History Around Every Corner ….. June 2013

11 June – 03 July: St Augustine Fl, to Beaufort NC – 34 42N 76 37W 

The Tale of the Turbo

After we were towed into St Augustine with a seized turbo Skipper had a busy week trying to get Balvenie operational again.  The local Volvo dealer sent someone to us the following morning, and after going through all the checks Mark had already done he too confirmed that the cause of our problem was the seized turbo.  Suggestions were made of ordering a new turbo, but as this one was only 2 years old and we knew how much they cost I started searching online for an option of having it repaired.  And that was where I found Evergreen Turbos located in an inland town in Florida.



It was late on Saturday afternoon but Mark rung them just in case.  No luck, just the answerphone, never mind.  You can imagine our surprise when our phone went around 7pm with Charlie Brown at Evergreen Turbos calling us back.  We explained our problem, Charlie was confident he could fix it (he deals with all the blown turbos from the Nascar Racing in Daytona Beach) and suggested if we could hire a car the following day we could meet him halfway while he was visiting his mother.
 
Back online I found Budget, the only car hire company open on a Sunday in St Augustine,  a car was booked and we had a very pleasant Sunday drive around Florida!  3 days later we had the turbo back looking brand new,  absolute first class service.  Volvo returned to fit it and after quite some coaxing Olive the Volvo sprung back into life, such a feeling of immense relief.  So it was out of the very expensive marina and onto an affordable Municipal Mooring Buoy – bags were packed, perishable food given away and we flew home to New Zealand the next day.

The Oldest Town in America

St Augustine claims fame to being the oldest, continuously settled town in the USA.  First inhabited by the Spanish in the 1500’s, it has a long and interesting history over the centuries.  The town is immaculate and tourism is their main income.  It is maybe just a little too picture perfect, but they have done such an excellent job of preserving their heritage  it is better to see everything looking cute than some hideous carbuncle scaring  the setting.
 
We had our injectors removed and sent away for cleaning and resetting when we returned from New Zealand, so we weren’t going anywhere until they returned. This gave us plenty of time to enjoy the town - St Augustine is rather a pleasant place to be stuck.   We had a great night out with Pete and Kourtney who took us to a local music tribute concert, an interesting collection of local bands played the night away.

Back in Working Order



With Olive running smoothly again and a weather window of light south west winds for a few days it was time to move on, as far away from the hurricane belt as we could get.  We hoped the weather would hold and that we would have favourable conditions to get around Cape Hatteras and into the Chesapeake Bay.  Over 6 weeks after arriving in St Augustine we finally headed out of the inlet, pointed north east and raised the sails. 

Why Are the Forecasts Always Wrong?

We had a great sail the first day, then the wind died completely and we motored in sloppy seas, on and off the first night and most of the 2nd day. The breeze was fickle so we sailed when we could, our steady forecast of 10 – 15 knots didn’t eventuate till mid afternoon on day three.  It was looking good to round Cape Hatteras the following day. 
By 6pm we had 20knots, at sunset 25knots, this was our last chance to turn into Beaufort, North Carolina.  We downloaded the weather gribs yet again and at the same time received an email from our friends on Bandit  who were watching the weather for us.   It was showing a period of over 30knots during the next day along the coast, not a good forecast for rounding Hatteras - we did the sensible thing and changed course for Beaufort.

Learning All About the Currents

The guide books show a deep shipping channel to access Beaufort Inlet, well lit and well marked.  The winds steadily increased throughout the night, the seas building behind us.  As we ran downwind heading straight for land we slowed down as much as we could to have a daytime arrival but it wasn’t to be, at 4am we entered the long shipping channel into Beaufort.

We had miscalculated the currents and thought we would have slack water, instead we had a raging river flowing out at us, a following sea and wind coming in with us -  not a mistake we will make again we hope!!! It certainly made for an interesting landfall and kept us both on our toes, checking course, staying out of the shallows, avoiding channel markers, getting twirled round like ballet dancers in some of the whirl pools – and then we were through, into the inlet, calm water at last just as day broke, the things we do for fun … phew!

6 Nights in Sleepy Beaufort

The strong winds continued for days.  On day two we moved anchorage hoping to get closer to town.  We just couldn’t squeeze into the town anchorage, jammed full of small permanent yachts on moorings … we just weren’t going to fit.  We continued along Taylors Creek, a tiny waterway barely 100 feet wide in most places until we found a spot that was almost big enough for us, it had great shelter with tall trees to windward and dinghy access ashore, perfect - it was home for the next 5 nights.



We enjoyed our time in this sleepy little seaport, we went to the very good Maritime Museum, wandered all the streets, admired some beautiful homes, found a cafe that served excellent espresso, lunched in cafes hanging over the water, walked on nearby Carrot Island with the wild horses but mostly did small jobs inside as we sheltered from the wind and rain.

We Are Very Pleased We Didn’t Do Hatteras in Over 30 knots!

The Ups and Downs of Florida ….. May 2013

01 - 1o May:  Lake Worth Inlet, Florida ~ 26 46N  80 02W



From the Land of No Stuff to the Land of Stuff

We left Havana, Cuba with a reasonable forecast to head north, into the Gulf Stream and up the coast of Florida, we were on our way to the U.S.A!  We had an absolute mixed bag of weather, fierce currents again out in the Gulf Stream accompanied by some nasty weather cells popping up from nowhere bringing wind and rain, followed by calms.  Can’t say we are fans of this Gulf Stream, it just has a mind of its own. 

As we made our way up the Florida Coast there just seemed to be wall to wall high rise erupting up out of the ocean on the horizon.  The silhouetted skyline made for a spectacular sunset off Fort Lauderdale.  We had a 3am arrival into Lake Worth Inlet on our 2nd night at sea.  Although the channel is well lit it is always very hard arriving into somewhere unfamiliar in the dark, we really try to avoid dark arrivals but sometimes it just can’t be helped.  Just to confuse us an armada of small fishing boats were leaving port as we were making our final approaches, there were all these little green lights that shouldn’t have been there to trick us!

We pulled into Lake Worth Inlet and dropped anchor before dawn, wow - touchdown in America.

Catching up with Friends

We had rendezvoused in Lake Worth with Australian friends Andrew and Clare on Eye Candy, last seen 16 months ago in the Caribbean, also Harry on Malua who had been in Havana with us but who we first met years ago in Croatia.  More Australians (where have all the kiwis gone?) Peter and Carole off Jack Tar were also there so we had plenty of company for happy hours. 

We spent a lazy Saturday afternoon lunching ashore at the Tiki Bar with all the Aussies and special guests Steve and Karyn off Threshold, they drove up from their home in Fort Lauderdale, we originally met them in Sardinia while in the Med, Threshold  is in Turkey and they are home for winter. 

After lunch they very kindly drove Clare, Andrew and I to Costco where Clare and I spent quite some time filling our shopping trolleys with all sorts of goodies.  Then Steve and Andrew spent even longer trying to squeeze it all into the car, no mean feat.  Only other cruisers can appreciate how grateful we were to be able to fill the trolley with endless heavy items knowing you don’t have to physically carry it all back to the dinghy.

Farewell to Tony

Our good friend Tony was still with us but would be leaving us here to travel overland to San Francisco before flying back to New Zealand.  Our days passed quickly, Customs and Immigration formalities were completed, buses were caught to procure phone and wifi internet sim cards (there are definitely advantages of being back in a ”land of stuff!!), chandleries were visited, boat parts sourced and many purchases made.  

We caught the bus down to West Palm Beach and said our farewells to Tony, off on a Greyhound Bus to New Orleans.  As always it had been a pleasure to have him onboard and we will miss our daily  long political and history discussions.  We walked down to the very upmarket shopping area and spent some time wandering around and lunching, rather a lovely place.  After months in Central America it had been quite some time since we had been in such an affluent area as this. 

Back at the dinghy we were greeted by a Parking Infringement – warning only!!!  The previous day we had been asked to move the dinghy to the designated dinghy dock which is where we then parked the dinghy and got our first ever written parking warning, Welcome to America!!! 

Off to St Augustine

It seemed a good time to leave Lake Worth and with a weather window of light southerlies we exited out and pointed the bow north for an overnight passage to St Augustine.  Not surprisingly the winds weren’t as forecast and before long we had 2 reefs in the main and were being bashed about in the Gulf Stream yet again.   We managed to get into flatter water inshore and had an excellent sail overnight but next morning the wind died out and it was time to motor so we would get in before dark.
 
Seized Turbo at Sea

But sadly Olive the Volvo had other plans and developed an irregular heartbeat, jumping up and down, rather unsettling when you are all alone, miles from shore on a glassy sea with not a breath of wind.  Then she did the unthinkable and just stopped, never to go again.  Skipper spent all day in the engine room trying absolutely everything in his repertoire to coax her into starting again but she just wasn’t having any of it.  Having eliminated nearly everything else he diagnosed that maybe the turbo had seized – and he was right.  Our new turbo, fitted in Spain in 2011 was no longer spinning, therefore starving the engine of air.  Just why a vessel that travels under engine power at around 6 miles an hour needs a turbo is absolutely beyond us, but we have one and it was broken.

Finally Safely into St Augustine

Early evening a light breeze came up off the land and we spent the night tacking backwards and forwards towards St Augustine, at 3am we dropped anchor under sail (that was a first) just 50 metres from the outer channel marker of St Augustine Inlet.  All we had to do now was get in through the channel! 

Before arriving in the U.S. friends had suggested we join TowBoat US (the AA for boats around these parts), the waterways here have many shallow patches and boats regularly run aground.  We were certainly hoping we wouldn’t be one of those unlucky ones but played it safe, got out the credit card, made the phone call and joined up.  It was the last thing we did before leaving Lake Worth, and the wisest decision made for a while.
 
Our 2nd Tow in 9 years

At 7am we called TowBoat US and explained our circumstances.  We have nothing but praise for the way the local operator dealt with us.  He came out to us around 8.30am as agreed as it was slack high tide, towed us in through the channel ~ must add it recommends in the guide book that you seek local knowledge before entering as the sands shift and the channel can move, well we sure got our local knowledge!! ~ he safely got us through the shallows, stood us off the bridge until it opened, moved us across to the river bank out of the current so he could tie alongside to push us into the marina berth, then carefully slotted us into our designated dock.  He was very professional and knowledgeable and an absolute pleasure to deal with during this stressful time. 

 

Our 9th Anniversary Since Leaving NZ – One We Will Remember!