Ripping apart the Velcro

Ripping apart the Velcro

Sunday January 3, 2021

Vero Beach is knick-named Velcro Beach among cruisers as some many people arrive and find it very difficult to leave.  This morning we ripped the Velcro apart and took off.  It sounds dramatic but was less so in reality.  We had a fantastic dock-hand help us with lines.  Even I had a role to play in pushing the bow away from a piling.  The captain used all his skills to get us out of the slip in reverse.  We had a bad few moments when we spotted what appeared to be a crab pot buoy about 50 feet off the fuel dock.  Closer inspection revealed that it was a coconut!

The trip down the ICW to Fort Pierce went fairly smoothly.  The southerly wind added to our forward motion resulted in 20+ kts of apparent wind in the gusts.  We elected to anchor just off the main channel of the Fort Pierce inlet.  Our timing was such that we were dropping our anchor within about 30 minutes of high tide.  However the current was still whipping past the bow.  Once the hook was set we were pointing to the east (into the current) with the wind just behind the beam.  The anchor chain was trailing sideways and under the boat.  That’s a somewhat spooky arrangement!

Now, an hour after high tide, we are still pointing to the east with a current of about 1 knot.  Eventually, the falling tide should set up a current in the other direction—even stronger if the internet is to be believed.  We’ll see when we turn and in which sense. Will it be bow to the south or bow to the north?   

Postscript: We were quite happy with our anchorage position. We use radar to measure the distance to any close vessels or obstacles. However, we had a brief and pleasant radio call with “Jubilee” our closest neighbor and found out they have 200 feet of chain out with depths of 10 feet at high tide. “Jubilee” looks like a 50+ foot vessel so when the tide changes their boat shifts 500 feet! We had just started our lunch when the current changed from flood to ebb and it became apparent that we didn’t have enough room – either “Jubilee” would swing into us, or at the least would be lying over our anchor when we come to leave in the morning. We knew that they weren’t going anywhere as they have been in this spot for 6 months! So we took the decision to pull up our anchor, drop back as far as we could to the boat behind us and re-anchor. Thankfully it all went well and we are happy with where we are now.

Gloria 

27 27.830 N, 80 18.870 W

p.s. Thinking of my Dad today as it’s his birthday. He would have been 91 today but sadly he died suddenly in 2004, much too young … Mike

"Jubilee" in the Vero Beach anchorage. The Captain is a pastor from Nottingham sailing on a Christian mission ... waiting for Covid to ease up before making a trip through the Bahamas

The vessel behind us, with the Fort Pierce inlet in the distance. With shallow water to the north, vessels east and west and the deep water channel to the south, we needed to chose our re-anchoring spot carefully.

There is an additional anchorage on the far side of this sand bar. The current is probably less fierce but the approach goes through some skinny water

Harry Block: 3rd January 1930 - September 2004. Most of my photos of him are pre-digital, this one from 1993 just happens to be one I have with me on disc. He was a great man, a wonderful dad, there isn't a day that goes by that I don't think of him.