‘cause you guys came puttering in here all nonchalant and casual. Like nothing was wrong.”

We just stood there for a moment, still in disbelief.

The Yankee Freedom III had entered the harbor and was docking. Our ranger jerked his head in the direction of the ferry dock.

“Gotta go,” he said and was off.

Part two will cover our time at Ft. Jefferson and The Dry Tortugas. Currently, we’re in Key West, waiting for weather to clear so we can continue on to Marathon.

Solar Power! And, Our Take on the Frib 360 Foldable RIB Dinghy and Suzuki 15HP 4-Stroke Outboard Motor…

March 09, 2019

Putting Sol to Work for us…

Our four SunPower 100 watt solar panels, mounted on our dodger and cockpit awning with Loxx Grommet Snaps

At long last, we have solar power! Our new SunPower Panels deliver 100 watts each of solar energy to our heavily tasked batteries. They are semi-flexible to a maximum bend of approximately 35° and weigh 4 pounds apiece. The performance of these panels is quite remarkable; and while they’ve only been in operation for a few days, we’re happy with them. We have actually watched the charge level of the batteries rise even as we drew power from them to run laptops, charge small appliances, and the like.

The Victron MPPT Charge Controller App on my Mac laptop…we’re utilizing 382 of our available 400 watts…10.3 amps per hour is going into our batteries!

The really neat part of this system is the Victron Charge Controller. The controller regulates the charge going to the batteries from the panels, allowing more current to flow into the battery cells when it’s needed and slowing it down when the batteries are fully charged. When the batteries are charged, the regulated current ‘floats’ the charge so the batteries stay fully charged, as long as the power draw doesn’t exceed the panel capabilities. There’s an app that we can monitor the charge activity through our phones, iPad and laptops. So far, in the early spring Florida Keys sunshine, we’ve seen an average of 6-8 amps flow into the batteries for several hours through day and for a short time early one afternoon, we had nearly 12 amps per hour moving into the batteries. Of course, as the days grow longer, so should our ability to ‘harvest’ more of the sun’s energy.

The SunPower 100 watt semi-flexible solar panels are the most efficient semi-flexible panels available

Of course, the downside of solar is the sun must set. And, there are overcast days – although on the few incidents where we’ve been shaded by clouds, power, albeit somewhat reduced – continues to flow. So far, we’ve had enough power banked so that overnight we only discharge 30% or so of the total battery charge. Pretty dang cool!

I’ll write a more in-depth review after we’ve lived with the system for a few months, and in varying ‘solar’ conditions. Certainly, we have no complaints. We’ll keep you posted.

The Dinghy Dilemma – Solved?

Another small victory for us is that we seem to have resolved what we called, ‘The Dinghy Dilemma.’ Aboard a small cruising yacht, the dinghy is a vital piece of equipment. It is the way the yacht’s crew gets from the boat to shore. It is how groceries get from shore to the yacht, how laundry gets done, and how spares and provisions are brought aboard. It’s also what gets the crew to all the great beaches, sandbars, and diving/snorkeling locations. It can serve as a towing vessel, when the yacht may have engine issues for example, or as a scouting vessel when entering an unfamiliar harbor.

The real part of the dinghy dilemma for us was finding a functional and suitable dinghy that would meet all of the needs listed above, and then some. However, it also had to be easily handled by one or both of us in and out of the water, tough and durable, and as safe as is possible.

We looked at all manner of dinghies; fiberglass rowing and sailing ones, inflatable ones which rolled up for stowage, inflatable ones which folded up for storage, and RIBS – rigid bottom inflatables – which typically could not be rolled or folded due to the rigid hull, usually made from fiberglass or aluminum. We owned two or three of the inflatable types, including one dead and dying RIB, which came with JO BETH when we bought her. We rowed a variety of hard dinghies. Yet, the dilemma persisted. The biggest issue we had was where to stow the dinghy aboard JO BETH when we wouldn’t need it. The space available was limited, and the smaller dinghies which would fit were too small and too light to function as a cruiser’s ‘dink.’

Add to that Lisa’s desire for a sailing dingy. We looked at 8’ and 10’ Trinkas and Fatty Knees (hard dinghies) but they are too big to fit anywhere on deck. We considered the Fatty Knees 7’ that would just fit on the cabin top between our traveler and the mast, but it wasn’t really big enough to carry us and gear plus several water jugs, etc. So, Lisa can only stare longingly at the Trinkas that sail about the anchorage on sunny light-wind days.

Enter the FRIB…

One chilly night in our Savannah apartment, while JO BETH was being repaired from her Hurricane Irma damages at the Hinckley Yacht Services yard in Savannah, Lisa stumbled across the FRIB while reading posts on a sailing forum. The FRIB is an inflatable RIB, with a fiberglass bottom, that folds for storage. Built in and distributed from England, the FRIB was available in a variety of sizes. With dinghies, generally speaking, bigger is better. Bigger dinghies can carry more weight, stay drier in rough conditions, and can be powered by larger and more efficient outboard motors. In Lisa’s increasingly enthusiastic research on these boats, she discovered that the 360 model, which is nearly 12 feet long when fully deployed, folded to essentially the same dimensions as the much smaller 9.5’ model, the 275. There was roughly 5/8” difference between the two when folded and stowed.

Soon, we were watching YouTube videos posted by FRIB owners around the world. We decided to inspect one at the closest dealer to us, Dania Beach, FL, when we travelled to the FL Keys to spend Lisa’s birthday with friends. The FRIB had to pass a variety of tests; could we fully deflate it, fold it, and repack it by ourselves; could we pick it up and carry it when inflated or deflated – it weighs just under 100lbs – and after seeing one, would it work for us? The short answer to all of these is, we returned with the FRIB 375 – and a few accessories. Even better, a friend of ours in Savannah is a Suzuki outboard motor dealer. Gillis Marine made us a deal we couldn’t refuse on a brand new 4-stroke Suzuki 15HP outboard motor!

Fast forward to now. One of the lessons we learned, a lesson which all cruising sailors learn, is that everything is a compromise. Dinghies are no different. The FRIB – or Frankie, as we’ve taken to calling her – is fantastic in the water. She’s carried us and our stuff with no complaints; she’s kept us (reasonably) dry and comfortable in rough and choppy conditions, and she’s weathered our bumping into docks, pilings, and even JO BETH like a champ. But on deck, folded up, she’s a beast. Hence, the name ‘Frankie’ – short for Frankenstein’s monster.

Of course, this is not Frankie’s fault, but merely the nature of life aboard a small boat. Space is limited and each piece of gear must earn its keep. Frankie has certainly done that, and more. We tried to develop a routine for launching her from onboard. Inflating the pontoons is no big challenge, but once she’s fully inflated she simply has to be shoved about until she more or less falls overboard – she’s longer than Jo Beth is wide. And while we love the Suzuki outboard, it’s another 100lb beast which has to be wrestled from its stowed location on the stern rail and lowered to Frankie’s stern where it’s secured and locked – without it or us going in the drink. Getting her back aboard is a bit easier, but still has its challenges. Peace finally settles when Frankie’s deflated, folded, and lashed securely on the sea hood, just forward of the canvas spray dodger, and aft of the mast.

(We don’t have any photos which show Frankie folded and stowed..we’ll post some soon.)

The Suzuki DF15A 4-Stroke outboard motor has, thus far, performed flawlessly. The motor can be started electrically, or manually with a pull-cord. We opted for the manual start, as we don’t have a place to safely store a starting battery when the dinghy and motor are stowed. The motor has plenty of power to get Frankie up and on plane quickly, and the fuel economy is amazing. Most of our time has been spent in harbors or no-wake/minimal wake zones, so we’ve not been able to really ‘open it up’ yet. We carry a portable three gallon tank for fuel in the dinghy and a five-gallon jug with spare gasoline on JO BETH’s deck. Our only concern with the motor is that it’s too heavy - just so - for the mount on JO BETH’s stern rail. Building a more robust mount is on our project list.

So far, so good. Frankie’s served us well during our time in Marathon and elsewhere in the Keys. But, is the ‘dinghy dilemma’ resolved? Really resolved?

Probably as much as it will ever be.

Welcome to 2019!

January 29, 2019

We left the Hinckley Yacht Services yard in Savannah, GA on October 2nd. It had been nearly one full year since Jo Beth arrived there on a truck trailer following Hurricane Irma in Marathon, FL. That one year proved to be an eventful one, from dealing with the insurance company, parts and materials vendors, and the repair process itself, to the sobering fact that Lisa and I moved no less than 11 times – 12, if we count our evacuation from the Keys for Irma – and all but two of those moves happened in less than 3 months. Jo Beth is our home, and needless to say, we are glad to be home.

From Savannah, we sailed to Brunswick, GA. The sail from Savannah to Brunswick was a boisterous one, but fast and fun. We covered the 95 mile distance in about 15 hours, at an average speed of 6.5 knots, with easterly 18-20 knot winds. The trip was a great test for our new Monitor Windvane self-steering system, which uses the balance of wind on the sails to hold a set course and steer the boat without using any power. ‘Monty,’ the name Lisa has given to the Monitor, did an amazing job. We arrived at our base marina, Brunswick Landing Marina, at about 3am – tired and a bit chilly, but happy to be sailing again.

Even though we were out of the repair yard, we were still wrapping up smaller jobs on board. After Irma, our refrigerator/freezer controller was no longer working, so it was replaced as part of the repairs. I noticed during the sail to Brunswick that the temperature of the refrigerator was steadily increasing and after we had arrived and settled into our slip, further investigation revealed the controller and compressor were no longer coordinating their efforts. As this had been part of the hurricane damage repairs, we contacted the Hinckley yard. They sent down their lead electrician who determined that one of the tiny, hair-like pins in a plug on the back of the controller was bent. Miraculously, he was able to straighten it – and we were cooling wine and making ice once again. Unfortunately , the system shut down about three days later, this time for good, the bent pin now broken. A replacement controller was ordered and installed by us.

*Much of our time in Brunswick was spent waiting for good weather - but the bad weather made for some beautiful skies*

We also discovered a minor leak; more of a seep really, in the installation of the replacement stainless steel railing posts on the port side. With help from the boatyard, we were able to pull and re-bed the bolts which attach the posts to the deck structure. One more issue resolved.

Otherwise, our time in Brunswick was spent getting ourselves and the boat prepared to sail south. In one long day trip to Jacksonville, we were able to get most of our long term provisioning done at Costco, and also sold my car. We then began watching the weather for favorable conditions to start sailing south. The weather window opened for us on November 20, and in the early morning hours, under a leaden gray and overcast sky, we motored away from Brunswick Landing Marina and out St. Simons Sound into the wide – and completely windless – Atlantic Ocean, bound for Miami, Florida.

The next 30 hours were relatively uneventful. Winds had been forecast to be light and northeasterly, but had remained nonexistent. The sea was calm, with only a slight swell. Ship traffic on the ocean was also very light. We had expected to see a fair number of ships, particularly when we passed Jacksonville, FL during the night, but only saw two. Before dawn, the city of St. Augustine was fading behind us.

Lisa and I take ‘watches’ when we make an extended trip offshore, as we don’t stop at nightfall, but continue sailing. In the Intracoastal Waterway, the waters are shallow and crab pot markers dot the surface; unlit posts and markers are also present. These things make moving on the waterway at night a potentially hazardous venture, but the ocean is, for the most part, free of such issues. Generally, Lisa takes the first watch at 10pm until 2am. Then, I’m on watch from 2am until 6pm. Then, it’s her turn again, until 10am. Between 10am and 10pm, we tend not to adhere to any set schedule, but share the duties as needed. Being on watch doesn’t mean you literally sit and ‘watch.’ We read and listen audio books, satellite radio, or podcasts; or plan projects for our arrival. Sometimes, we think of that great restaurant we remember from a previous trip, or making a visit to a favorite beach or museum. Every 15 minutes or so, we take a full look around the horizon and check the RADAR and AIS information from our instruments, as well as our course and speed. Sometimes, it can be hard to stay awake, so we use a timer which chimes at 15 minute intervals to keep us alert. We also wear safety harnesses which double as life-jackets and are tethered to the boat, 24/7 when we’re offshore. At night, we even clip ourselves into pad eyes installed in the cockpit.

The temperatures were tolerable, in the 50’s at night and 60’s during the day, so we wore layers. In the cabin, with the engine running, it was a good bit warmer. Wednesday morning dawned with clearing skies and warmer temps – we were moving south – but there was still no wind. We had been sailing a course which took us about 35 miles out from the coast. Now, we made a slight course change to the southwest, to ‘angle’ in a bit more on the coastline. This was done to avoid the influence of the powerful gulf stream current, which flows northward like a massive river within the ocean.

*Every few hours, we walk around the decks; we check gear and equipment and stretch our legs - and occasionally we find little things left by the sea such as this flying fish*

In the late afternoon of our second day at sea we felt a stirring in the air, and soon, we had a breeze. We set the jib, which is the large sail at the head of the boat, and eased back on the engine throttle. Our wind direction and speed instruments, mounted at the top of the mast, indicated we had 5, then 8, then 10 knots of wind from the northwest. On our present course, this meant the wind was blowing from nearly directly behind us. Our boat speed remained the same, even with the engine slowed down. We set about the procedures for getting the mainsail up and when ready, I clipped my tether onto the jackline secured to the decks and went to the mast. I prepared the mainsail halyard – the line which raises and lowers a sail – and began the process of hoisting. One hoist, then two, and I felt a twinge in my lower back. On the start of a third hoist, I felt it again – and suddenly, it was as if someone swung a sledge hammer into my lower spine. I dropped onto the deck and looked back at Lisa in the cockpit. She knew immediately what had happened.

In my college years, I injured my back while jumping – and showing off - on a trampoline. Even though 35+ years have passed, my back still ‘goes out.’ There’s no rhyme or reason to it; it’s happened when I was trying to move a refrigerator and it’s happened when I’ve reached for a piece of paper on a desk. As a doctor once told me, “you can carry an anvil all day and be fine, but bend to pick up a hammer and you’re out for a week.”

Lisa clipped in and rushed to the mast. “That’s it,” she said, “this changes things. About an hour earlier, we passed Cape Canaveral, 25 miles to the west. “We’re turning back and putting in at the Cape. In the meantime, you’re down below and on the sole.” (‘Sole’ is the nautical term for ‘floor.’) The winds had continued to increase and now steadied out at around 12 knots. Lisa furled the headsail and brought down the portion of the mainsail I’d managed to raise. She came into the cabin and stood at the chart table and began leafing through our charts to plot our course change. I watched from the floor, lolling with rolling motion of the boat, each roll threatening to start a new series of spasms.
“Let’s go to Ft. Pierce instead,” I said. “Going to Canaveral will have us going upwind and I’m afraid that motion will make things worse. Plus, Canaveral has a lock system to go through, and it will be dark when we get there. We’ve been in and out of Ft. Pierce before. It’s very straightforward”

She thought for a moment, then sifted through the charts, stopping at one. She moved the course plotting tools around the paper.
“Ft. Pierce is 55 miles from here,” she said. “It’s going to be the middle of the night when we get there.”
“Yes,” I said, “but we can hover outside at the channel entrance and go in at daylight. Besides, it’s an easy, well-marked channel. We’ve done it before, remember.”
She stared out a port for a few moments.
“Alright, but I don’t want to go in until daylight. Go in and anchor?”
“Sure,” I said, “that’s fine. Or, go to the City Marina.”

Going to a marina was my preference. Both of us would rest more there, but more importantly, I could get off of the boat and walk around. Experience has taught me the worst I can do for my back is lay about, taking drugs, and waiting to feel better. I needed to be someplace where I could get off the boat and move.
“Ok,” she said. “Where are your muscle relaxers? And anti-inflammatory meds?”
Conversation over.

*Sunset at sea, just after ‘throwing’ my back out at the mast*

We made an agreement she would do an extended watch, until 2am. She also decided we would continue under motor power and not sail, as we could keep a faster average speed. I took the meds and made myself as comfortable as I could on the cabin sole. Soon I was rocked into a pharmaceutical slumber.

I woke with a start and looked at the clock. 2:15am. My watch. I slowly moved up and off the sole and made my way outside. The wind had picked up more and a larger following sea had built, but the motion was still fairly easy. Lisa double checked me, but I urged her to go below and get some sleep. She updated me on ‘need to know’ details; our course and speed, and that the electric autopilot was handling things well. She also said she had sighted the Ft. Pierce sea buoy and that we had just passed the inlet. But, after consideration of the sea state and wind, she decided it was easier to do a large circular course close by the channel entrance and sea buoy, than to try and hover near the buoy. The AIS system showed an ocean going tug paralleling our course, about 8 miles east of our position. There was no other traffic to speak of. Lisa went below and settled onto the starboard settee. She was soon asleep.

The next four and a half hours passed slowly. The eastern sky began changing from black to gray, easing into muted oranges and yellows. At sunrise, we were north of the channel entrance by about three miles; I adjusted our course for the sea buoy and decided to let Lisa sleep a bit longer. I remained very much aware of my back, which I now thought of as a schoolyard bully, threatening to send me into spasms with each lurch of the boat. When we were a half mile from the sea buoy, I slipped below and woke Lisa.

As we passed into the inlet and the ocean swell subsided, then vanished, I let out an audible sigh. It was only then we realized it was Thanksgiving Day, and that my plan to find a marina may not work so well. We called the City Marina on VHF radio and by telephone, but received no answer. Since the City Marina was the closest and easiest to get into, we decided to go in and secure ourselves to the fueling dock, taking a ‘better to ask forgiveness than permission’ approach. By 6:45am, we were secured at the fuel dock. I quickly stepped ashore and went for a short but stooped over walk.

At 10am, there was a knock on the hull. Outside was Dean Kubitschek, the City Marina manager. We promptly made apologies for stopping unannounced and explained our situation. He held his palms up in a silencing motion, a set of keys strung on a blue lanyard swinging from his fingers.

“Don’t worry about it one bit,” he said. “Here are keys for bathrooms and showers, over there and over there,” he said, pointing behind him and across us to the other side of the marina basin. “Laundry’s in the same areas. We have quarters in the office if you need them. We’ll check y’all in, do paperwork, all that, tomorrow. We’re also having a Thanksgiving dinner for the boaters, this afternoon at the yacht club. Starts around 2pm. Hope y’all can make it.”
He even gave us his cell phone number. Lisa and I remain very grateful for the hospitality extended to us by Dean and his staff; Matt, Antonio, and Anne, to name a few, particularly as we kept extending our stay due to my back and then weather. On the following Monday, when I went to the office to extend our stay for another week, Dean looked at me and said, “you only look half as crooked now as compared to when I first saw you.” The next day, I got a very intense – and beneficial – massage. And we walked. A lot. We also met other sailors and boaters, and were able to caravan with them into town for groceries, boat parts and supplies, and so on. Making new friends is a big part of the cruising life.

*Shortly after Thanksgiving, Ft. Pierce was dressed in her Christmas best*

The following Thursday, after waiting for another weather window, we were ready to continue south. We topped off the fuel, took on water, and pumped out the waste holding tank. We had lovely easterly winds around 15 knots. The sun was warm and we were looking forward to a fast and pleasant overnight run to Miami. We left the marina and entered the inlet channel, once again bound for sea. After clearing the sea buoy, we began to set the sails. I clipped onto the jackline and went to the mast. The mainsail went up fine, but stopped short of the full hoist. It was clear something was amiss. I squinted up and into the late afternoon sun to see what was happening.

This time, the problem wasn’t my back, but a piece of hardware on the mast. Near the top of the mast, there is a set of folding steps installed, one on each side. The steps allow a person who has been ‘hauled up the mast’ to stand up and gain access to the very top of the mast, where navigational lights, radio antennas, wind direction and speed instruments, etc., are installed. The steps are normally folded up and locked, but now, for some reason, the one on the starboard side of the mast was fully open – and the main halyard had caught around it.

What followed for the next two hours was a somewhat comical, somewhat pitiful, attempt to un-entangle the halyard from the step. Doing so was exponentially compounded by the fact Jo Beth was pitching headlong into a steep swell. I was harnessed and clipped in but still had to hang on with one hand and flip the halyard around with the other; otherwise, I would have been catapulted from the deck and into the sea. The halyard is one long line and runs outside of the mast, so there is a front section of the halyard, which is the part pulled on to hoist the sail, and a back section running through a sheave/pulley at the masthead. The ‘head’ or top of the sail is shackled to the halyard on the back side of the mast. I succeeded in repeatedly crossing the halyard over the front or back side of the step, but never completely off of it, until I looped the back section of the halyard over the forward side of the step. Then, the motion of the boat in the swell flung the front section of the halyard over itself on the back side of the step, effectively locking it in place.

Lisa and I admitted our defeat. We briefly discussed continuing on to Miami under power, but were acutely aware the step needed to be closed and secured. Once again, we turned on a westerly course back into the Ft. Pierce Inlet and called the City Marina on the radio. That evening, as we motored back into the slip we’d vacated only 4 hours earlier, we were met with incredulous looks from friends with whom we’d said our “until next time” partings. Our dock neighbor, Dave van Cleef, who lives aboard his pretty boat Cilcia with his ginger tom cat Lucky-Roo, stood and threw his hands in the air with a questioning look. I pointed towards the masthead and quickly explained what had happened. He looked up at the masthead, and then back at me for a moment before saying, “well that’s just plain tacky.”

The following morning, I was able to un-entangle the mainsail halyard, with the boat lying still in a slip, in less than 10 minutes. Dave stood and watched from the cockpit of Cilcia. Dave is in his 70’s, but healthy, lean, and wiry. I mentioned that I had a bosun’s chair, and would be happy to haul someone up the mast to secure the steps. He eyed me warily.
“I’m too old,” he said in a stern tone.
I paused, then said, “well, if someone could haul…”
“You’re too fat,” he called over his shoulder as he stepped off his boat. He smiled, then turned up the dock, Lucky-Roo on his heels.

We called Mack Sails of Stuart, FL. Fortunately for us, they had some crews working in a boatyard not far from the marina. After a quick read of a credit card number over the phone, we had rigger Eli Levi on site and going up the mast to close and secure the steps, all within the hour of my phone call.

*Mack Sails rigger Eli Levi - his real name - made quick work of securing the steps at the masthead; look closely at the top, right side of the mast and you can see the open step*

After our return to the marina the night before, Lisa and I went out to dinner. We were nursing our wounds, me with a Guinness and her with a vodka soda, when she asked if I was feeling well to which I had to say I was not. I had started coughing a bit the night before, and as I seem to be prone to bronchitis, I was concerned it was in the offing. However, I was also beginning to believe the medicine I use to alleviate seasickness was affecting me adversely.

For decades, I have used the Trans-Derm Scop (Scopolamine) Patch for my ‘mal de mare’ affliction. It has always worked wonderfully. However, after the sail from Savannah to Brunswick, I felt a bit out of sorts, but wrote it off to all the stress of finalizing repairs to Jo Beth, dealing with the refrigeration issues, etc. When we first arrived in Ft. Pierce, the ‘off’ feelings were amplified; but again, I wrote them off to being an effect of the muscle relaxers and other meds I was taking for pain, etc. However, after our attempted departure for Miami from Ft. Pierce, I felt incredibly bad. That time, the issues were much more severe; mild double vision, a dry mouth to the point of being painful with difficulty swallowing, mild disorientation, and a host of other symptoms – all of which I later discovered are well documented side effects for the Scopolamine patch. And, as it just so happens, I was actually getting sick - a fever appeared on Friday and lingered until Sunday. Thankfully, it wasn’t bronchitis, but only a case of the general upper respiratory crud. Lisa soon picked it up as well.

*Jo Beth lying at anchor in Peck Lake, just south of Stuart, FL; we spent several lovely days and nights in this beautiful spot*

Both Lisa and I knew we had to leave Ft. Pierce, if for no other reason than our mental health. We decided to travel about 30 miles south on the Intracoastal Waterway to the Peck Lake anchorage just south of Stuart, Florida. Staying in the waterway meant a weather window was less critical, giving us more flexibility. We were joined by our friends Bill and Jackie White in their 43’ trawler styled yacht, Fancy Free. We spent the next 4 days anchored in Peck Lake as another cold front roared through. We left the anchorage on a bright and sunny Sunday morning and motored south along the waterway to Lake Worth, a community near Palm Beach, FL. We anchored there and planned an early departure for Monday to Miami. The weather was lovely for an offshore run.

We left Lake Worth with the rising sun on Monday, passing the small freighter Tropic Mist on our way out. Initially, there was little wind, but it soon became light and variable, mostly from the northwest-west. The apparent wind, which is the wind produced as we moved forward, was greater than the actual wind. We had to cover 70 miles to Miami and wanted to be there and anchored by sunset. It was a tall order. In order to have our best possible chance, we decided to motor-sail. We pushed hard on the indigo blue sea, but didn’t make it; by sunset we were just passing the sea buoy at Government Cut, the entrance to the Port of Miami, among a string of departing cruise ships. By the time we were inside the channel jetties, night had fallen.

Neither of us is keen to the idea of entering harbors at night; even a harbor familiar to us, such as Miami, can be challenging due to the lights ashore, and doubly so when the lights are those of a major city. Miami harbor at night is, suffice to say, quite dazzling. We made it through, proceeding slowly, and after another two hours were anchored in one of our favorite spots on Key Biscayne’s western shoreline. Lisa made a pot of chili and soon after eating, we were in bed asleep. Our friends Bill and Jackie on Fancy Free, had anchored further south in Biscayne Bay. We awoke about 1am with Jo Beth rolling heavily. The north wind had piped up, sending a swell across the bay into our serene little spot.

In the morning, after the routine check of weather, we decided to move across the bay to Dinner Key Marina and secure to a mooring. Lisa was still a bit under the weather, and we had a monster cold front coming at us. Bill and Jackie on Fancy Free decided to continue down to Key Largo and secure for the weather there. The immediate weather forecast was daunting; gale warnings were posted until early Saturday morning. The forecast called for winds up to 40 knots, with gusts to 50 knots possible, mostly from the southwest and west. That’s pretty much what we got. The mainland provides some protection from southwest and west winds, so it wasn’t too bad.

Jo Beth was well secured; the mooring lines were doubled and her sails furled and tied. We secured the boom against swaying and the well salted decks got a benefiting rinse from the heavy rains. As forecast, the gale was spent by Saturday, and things began to settle down. It had made for a few breezy few days aboard Jo Beth. Sunday morning, we were ready to be underway again.

*A stormy sunrise in the Dinner Key Mooring Field, just south of Miami on Biscayne Bay…some of our old cruising grounds*

After my realization that Scopolamine and I were no longer getting along, I did extensive research into motion sickness remedies. For years, I have heard wonders about a drug called Cinnarizine. Commonly sold as ‘Stugeron,’ it is available over the counter in most every country except for the US and Canada where it is banned. It can be ordered from online pharmacies in Canada, which obtain the medicine from Great Britain. Lisa likes Bonine, but in the past, I had found it ineffective; Dramamine is essentially anesthesia for both of us. Surprisingly, I stumbled upon a non-pharmaceutical remedy popular among scuba divers - plugging one ear.

The theory behind the single ear plug is this: motion sickness is generally caused by a sensory conflict in auditory and visual signals received by the brain. The inner ear tells the brain you’re moving, while the eyes tell it you’re not. The brain reads this sensory conflict as a hallucination caused by an apparent ingestion of poison, resulting in the all to familiar nausea and vomiting associated with motion sickness, the purpose of which is to expel the ‘poison.’ However, by plugging one ear, (usually the non-dominant ear – for example, the left ear for a right-handed person), the brain interprets the inner ear systems to be malfunctioning. Accordingly, it disregards the information the inner ear is sending, and relies solely on what the eyes are relaying. Thus, there’s no sensory conflict; no conflict in the brain, no motion sickness. Lisa also whipped up blend of essential oils known to alleviate nausea, and we carry something on board called ‘Quease-Ease.’ It’s a blend of essential oils, and is used in hospitals to help patients recover from post-surgical nausea and nausea caused by medications. You sniff the receptor of the Quease- Ease tube and voila, nausea vanishes.

I tried the ear plug method on the sail from Lake Worth to Miami, and was fine. I also took a dose of Bonine. One, or the combination of both, worked. The remainder of the trip would be made in Hawk Channel, which is generally protected from the ocean swell by the barrier reef, so not precautions were needed. Needless to say, the Scopolamine patch and I have parted ways.

(I’m sure many of you are thinking I encountered a bad or expired set of patches. Not the case: I checked for recalls, etc., for the batches I have and there were none. The patches have been stored properly and are not expired. I did speak with my doctor, the one who prescribed them, who is also an accomplished sailor. He believes my reaction to the medicine is due to physiological changes as I’ve aged.)

We stayed on the Dinner Key mooring until early Sunday, December 23rd, leaving at first light. We motored a few miles east-southeast across the bay towards Biscayne Channel and on through to Hawk Channel. Biscayne Channel passes through ‘Stiltsville,’ a small group of homes built on stilts above the very shallow water area of the bay known as Biscayne Flats. Stiltsville began in the late 1930’s when a local crab fisherman built a shack on stilts to process and sell his catch. More houses were built by others, typically serving as ‘social clubs,’ and at its peak, there were 27 structures. Some of the structures weren’t technically houses, but purposefully grounded boats and barges. Most were destroyed in 1965 during Hurricane Betsy. In 1992, there were 14 structures still standing, until Hurricane Andrew; after Andrew, only seven remained. Those seven remain today. Now contained within the boundaries of Biscayne National Park, the structures see only limited use.

Once in Hawk Channel, we set our course south and motor sailed the approximately 50 miles to Rodriguez Key off of Key Largo. Winds were light and from dead astern, so we only set the headsail. By 4pm, we were tucked in on the southwest side of Rodriguez Key with three other boats. The winds picked up a bit during the night, and we rolled and pitched constantly. Welcome to paradise!

*Anchored at Rodriguez Key, just off of Key Largo, in the Florida Keys; the orange glow in the dodger window is a reflection of the setting sun in the clear vinyl panel*

We were underway from Rodriguez Key at first light, and treated to a spectacular sunrise. It was Christmas Eve. The skies remained overcast as the upper Keys passed along our starboard side. Tavernier, then Islamorada, then Long Key. After that, we passed The Conch Keys, and then Duck Key and Grassy Key. We were motor sailing with the jib; the winds at Rodriguez had abated and our course had changed to a more southwest-westerly track. Just before noon, we could pick out the Bonefish Condominium Tower on Key Colony beach, which is just east of Marathon. By 2pm, we were in the channel for Boot Key Harbor where we hoped to pick up a mooring ball in the Marathon City Marina Mooring Field. Unfortunately, no moorings were available, so we added our name to the wait list – number 12!

We made a quick turnaround in the harbor and headed to Marathon Marina, which is at the harbor entrance, to take on fuel and water. While there, we decided to treat ourselves – it was Christmas after all – to staying in the marina for a couple of nights. After the fuel and water tanks were full, we were secured in our slip. We celebrated our arrival back in Marathon with a Christmas Eve dinner at Lazy Days, a restaurant on the marina property. Christmas Day was spent doing necessary boat chores – washing the salt off of the boat, cleaning, boat maintenance, and laundry. Lisa went to church as well, reconnecting with friends she had made during our time here in 2017.

Wednesday morning, with a fresh breeze out of the east, we left our marina slip and motored the short distance into the Boot Key Harbor anchorage to anchor and wait for our mooring ball assignment. We also took the dinghy in and walked to Keys Fisheries, where we lunched on fresh stone crab claws and conch ceviche…yum!

*Christmas Eve in the Keys…it’s good to be back*

Unfortunately, there was a spot of trouble in paradise – Jo Beth’s 15 year old engine alternator has ceased to be. We had noticed a significant slowdown in the battery charging cycles during the past couple of weeks, and that the battery charge indicator light was staying on longer than it should after the engine was started. We were able to get in to Marathon Boatyard where the alternator output was tested and found to be under
13 volts at over 3,000 RPM- it should be 15 volts at a much lower RPM. Jo Beth’s batteries were not being fully charged. Over time, this could damage the batteries, necessitating their replacement - a very costly repair.

Prior to Hurricane Irma, we had a wind powered battery charger, but the hurricane took it for her own. During the storm repairs, Lisa and I decided to switch from wind driven power generation to solar, which is much more efficient. However, adding solar power to the boat requires careful planning; where to locate the panels and how they should be mounted; how many panels would we require; and so on. With all of the other storm related repairs, we felt we had enough on our plates and tabled the solar additions until this year. This meant we were dependent on the old alternator to keep the batteries charged. When the old alternator was no longer functional, we had to move somewhere quickly so we could plug into shore side power. Marathon Boatyard was our best, and closest, option. An alternative was to obtain a portable gasoline or diesel powered generator to use for battery cgaring, but that would have to be stored when not in use, and there simply isn’t enough room aboard Jo Beth for one.

Soon, Marathon Boatyard had the alternator replaced with a new unit and we received our mooring ball assignment. We’ve now settled into ‘life on the ball,’ and into a bit of a routine – catching up with local friends, planning some short cruises in and around the Keys, and the like. The solar panels are ordered; four 100-watt semi-flexible Sun Power panels will be installed in a few short weeks - hopefully. After all, we’re in the Keys and on ‘Keys time’ once again. As they say, “no worries, soon come mon!” Of course, there are always numerous maintenance chores and projects to be done around the boat.

Thanks for sailing along with us. Feel free to get in touch with any questions or comments. Please let us know what you’d like to see here. We want this new site to be an interactive experience, so don’t be shy. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we belatedly wish all of you many sincere, safe, and happy days; not just now, but for all of 2019 and beyond.

See you soon!