Off to West Palm Beach — 11•15•21
Prepped for early departure to West Palm Beach (Lake Worth). This will be a 210nm trip, with an overnight sail. It should be smooth sailing. Well, it will be very little sailing as the wind will be light. So motor sailing most the way.
I dropped the line to the mooring ball at 0630 (6:30 am). I wanted to make the 0700 Bridge of Lions opening. A few other boats had the same plan. The bridge tender opened the bridge a bit early for us, and I cleared the bridge at 0650. I settled in for the day with light winds on the nose, with very little swell. I set the boat up for my ECO mode, where I alternate running the port and starboard engines, to save fuel. The mainsail went up, but I left the genoa furled as it would just be flopping around and not doing much good.
Florida Night Sailing — 11•16•21
Very calm night sailing, with lots of stars and a few other boats traveling in the same direction. On these overnights by myself, I settle into a sleep schedule of 20 minutes, with an alarm going off. I wake up then scan my instruments and go outside to look for the lights of other boats. My body gets into this groove pretty easily now. It really is not as bad as it sounds. I sometimes will say up longer if a boat looks like it might pass close by in the next 20 minutes.
At about 0600 (morning) the wind picked up enough to get the engines shut down and the genoa out. It was nice to strictly sail. I slowed down a bit so I would arrive at the Lake Worth Inlet on a flood tide, which would put the tide current behind me, and push me in.
Lake Worth – West Palm Beach
At 1100 I dropped the sails and started the engines at the mouth of the inlet. I had the anchor down at my usual spot I anchor here at 1210. West Palm Beach is one of my favorite anchorages in Florida. It has great protection, good anchor holding, and the nicest Publix just a short dinghy ride in Palm Beach.
The next morning another Catana 431 ( Minerva ) anchored next to me. They came over and said hi. The Catana community is a small community, but most of the boats are out there cruising, so you are running into each other constantly.
I’ll stay here for a few days, then I’m off the Ft. Lauderdale for thanksgiving, and picking up my crew for my Bahamas crossing.