👉Lake Worth, Stuart and Fort Pierce
Lake Worth
is the first place we anchored at in January 2014 after leaving Fort Pierce. It
looked quite different to when we were last there. A lot more mooring balls
with semi-permanent live-aboard boats.
Lake Worth is also part of the ICW and is at least 1 km wide. There is a marina for super big and
wealthy yachts and power boats. In fact, there was one boat called Bravo Eugenia that sparkled at night. It was huge and quite beautiful!
FYI: I, of course, googled to find out some more
information about it – here is a link.
BRAVO EUGENIA Yacht •
Jerry Jones $225M Superyacht • Oceanco • 2019 (superyachtfan.com)
After we left Lake Worth on
Saturday morning, we heard the captain of the Bravo Eugenia say that they were
leaving Lake Worth and heading south.
Our time in Lake Worth was lovely
and relaxing. There was not much to do as there isn’t a decent dinghy dock
although we did tie up at the West Palm Beach yacht club – which was nothing
fancy at all. We went exploring but didn’t find much except a corner grocery
shop and KFC with some shady characters around. We were still struggling to
find decent Wi-Fi so we decided we would buy a burner phone for our time in
States, but we didn’t want to be tied down with any mobile phone company. Fast
forward…. We found a HUGE Walmart in Stuart which had phones for sale, so at
this current moment, we are all sorted... Phew!!!
While at Lake Worth, there was
another yacht anchored close by called ‘Tumble Weed’. We later met the owner
and explained to him that we almost changed Passages name to ‘Tumble Weed’.
This is due to Mel’s connections with Namibia and a very good and special
family friend from my days growing up in Zimbabwe, Uncle Trev. When I let Uncle
Trev know that I had meet Mel who came from Namibia, he would always refer to
Mel as Tumble Weed. We obviously didn’t change her name….. that is largely
since there was an Australian boat already called Tumble Weed. In fact, there
was a Tumble Weed,2 and 3 registered in Australia too. In Australia, only one
boat can be registered under one name whereas in the USA, it is per State hence
there being several boats with the same name. It all depends on the State they
are registered in.
When we left Lake Worth for
Stuart on Saturday morning around 7.00 am, we should have guessed that it would
have been busy leaving the entrance, being the start of the weekend. It was
like morning rush hour as every size of boat possible was heading out to sea.
My goodness, as we were sailing north to Stuart, the amount of fishing boats
out and about was incredible. At least 200 boats of different sizes.
We had to time our arrival at
Stuart for high tide, as Stuart is known for its shallow depths. At times, we
had less than 20cms below our keel. Quite nerve wracking for Mel. I wasn’t
looking at the depth instrument just checking the route and the channel
markers.
Anyway, the reason for going to
Stuart as mentioned previously, was to have the whisker pole installed onto the
mast. We had arranged for this to happen while at the Miami Boat show, back in
February. The whisker pole keeps the genoa sail in full mode so allowing us to
sail more efficiently. Before the whisker pole, as the wind changed, either
direction or intensity, the genoa sail would ‘luff’ – flap, spilling lots of
wind.
By lunch time, we had anchored in
Manatee Pocket in amongst a few rust buckets, permanent live aboards and Island
Packet yachts. My goodness, we had never seen so many Island Packets in such a
small anchoring area before. We later learned that Mack Sails, the company we
were dealing with for the Whisker pole, was affiliated to another business, Mack
Yacht Services, which is run by one of the ‘Mack’ brothers, Colin. He has
become extremely well known in the States and further afield for working on
Island Packets. It is quite a long and involved story with a bit of social
media ‘politics‘ involved, but basically now Colin only works on Island
Packets.
No sooner had we dropped anchor
and were preparing to have lunch and relax for the afternoon, when the crew
from one of the Island Packets anchored in Manatee Pocket, Petrel - Mark and Valeri
from Connecticut came to introduce themselves. They were on an IP420 and were
planning on leaving Manatee Pocket the following morning after having quite a
bit of work done on their boat. They filled us in on the ins and outs of
Manatee Pocket – for example, the Poop boat, that comes round to the boats that
have requested a pump-out, every Tuesday. It is a free service.
We were still experiencing a few
issues with our outboard motor for the dinghy. It was quite frustrating as the
dinghy is our lifeline to land. After spending another couple hundred dollars to
have the fuel pump’s diaphragms replace, the engine stopped in the middle of
the channel when we were going to meet up with some friends and we had to row
the rest of the way. Mel ended up spending several hours trying to get to the
bottom of why the engine was still not working after it was supposedly repaired.
It turned out that the ‘technician’ hadn’t fitted the choke correctly and it
was left in the ‘on’ position, flooding the engine. The engine is now working
well. Hoorah!!!!
 |
| The whisker pole. |
Early Monday morning, 22 May, Mel
and I went to Mack Yacht Services – Colin’s Office/workshop/boatyard. It was
down one of the river outlets of Manatee Pocket. There were at least 10 Island
Packets along the riverbanks or on the hard at Colin’s boatyard – more
information later about what transpired after visiting the boatyard and how it
is impacting our plans.
This wasn’t where the whisker
pole was being attached – we had to go to the Mack Sails workshop and office
which was about a 2 -3 km walk. When we arrived at Mack Sails to find out when
the whisker pole was going to be attached, we were a little disappointed as we
were pushed back by another week. Anyway, the whisker pole was put onto
Passages, a week later, on Tuesday 30 May 2023. In the meantime, we were able
to fix a few other bits and pieces on the boat, like the small fans we have in
the main living area, kitchen, and bedroom.
We also took the opportunity to
have Mack Sails look at the stay sail which had ripped when we were sailing up
the Florida Keys, to Boot Key. Unfortunately, it is not repairable as the
material has deteriorated, so Mel is busy getting quotes for a new stay sail
and genoa.
While in Manatee Pocket, we met a
wonderful couple who were also anchored close by and are on an IP38, Johanna
and Ronald and their little dog, Henry, on the boat ‘London Calling’. They have
stayed in Stuart and anchored in Manatee Pocket on a few occasions having work
down on their IP by Colin.
Every day for the next week,
until we left Stuart on Thursday 1 June, we would meet up with Johanna and
Ronald either on our boat or theirs for drinks, or we would go to the Twisted
Tuna or Fish House for a drink. (This is where we would fill up our 5-gallon
water container).
One morning, Johanna decided to
be independent, and take their dinghy to the local park so Henry, the dog could
go for a quick run around. A big part of moving onto a boat is losing one’s
independence. In the past, I have tried to drive the dinghy so if I feel like
going ashore on my own, I can. Well, this time round the dinghy hasn’t been
reliable so I have been reluctant to have a go by myself.
Anyway…. London Calling’s motor
is electric and reliant on a small foldable solar panel. Johanna asked if I
wanted to join her, which I did and off we went to the park. It was lovely to
be walking around in amongst the trees and the squirrels. The squirrels were
cheeky little things, coming up really close to Henry the dog, teasing him to
have a go at chasing them.
When it came time to head back to
the boats and our husbands/partners, the engine wouldn’t start. We tried
several things as we were both determined to be independent and to solve the
problem of the engine not starting. Well after about 20 -25 minutes, we
reluctantly phoned Mel to ask him to collect Ronald on his boat and to come and
rescue us. Both Johanna and I were quite deflated as whenever one tries to be
independent, like we are on land, something seems to go wrong. Oh well such is
life on a boat!
While in Stuart, we visited a
huge Walmart, bought our mobile phone for the USA, and stocked up on a few
groceries for the rest of our stay and journey onwards to Fort Pierce.
During our stay in Manatee
Pocket, we saw and heard of some sad stories:
I know I have mentioned in a previous post about how anchoring spaces
are reducing and more and more of these areas are either becoming mooring
fields, attached to a marina or a city council. It usually costs between $25 – $35
a day for a mooring ball. In many cases, included in the price is access to a
dinghy dock, showers, laundry and a few other facilities that yachties require,
like a bus into town, etc. All well and good, however what is happening in the
USA is many people can no longer afford to rent a house, so it is cheaper for
them to live on a boat. As we have found in a few anchorages, there are live-aboards
and their boats in many cases, are rust buckets. While in Manatee Pocket, there
was a rust bucket, that didn’t swing on it’s anchor like other boats, so when
there was a huge thunderstorm (and we had a few while we were anchored), we
became quite close to it. In fact, one night, we hardly slept as we were
watching how close we were to it. Our anchor held well, but we had to keep a
watch, as if the anchor dragged, which we were sure it wouldn’t as it was deep
down in thick, gooey mud, we would need to react very quickly, to prevent
ourselves from colliding into it. We re-anchored at least three times and the
third time we were just sticking into the channel when the wind was blowing in
a SE.
On one of the boats close-by, lived
an elder couple who were forced to put on a generator several times during the
day and night. The wife is sick with cancer and asthma, and they are hoping to
get to the Bahamas, soon. Their boat doesn’t look as if it will be able to
survive the up-and-coming hurricane season. It is so sad! In fact, while we
have been in the USA, we have noticed how many places have been adversely
affected by Covid. Even lovely Fort Pierce looks run down in many sections and
the people who are homeless – there are many more than when we were last in
this part of the world. Yet the wealth of some people…..enough said.
We headed for Fort Pierce up the ICW – the Intra-Coastal Water way. I wanted to see what the ICW was
all about although Mel doesn’t enjoy travelling along the ICW as you are motoring and it is like connecting the dots, from one green and red channel marker to the next. I did enjoy seeing the ‘countryside’ along the banks of the ICW.
The history of the ICW is quite
fascinating as it is a water way that runs from Massachusetts in the north,
right down the east coast of the USA to the Gulf of Mexico. It is 4.800km long
and basically one does not need to go out into the open sea/Atlantic Ocean to
travel down the east coast of the USA.
Here is some information about
the ICW: Thanks to Wikipedia: Intracoastal
Waterway - Wikipedia
It took us about 4 hours to
travel up to Fort Pierce, where we had arranged for a slip in the Fort Pierce
City Marina. This is quite a significant place for me and Passages, as this was
the place where I was first introduced to her in December 2013. We were keen to
see if any of the lovely people we had met 10 years previously were still
around, but sadly no. One such character – Frank, who was a retired New York
City police Officer and was serving when 9/11 happened, and his wife Annie,
were living aboard their motor boat, passed away a few years back and nobody is
sure what/where Annie is. Their boat is still around, in fact diagonally
opposite us, as when Frank passed away, Annie sold it to the couple who are
currently living on it at present.
While we were in Fort Pierce, we
enjoyed the Saturday Farmers Market, went for a bike ride to Aldi and around
and down some of the side streets of Fort Pierce. On one such occasion, we saw
a sign that said, ‘Peacock Crossing’. Upon investigating a little further, we
came across a whole field of Peacocks of all different ages. It was quite
fascinating to see the males, strutting their stuff.
Here is
what still needs to be done on Passages:
The
windvane: Mel is not totally happy with the positioning of the windvane and
would like to make an adjustment. This adjustment requires some fibreglass work,
so we are waiting until Passages is back in the boatyard. The lovely washing
machine we bought for Passages, requires some fibreglass work as well, to make it
stable on the boat.
The HUGE
issue we have are the chain plates: While in Stuart and at Colin’s place with
all the Island Packets, it became apparent that we need to have the chain
plates replaced. This is MAJOR work – 6 weeks of work and I will
not mention the amount of money. HOWEVER, they are an essential part of the
boat as without secure and stable chain plates which hold up the mast, we would
not be able to sail Passages.
SO, while
the chain plates are being done in December 2023, later this year, the mast
will have to come down, so the wiring for the new radar and wind instruments,
will be added. At the same time, we will have the new stay sail and genoa made.
At Colin’s
boatyard, there are storage containers where we can place everything that is on
Passages, in a safe environment. Mel and I are busy working out different
scenarios where we can go. We could organise an Airbnb as Johanna and Ronald
did when they were in a similar situation to us, having to live off and away
from the boat for over 6 weeks. I will have plenty of time to make the new hatch
covers and some rope bags while Passages is having the work done on her.
I will not
write any more long detailed posts of our journey up to St Marys, but I will
make a short video to share with you once we are about to leave Passages.
So, until
next time – enjoy whatever you are doing. Keep safe, Be Kind and Be Happy.
Bye for
now.
Mel and
Caryn
