The Trek Northward

We finally moved aboard Kinvara on Thursday for the trip north. It took quite a while to get all our belongings put away then we decided to go to the dockside bar & grill for drinks and to listen to a dock neighbor who plays beautiful instrumental music on the steel drums. While having our meal a thunderstorm approached with high winds and quarter sized hail then heavy rain for 2 hours! I thought we were having a tornado warning but it was just a severe thunderstorm.

Friday we checked out our instruments, scraped the sides, washed the boat and then sat back to relax. It was hot not being in our air conditioned house! In the evening we met up with Joe and Cherie from Oriental who were leaving on Saturday to head north also. We compared notes and planned to buddy boat at least to St Augustine. Around 5PM we gathered aboard Kinvara for sunset drinks and our dock neighbor, Milt came aboard with his guitar. What a delightful time. Milt was playing beautiful instrumentals on his guitar while we all sipped on goombay smash drinks. (Thanks to Linda who gave us the recipe!) Then bedtime!!

Cherie and Joe

Milt playing his tunes

Joe with his guitar

Our last sunset at Harbortown

Today, Saturday we backed out of the dock at 7:30AM and headed for our first bridge opening at 8AM. It took us 3 hours to get 18 miles to Titusville. Once we passed the municipal marina we started talking about the engine quirks. We felt vibration but thought it might have been the 20k headwinds and 2' seas, then decided it was not running up to speed. Facing another 7-8 hours to the next place of civilization we decided to turn around and go back to Titusville Marina. They called a diver for us who came about an hour later. He scraped lots of barnacles off the bottom and found a wire cable wedged into our prop. That was apparently causing the poor engine performance and we were lucky to make it as far as we did. By 3:30PM we paid for our dock for the night ($54...gotta love it) and walked apx 1.5 miles to a seafood restaurant called Dixie Crossroads. Tonight the winds are up to 20+k so we are happy to be on the dock for now. Tomorrow morning we go 33 miles to New Smyrna Beach. Unfortunately we can't make it to Daytona because the tide is not right passing near an inlet known for constant shoaling. Our friends, Joe & Cherie kept going so we hope they made it to Daytona Beach. We are hoping the winds are slack in the morning to back out of the dock!! We just heard from our weather router that a named tropical storm has now formed off the Carolina coast but is not suppose to reach Florida. I guess we will check in with him tomorrow morning again!