Ft. Pierce

After spending a few days in Fernandina Beach it was time to continue south to Ft. Pierce, which is about 220 miles away. We charted our course and decided to jump out and sail offshore for 36 hours, which would put us in at Ft. Pierce around sunrise on Sunday. We were excited to sail again and wanted to make up some lost time. The wind was 10-15 knots from the North and the waves were only 3-5 feet, perfect sailing conditions for our trip south. The first night was so peaceful, there is really nothing like sailing at night. You hear the waves as the boat cuts thru the water and nothing else. Every so often a pod of dolphins swim with the boat and there was a full moon, which was beautiful. So far we both of us really like sailing at night (except for the fact that neither of us get a full night’s sleep). We divide the trip into 3 hour shifts so that you have 3 hours on and then 3 hours off. It actually works out rather well. Then the wind started picking up to about 20 knots and we were really starting to fly. We were cruising around 9 knots, which is incredibly fast for a sailboat. It was a great night sail and then we got to watch sunrise over the Atlantic, an amazing site.

We continued to sail on Saturday, just about 5 miles off the coast of Florida. It is neat sailing that close to the shore because you can still see all the buildings and beaches off in the distance. Jay caught his first fish that day; we think it was a little barracuda. It was about 5 inches long, silver with yellow spots and lots of teeth (seriously, that fish had a mouth full of sharp little teeth). Unfortunately we thought it was too small to eat, so we let him loose. And as we sailed by Cape Canaveral we got to see the launch pads and space shuttle from a distance. It was very cool. The whole day we had 15-20 knots of wind on our back and were still making amazing time. We didn’t drop below 8 knots the entire day. And that is when we realized that we were almost making too good of progress. We were 40 miles away from Ft. Pierce and at the speed we were traveling we would arrive at the inlet in the middle of the night. Now it is pretty dangerous to come into this inlet at night and the marina we have made reservations at will be closed. So that is when we realize that we need to slow down our progress. We pull in the genoa and reef the main sail so that we drop our boat speed to about 4 knots. We continue to sail this way thru the night and arrive at the inlet right at sunrise. We just never thought that our boat was this fast and that we could average 8.5 knots- wow!

So we arrive at Ft. Pierce at sunrise, another beautiful day in Florida. We watched many fishing boats leave for the day as we were coming into the harbor. Ft. Pierce has a big boating community with a lot of marinas and boat yards. We are planning on staying here until a weather window develops for our jump across the Gulf Stream and into the Bahamas. We are planning on crossing over with some friends we have made in Charleston, Chris and Kelly. Unfortunately the weather has not cooperated; it has been blowing 15-20 knots from the north the whole time we are here which is exactly what you should avoid when crossing the Gulf Stream. Such is the sailing life, you have to wait for the weather and you go where the wind takes you.

But we have had a great time here in Ft. Pierce, hanging out with Chris and Kelly and their other friends, having barbeques at the beach, and watching the wildlife from our boat. I can’t believe how much wildlife you see when living on a boat. There are giant fish that swim around the marina- Jay has tried to catch one but to no avail. It is funny because these fish get chased by the pelicans here and as the fish tries to escape they run into our boat and make load bashing noises. It happens all the time and we find it very amusing. The other day we saw a manatee- who was just hanging out in the river about 20 feet from our boat for a couple of hours. I don’t know why I was so excited to see one, they just kind of float around and aren’t that exciting to watch. But I guess that I just always wanted to see what one looked like in real life. And of course we see dolphins swim by every so often, but there certainly aren’t as many dolphins here in Florida as there are in South Carolina. There is always entertainment in the wild.

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