The Naked Eye

A few nights ago we were able to see the latest SpaceX launch from Cape Canaveral, right here in our park. This was the second launch we have witnessed since we arrived, and both were quite impressive even though we were over 100 miles away. The first one was a manned launch, heading to the international space station, and this latest rocket had another 60 satellites. Even though I knew photos probably wouldn't amount to much, I decided to try and zoom in and see what it looked like. After I downloaded them, I noticed something we didn't see with our naked eye...the first stage separation as it fell back to earth. The cropped photo below shows two lit up dots in the corners, but if you right click on the photo, save it, and then zoom in, you should be able to see both more closely. How kewl!

Day 4, The Port

We did it...four days in a row of kayaking! Today we launched from underneath the Blue Heron Bridge in Riviera Beach, and paddled out to Peanut Island. The tide was coming in and supposedly high late in the afternoon, so we had our snorkel gear with us. Unfortunately the clear water of the incoming tide did not materialize, so the water was still brown and turbid. Plus the 15 mph southeast wind was making waves break on the rocks where the snorkel area is, and there were quite a few more people than we expected. After our picnic lunch and a walk around the island, we altered our plans and paddled around the Port of Palm Beach instead. What a good idea! We love seeing the activity with freighters, mega yachts, and all sorts of boats. 

We even got to see a Dockwise ship loading yachts for transport.

The boats certainly are diverse in the area, ranging from near derelicts with tons of accumulated possessions (notice the seagulls in the dinghies)...

To a few sunken or boats washed ashore (I heard that there are plans to install a mooring field to prevent this from happening).

On the other end of the spectrum, there are gorgeous mega yachts like this one, with its mast-less racing sailboat behind it. 

We can't leave out all the yachts being worked on at Rybovich too. They now have a huge drydock.

The 'Coasties' flew by us on a mission to assist, and it is comforting to know they are out there.

 

This tugboat was headed out on its own mission too.

Talk about a boat with windage? This huge houseboat doesn't need an anchor because it has 'spuds' (pilings) on its sides that go down into the bottom to keep it in place.

Being the sailors that we are, when it was time to head back into the wind, we used this barge to give us some lee and protect us from the breeze and waves.

So "when life gave us lemons, we made lemonade" and it was a perfect change in plans. We are so thankful that we are able to do and see as much as we do. Tomorrow is a day of rest though! 😉

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Triple Header

We have been kayaking for three days in a row! After my last post, we decided to head out again yesterday and find some protection from the increasing wind in a canal off the St. Lucie River that I call Hope Creek, because of this yacht that we see from the road when we travel to Port Salerno...

The only public access is on the side of the road to Sandsprit Park, and it is just a mucky steep little cut in the mangroves. Below is a photo of Dave as he hauled his kayak out, then came back for me. What a chivalrous husband to pull my yak up the bank so I didn't get my feet muddy, or slip and fall. 

First we had to get the Great Blue Heron to mosey out of the way. No problem, and he didn't even squawk at us.

We saw lots of gorgeous homes, including one with a pirate and cannon standing watch...

This hacienda even had a bell tower...

We liked this house with an old fashioned boathouse...

This huge compound being built, certainly is sprawling and had lots of porches that must have quite the view of the river.

There is a unique property on the end of a peninsula that protects the creek, complete with beach, cannons, and two fun-loving labradoodles that swam out to see us (I think the trimaran has seen better days and the bow was buried in the sand.

This marsh area was actually the driveway to get to the property from the mainland. It reminded me of Cape Cod.

There are quite a few unusual trees in the area, especially the banyan trees. I think the first one below, looks like a broccoli stalk and the second one's roots look to be melting on the retaining wall.

There was plenty of nature in the area too, and the juvenile Little Blue Heron (they are white when they are young) and anhinga looked down on us from their perches (I also had a manatee surface right in front of me, but did not have time to get a photo).

Today, after our bicycle ride and morning walk, the wind was calmer than predicted, so we ended up kayaking from the park on the northeast side of the Jensen Beach bridge. Then we went under the bridge and south along the shore. We saw lots more birdlife and of course more homes and boats. What a fantastic way to get exercise and fresh air! 

Three days in a row on the water is making up for lost time. Can we make it four tomorrow? Stay tuned!

Finally!

Finally the weather is starting to get better, and finally there is something to write about! The wind and rain have been relentless, and until today, we have had no new adventures worth reporting. Today it was even predicted to be showery and windy, but luckily we woke to much improved conditions. We hopped in the van with the kayaks and launched on the northeast side of the Stuart bridge, paddling north in the St. Lucie River, making it perfect in the lee of the ESE wind (the ocean has been dangerously rough). 

Since it was so early in the day (you can tell by my shadow in the photo above 😉), we were able to view lots of water birds including Great Blue Herons, Snowy Egrets, Kingfishers, Cormorants,  Ospreys, and Louisiana Herons, also known as Tri-Colors. First one flew into the tree, then a whole flock came in, which is something we had never seen before.

As we paddled along the shore of the Oceanographic Coastal Center, I noticed an unusual wall made out of bags of oyster shells, which they were probably using to help prevent erosion.

This is what the oysters look like attached to all the piers and docks...

The Coastal Center has big pumps to bring in water, which I presume is to keep the flow going to their lagoons so that the fish, sharks, rays, aquatic plants, etc. remain healthy.

The tide was low, so we were able to go under all the docks and look at boats.

It sure felt good to finally be back out on the water again. Hopefully more days like this will follow!

Waiting Out Eta

It was a wild day and night for us northerners, as we sat through the outer bands of Tropical Storm Eta (Floridians are used to this and didn't even make any preparations). We were in a tropical storm warning and hurricane watch area, but at least the hurricane winds didn't materialize. We had some really nasty squalls hit us though, and lasted through the night. Our place certainly did lots of creaking, although we had quite of bit of protection from the easterlies. There were tons of leaves and small branches down around the park, which have already been picked up by the great maintenance crew. Our only damage was that we woke to our shared mailbox post having broken and fallen over. It was pretty rotten and down to a skinny little nub left at the base from the lawn guys that weedwhack around it, whittling it down each week. Our neighbor couldn't believe it when he saw it had collapsed. He said it had survived two other hurricanes, but a tropical storm finally did it in. Replacing it was a perfect post-storm 😉 project for Dave, and he completed it just as the mail truck rounded the corner. 

We were lucky this time and I hope Eta doesn't loop around and come back to get us again. The 'spaghetti models' for this storm have been all over the place. The wind may still be blowing but it is sunny, hot, and steamy out now. Welcome to Florida!

Holy Cow!

Today was our only day to get out on the water between weather systems and when we start to feel the effects of Tropical Storm Eta. The wind has continued to blow at least 15-20 mph daily, but we took a chance that we would be protected enough to kayak the south fork of the St. Lucie River. We launched at Hosford Park, that we discovered last season, and it worked well, although we did have to hide under a boat on a lift for 20 minutes, to keep from getting wet in a squall. 

We saw the same boats and homes as last time around, but we only saw one turtle and no alligators. Dave did get up close to an anhinga and I spotted a very unusual sight along the river. I was looking at some of the nice homes on the opposite shore, when I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, right next to me...CATTLE! Boy, did they give me the evil eye, but they didn't attempt to flee or get out of the water. 

Apparently there must be a farm on that side, and either they were cooling off or attempting to drink the brackish water. Either way, they were fun to see and added to our first adventure out. Now we await storms and lots of rain from Eta.

Migratory Goats

We have migrated to Jensen Beach on a spur of the moment decision! We had planned on going south just around Halloween, but when it was predicted to snow up home and Hurricane Zeta was going to cross our driving route in Virginia, we had less than 24 hours to pull everything together, pack, and winterize the house. The same day, I had a doctor's appointment to have my ear infection checked and when the receptionist took my temp with the laser thermometer, it was 99.9 degrees. All I could think was, Dave is going to kill me because we won't be able to go! When my real temp was taken, it was normal and my infection is gone. She asked me if I had the heat on in the car when driving to the office, and of course I had it cranking. Who would have thought that would affect the laser reading, but then again, it is only a surface reading. Dave's knee is healing really well and he barely limps, so off we went for the two day drive, living out of the van. We also towed Jim Ryan's 14ft. sailboat down for him, so we had to go a bit slower. We arrived on Dave's birthday at about 6 PM and all is well with our place here. We have been busy getting everything back in service, weeding, trimming, pressure washing, etc. Thanks to our good friend Scott, who looked after the place this summer, this has all been very easy. Dave is out cleaning up our powerboat Coqui (ironically there were two tree frogs living in it), although the weather is not conducive for boating with lots of showers and wind this coming week. We don't mind (too much 😉) because we are warm and in shorts! We are ready for our winter adventures.