Small is beautiful

Since we're hanging around Fort Pierce waiting for this outboard engine part we've ordered from Yamaha, we rented a car for a week and have been playing tourist. A couple of days ago we went to nearby Heathcote Botanical Gardens, which was gifted several years ago with over 100 bonsai trees from a private collection. Apparently it's the largest bonsai collection in the US. It was interesting to compare this collection to others we've seen in DC and Delaware. These were all species that do well in warmer climates of course, compared with the miniature coniferous and other more northern species we've seen elsewhere. Here's a bougainvillea, a Brazilian Raintree, and one other species I neglected to identify.

Yesterday was market day again in Fort Pierce, so we roamed around, checking out baked goods and cheeses and fresh produce with our friends Sharon and Greg who live on their Island Packet Dreamcatcher and are currently located in Stuart FL, just a bit further south. It was a misty and chilly morning, so the biggest hit at the market was the booth for coffee and hot chocolate.

After the market we drove to Vero Beach, a few miles north of here, and spent some time at the Art Museum. We saw a retrospective on American photographers of the last century, and also a commemorative exhibit celebrating the 50th anniversary of the publication of Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are. The illustration below is from In the Night Kitchen, one of my favorite children's books from that era.

 Here's Jim in a somewhat more open sailboat than Neverland.

 And a well-worn display copy of Where the Wild Things Are

The Vero Beach Art Museum has a lovely sculpture garden. Since the day had turned warm and sunny, we took a walk outside. Below is a Dutch sculptor's work in bronze that we both admired. Two people reaching their arms and hands out towards each other across a table. 

In the late afternoon we left the museum and met up again with Sharon and Greg to go see "The Darkest Hour", a film about Winston Churchill's first 3 weeks as Prime Minister of England.  We all loved the film and ended up having long conversations about it and other things over drinks and a bite to eat at Cobalt, a very nice restaurant overlooking the ocean.  

Today was New Year's Eve day and we met up again with Sharon, Greg and other friends of theirs for a late brunch at the Riverside Cafe in Vero Beach. We have no TVs on the sailboats, and since Jim wanted to watch the Eagles game, Sharon and Greg wanted to watch the Patriots, and I just decided to go along for the ride, a sports bar was the locale of choice for the afternoon. Here's Jim, mimosa in hand...

It will be a quiet night on the boat and we won't manage to stay up until midnight, I'm sure. We took a walk around town late in the afternoon and watched fishermen at a local pier as the sun went down and the moon came up.

Tomorrow we're expecting rain for a few days, so it's nice to get out and enjoy sunshine and sunsets while we can.

May 2018 bring us all peace and well-being. Happy New Year!

Happy Holidays from Fort Pierce Florida

It's December 24th and we've spent the past few days in Fort Pierce in warm, sunny, dry weather - a welcome change from the first couple of weeks on the boat. No more mittens!

We're at a marina because we can't get our Yamaha 8hp dinghy engine to run. With no working outboard it's not very inviting to anchor somewhere remote or pick up a mooring ball. We do have oars, of course, but rowing any distance and/or in strong currents isn't very much fun, so we're at a dock for a week at least.  It's looking more and more like it's a carburetor problem. If so, we'll need a to get a new one. And, of course, as these things usually go, it's a weekend. And a holiday. So no place to get parts or assistance for a few more days. Oh well. There are worse places to be stuck than Fort Pierce.

Backing up a tiny bit, after leaving Fernandina Beach (last post), we stopped overnight in St Augustine, which was uncharacteristically quiet, as you can see below.

We decided to keep pushing south to warm up a little more and made only a couple of stops before reaching New Smyrna Beach, where we stayed three days at the city marina. This was an early morning photo of the ICW along the way.

The days are so short now that if we're trying to go a decent distance (which for us means 40 miles going 5 or 6 knots an hour - 8 hours of chugging along), it means getting up before dawn and aiming to reach a destination well before sunset, just in case there are hold-ups along the way. Delays at bridges that only open on a fixed schedule, adverse currents that slow us way down, running aground in very shallow water at low tide (yep, we've done that a few times already since the recent hurricanes have caused a lot of unmarked and sometimes unavoidable shoaling along the ICW), or other delays.

Along the way the scenery varies from wide open sawgrass lowlands with egrets and dolphins to homes that look like someone dreamed of living in Disneyland. This one was just north of Daytona.

In New Smyrna Beach we were just in time for the catered holiday party at the City Marina. It was AMAZING. Cruisers brought sides and deserts and their own beverages, but the marina provided turkey, salmon, trout, and ham, and some of the people who came were locals who operated restaurants, so we were treated to lobster bisque, grilled asparagus, and other treats. That night was the boat parade of lights and many boats at the marina were decorated for the holidays as well.

One day we walked the couple of miles to the New Smyrna beach. Yup, it's Florida.

After New Smyrna Beach we anchored a couple of nights en route to Fort Pierce since the weather was much warmer and we could survive chilly nights. We have a little space heater on the boat but we need to be plugged into shore power to use it.  We would have continued south, but we need to deal with the outboard. After making lots of phone calls to try to locale Yamaha parts and a mechanic, we decided to stop here. Fort Pierce may have the help we need, but only after Christmas.

While here, we've enjoyed the outstanding Farmer's Market....

...where Jim got crab cakes Benedict for breakfast yesterday morning...

And there's abundant, beautiful fresh produce and lots of people-watching as entertainment.

In the background is the Fort Pierce Library, which unfortunately seems to be closed for the week between Christmas and New Years.

We bought some of this excellent Parmesan cheese at the market.

Of course there are Christmas trees (fake) and palm trees (real)

And of course there are several tiki bars and restaurants right on the waterfront

As you might expect, there are lots of tile roofs and stucco this far south, and the downtown area has many art deco facades too. Fun for walking.

Because we have some time on our hands and we're plugged into shore power, I walked to the Ace Hardware yesterday and bought a heat gun so we can tackle removing varnish from the toe rail on Neverland. I'm keeping up the varnish everywhere else, but can't stand the thought of varnishing all around the stanchions, sail tracks and other hardware on the toe rail. So off it comes and we'll leave it as raw teak to weather to a nice grey color. Here's a photo of the most nasty part to clean up. All those little nooks and crannies are a pain.

 Clean bare teak now at the bow, with lots of removed varnish to sweep up on deck.

 And one last photo of the taped off and newly varnished and drying teak elsewhere on deck.

So yeah, as I've mentioned before, cruising is often about fixing things and working on your boat in exotic or not so exotic places. But it's rewarding work and sometimes it's even fun! We love this boat and she brings us a lot of joy, no matter where we cruise.

Thanks for coming along for the ride. We love to tay in touch and send you warm wishes for the holidays and a healthy and happy 2018!!

Dogs, Kids, A Dickens Christmas Street Fair

We spent the last 2 nights in Fernandina Beach in the northernmost part of Florida, visiting with friends from Annapolis who now live here (Julia Newhouse and Dennis Jay). Fernandina Beach is a beautiful little city and we always enjoy stopping here. One afternoon we borrowed the loaner car at the marina and went into town to wander around a holiday street fair in the sun. After several cold and rainy days, this was heaven.

This is a little house on a side street right downtown. Fernandina Beach is a charming place to walk around and explore neighborhoods.

The bookstore on the main street had this window decoration last year too. The mannequin's skirts and the tree are made of curled and pleated paper from old books.

Lots of vendors were dressed as characters from Dickens' era

Jim alight as a candle. Not a very smiley candle...

A big chess game in the street

LOTS of dogs! This is Georgia, 8 weeks old. SO cute.

 These two had holiday bells around their necks

 Sorry - back to random shots of lovely old brick facades and pretty, shadowed doorways

If you have Instagram, go to my account (cspsail) and watch the video of an impromptu street enactment of the carol "The 12 Days of Christmas". Jim got roped into playing the part of "6 Geese A-Laying". He's in the red baseball cap. It's hysterical.

Here's a chimneysweep and his mate

Another dog. A huge one.

Dickens street players on stilts

A cute little kid in a great hat, working with popsicle sticks and markers

Another one with her pony...

This little guy was super friendly

We had such a good time! More coming soon...

Heading south

Yup, time to move back on board Neverland and head south toward warmer weather. Tuesday November 28 we loaded up the car in Annapolis with boat stuff and drove south to rejoin our sailboat in Brunswick, Georgia where she has been waiting for us since last May. This year we'll cruise the east coast of Florida, the Keys, the Dry Tortugas, and the west coast of Florida for 6 months.

We've spent about a week working longish days to get the boat back into the condition shown in the photo above. Checking all the systems, cleaning, unpacking stuff, sorting, repairing stuff, bending on sails, provisioning with food, drink and other supplies, etc, etc. There's a well-known saying that the definition of cruising is "fixing your boat in exotic places". Well, Brunswick is far from exotic, but here I am, lying sideways squashed into a cockpit locker with a wrench in hand, tightening 4 nuts on stanchion bolts in a t-i-i-i-ny little space. The spaces you need to work in on boats are sometimes so limited, it's hard to understand how anyone got all the pieces put together in the first place.

Brunswick is a quiet little town that has seen better days, frankly. But the locals are friendly, some of the old buildings have interesting facades, there are the kinds of stores cruisers need (although they're outside downtown and only accessible by car or Uber) and it's generally an inexpensive place to hang out when not actively cruising.  We walked into town one evening for "First Friday" - antique stores, restaurants and art galleries were all welcoming us with open doors and sometimes complimentary wine and apps, hoping for decent holiday sales...

The marina where we keep the boat - Brunswick Landing Marina - is sort of unusual. It's very large and located 'way up a river, so it's pretty safe from bad coastal weather. There are free washer/dryers, free beer 24/7, free wine at 3 happy hours a week, a huge lounge and book exchange, yoga get-togethers, free bikes to borrow, and tons of cruisers who like to party and help each other out and share crazy stories in their spare time. A lot of people spend MONTHS here, often working part-time and needing reliable wifi, or just reluctant to break away from their routines and the convenience and comforts of hot showers, plug-in heaters and the cruiser-friendly atmosphere.

Earlier today we were ready to leave Brunswick tomorrow morning to make a run down the Intracoastal Waterway to Fernandina Beach, just past the northern Florida border. The weather has been lovely for the last several days, but now it's very suddenly turned cold, with driving rain and gusty winds that rock the boat at the dock. Weather forecasts have led to us to deciding to stay put another couple of days until the weather is a bit more cooperative. It's not very pleasant cruising on Neverland in cold, wet conditions. We have an open cockpit and the rain coming down steadily on the dodger windows makes it impossible to see ahead without craning your neck outside the dodger. No windshield wipers!!! The rain drips down your neck and arm and it gets pretty uncomfortable.

Since we haven't really taken any time to get photos to add to this blog, for now I'll say 'bye and try to get more photos for the next post.  Cheers till then!