December 29, 2019

A short jaunt south took us to Saint Augustine, where Eric pulled a crazy Ivan to negotiate the ripping current and get us near the dock. The extra hands of our crew really helped in this tense situation to get us safely secured for the night.

Saint Augustine is all lit up for the holidays, and is internationally known for it’s Christmas lights displays. We’ve decided to take the next couple of days to explore the town.  We also had the chance to meet up with our friends from Parallax who we haven’t seen since the Bahamas.

December 31, 2019

Today we cruised down to Fort Matanzas. This National Monument proved to be a fun walk-about, although the actual fort was inaccessible and pending repairs from hurricane damage.

I love Southern Live Oaks, they are such frickin pretty trees all decked out in moss and other greenery. We walked to the other side of the island, and said hello to the Atlantic.

Then we made it back to the boat after dusk. In the distance we could see fireworks, although I was too tired to stay awake for them.

 

January 1, 2020

We hopped down to Daytona for an afternoon of walking. We were hoping to get groceries, but the only store within striking distance (called Jay’s Store) had pictures of guns and questionable substances in its Google reviews, so we decided to wait until tomorrow for provisioning. Instead we found a tasty pizza joint and feasted on pie.

 

January 2, 2020

Here’s a sunrise for ya –

In Titusville we walked around town, hit up a delicious brew pub for dinner, and snagged groceries on our way back to the dinghy.

 

January 4, 2020

We anchored behind Dragon Point to wait out a big blow forecast to come through overnight. There wasn’t a good spot to access shore, so we spent the day lounging on the boat, enjoying the sun and watching derpy pelicans and dolphins swim by. Most of us were sunburned by the end of the day.

 

January 5, 2020

We made it to Vero Beach today! This marina has a large mooring field (pre-set anchors that boats tie up to), and since this area is so popular among cruisers, the marina has a policy of rafting boats together. Super quirky, however with extra crew it made sidling up next to our designated rafting partner and tying up almost painless.

For evening activities we met up with our friends Skip and Saskia who live in Vero, and they invited us out to witness drag queen bingo at a bar that Skip painted a mural for.

After a brief visit of the bar, we moved the party to their favorite Mexican restaurant and regaled our tales of the Bahamas.

 

January 6, 2020

The cruisers of Vero meet up every Monday afternoon at a local restaurant called Mr Manatees to partake of their Monday special of $5 burgers. It’s quite the social event. Eric and I dropped in to say hi to other cruisers, and Alex and Momo joined us after a while.

After noticing the food challenge on the menu, Momo ordered a massive two patty  burger complete with slices of ham and mozzarella sticks as well as a basket of fries.

It was quite the feat, but she made it look easy, ate it like a champ, and earned a Mr. Manatee’s T-shirt.

 

January 7, 2020

At Jensen Beach – I had sushi! So happy. We enjoyed walking around a lot this afternoon and evening.

 

January 8, 2020

We anchored in Peck Lake today and walked along the beach for most of the day.

January 9, 2020

Today we took our friends to our favorite anchorage in Fort Pierce. Eric, Alex, and Momo hopped in the dinghy and explored the mangrove island in this sheltered anchorage while I stayed on the boat, feeling under the weather.

We ordered pizza to be delivered to the nearby boat ramp, now a tradition at this anchorage. Eric and Momo took this shore mission, rowing to the close shoreline, tied up along the highway, and used a smelly dead raccoon carcass as their marker for finding the dinghy again in the dark. Pizza was delicious.

 

January 10, 2020

Well, we got stuck in the anchorage today.  Not physically stuck, just that when we were ready to pull up the anchor, Eric realized it was low tide, and we had already scraped the bottom in the channel leading to this spot, so we didn’t want to risk getting grounded in an attempt to leave. So we stayed put for another night, making sure to note when high tide would be for our exit tomorrow morning.

 

January 11, 2020

We’re back to Vero Beach! We pulled up to the fuel dock to check in, dropped off our friends with hugs goodbye, and grabbed a mooring ball back with the folks we had rafted with on our previous visit.

I’ve been so grateful to our friends for joining us on this cruise south and helping us get to warmer weather.