Most Bad Days of Cruising are Better Than Working

At least I think so.  This has been a strange year!  We’ve always known that there would be mechanical problems from time to time, but his year it seems like it has been non-stop.  The really strange thing is that several of the cruisers that we got to know last year have also had a rash of mechanical and electrical problems this year as well.  It seems like we’ve had one thing after another since we left the end of January.  We arrived here in Key Largo to find that our house batteries were acting strange.  When we checked them they were extremely hot.  We checked the alternator and the shore power charger and everything seemed normal, but the solar controller didn’t seem to be functioning properly.  The batteries were toast, so we set out to locate the best replacements.  That in itself turned out to be a real challenge.  Based on all the suppliers we talked with, it appeared that our current batteries were mis-labeled and we didn’t have the capacity that we thought we did.  So we went with similar type and size batteries and assumed that the capacity would continue to be adequate for the things we have on board.  As we speak I’m waiting for a new solar controller to arrive so that we can change that out.

It was nice to return to Manatee Bay Marine in Key Largo.  The owners and staff had always been very pleasant and welcomed us back.  We got some great help with trouble shooting the electrical problems and if we had to have some down time, this was a great familiar place to be.  Hard to believe but we have arrangements to haul the boat out of the water in about 5 days.  That will give us enough time to clean things up and prepare to leave the boat.  We will then head to the British Virgin Islands where we’ll meet friends from Denver and Bismarck for some charter sailing time.  Plans are to return from the BVI about April 27 and then start the trek back to Bismarck.  We hope to visit our son Tom for a few days in Savannah, GA on the way back.

Haul Out area at Manatee Bay

Spent several day in this well protected area

Made it to Ft Lauderdale

These photos don't  really do justice in giving you and idea of how many people are there

Things have been running much better since we had the work done in Port Solerno and I found the crud in the fuel line.  

We've been working our way south on the Intracoastal Waterway, mainly because there are few good inlets between Port Canaveral and Fort Lauderdale except for Fort Pierce and Lake Worth.  When we got to those inlets, the wind was coming from the south.  Go figure!  One of the stops that we made was at Boca Raton Lake.  It was a wonderful anchorage until we hit the week-end.  I thought we had gone to never never land.  I really don't think I've seen so many boats in one place except at a boat show.  Then in addition to the regular crowd, the Hillsboro Yacht Club was having a change of commodores and the whole club was there with all their boats rafted together.  Thank goodness we had anchored before everyone started to arrive.

We arrived today in Ft Lauderdale and are staying at the Las Olas Municipal Marina for a few nights.  We're convinced that some schools must be on spring break since there were so many young people at the beach and it's only a Monday.  We hope to kick back for a few days and then head for Miami, Biscayne Bay and then the keys.