Vero Beach

We're on a shakedown cruise that will take us from St. Augustine Florida south to Vero Beach. We've been to Vero Beach before and like the City Marina atmosphere. It is in close proximity (walking distance) to the beach. 

Part of our decision to come here was to hide from thunderstorms and wind that was forecasted for the next few days.. We knew we'd be protected in the harbor at Vero. The storms ended up missing us but we got quite a bit of wind. Mystic was rafted up to another sailboat, My Dream. The two boats swung this way and that on the mooring ball all weekend. 

Our wind scoop creates air flow that pushes the cool air through our forward hatch and into our cabin. It's like air conditioning (almost). We have our sun awning up too. Dave is trying out new garden stakes which tension the awning over our boom. This keeps the awning from flapping in the wind and makes it easier to get under the awning when we board Mystic. Unfortunately, the middle stake popped out during a big wind episode overnight. We notice it in the morning. We've lost our share of awning poles overboard. Dave continues to come up with new ways to keep them from falling out. This time he drilled holes in the ends of the remaining two stakes. We added ties to the stakes and the awning so that the stakes are attached. There's no way we'll lose them now! 

Mystic in mooring field

Mystic and My Dream rafted on ball

Dolphin and manatee are abundant in the bay. We spend a lot of time watching their antics. There is one distinct dolphin that visits daily. He is identifiable because he has lost his dorsal fin. He cruises back and forth in front of the sea wall, successfully fishing. We never managed to capture a photo but we saw him on the ICW on our way back north. Apparently his stomping grounds are wide. He was quite a way outside the bay area.

In Vero we had our first opportunity to get our new 10 foot dinghy and e-propulsion motor out. We were able to inflate it and add the dinghy chaps on our deck. We launched it over the side using lines tied to the bow and two side handles creating a triangle. We attached the center where the lines meet to our spinnaker halyard and raised the dinghy over our lifelines and carefully lowered it into the water. This worked quite well!

Dinghy tucked between
My Dream and Mystic

The electric motor is light. I can pass it to Dave on the dinghy in two pieces, the motor and then the battery. Each weigh about 20 pounds. We purchased this motor because I can set it up on my own if I have to. Dave rigged a cooler with a lock and chain. It sits in front of the motor and holds all our gear when we go ashore. We lock the motor and cooler to the dinghy. It is a simple safety measure and we gain piece of mind. Vero has a big dinghy dock. We made many trips back and forth while we are in town.

Epropulsion Spirit 1.0

Vero has a free shuttle service that goes all around town. We prefer to walk most everywhere and manage to rack up almost 20 miles in three days. We met locals this way; many out walking their dogs. We miss our pets back home in Minnesota so greeting pets that we meet is a treat. We did take a ride on the shuttle that comes by the marina, just to see where it went. It was an interesting ride that stops at the local Publix. If you time your shopping right, you can be waiting for the bus on it's return trip. This is a city-wide shuttle service and is very convenient!

We met up this little sweetheart on every
morning walk. She's part chihuahua,
part Australian sheepdog

Vero has a fabulous farmer's market down by the beach. We scored big time with our purchase of 6 tomatoes, 3 limes, 2 lemons, 4 sweet peppers, a head of purple cabbage, 2 cucumbers, 2 apples and an onion for $11.00. We walked from the marina to the market with a German couple off another sailboat. They had just returned from the Bahamas and were looking for berries. They were not disappointed!

Farmer's Market Score

We like to take different routes on our walks in order to see more of the town. Coming back from the farmer's market we stumbled upon an orchid festival. The plants were A-mazing!!! We noticed that homeowners have orchids growing everywhere in Vero .

Beautiful live oak lined street in Vero

Orchid's planted in a live oak

We spent one morning at the beach. The water was warm but the waves were brutal, knocking us over again and again. There is a park with bathrooms and a playscape for kids. In a far corner we found a butterfly chair which makes us think of our butterfly baby Avery May Silva. Avery was born with a debilitating skin disease called Epidermolysis Bullosa. You can read about Avery here:

http://cruising-teamrogers.blogspot.com/2017/06/butterfly-baby.html

Butterfly Chair between two Palms

Sitting on the butterfly chair

Sweet Avery, our Butterfly Baby - Thinking of you!

Mulligan's Beach Bar in Vero

As our weekend in Vero comes to an end, we reflect on how lucky we are to be on this wonderful adventure together. We will head back north on the ICW and make our way to Titusville. Mystic has a berth there for the month of May. We look forward to exploring along the way!

Shakedown Cruise

Mystic was launched on Monday April 15th after a long 18 months on the hard at St. Augustine Marine Center. We were thrilled to be back in the water! As soon as Mystic's hull was snuggled up to the dock, we heard the clicking sound of shrimp and fish chomping at our hull. At times it was so loud that it sounded like sleet!

Our plan was to move south to Lake Worth to meet up with our buddy boat Mucho Gusto then cross to the Bahamas together around April 19th. Plans change and weather windows for crossing evaporate. We found we were running out of time for a Bahama trip before Dave's next work gig in May. Together with friends Scott and Rhonda, we decided to put off our trip until we got back. This would allow us an open timeline for returning to the states.

Mystic's launch at St Augustine Marine Center

San Sabastian River sunset

Night Light

Mystic dockside at St. Augustine Marine Center

We had a good two weeks to kill so we headed south on a shakedown cruise. We really needed to run our engine, raise our sails, launch our new dinghy and get our feet wet aboard Mystic. Our first stop was Daytona. We left our St. Augustine dock on a sunny but cool Monday morning. There was a light 5 mph breeze out of the NW. We motored south all lathered up with 50 SPF sunscreen, eager to experience life on the water once again. Our day was filled with sightings of white appia, viceroy, and monarch butterflies. Eagles and osprey soared over our heads while dolphins danced in our wake. It was a perfect first day out. We found a nice anchorage just outside the ICW where we slept like babies.

Leaving St. Augustine Marine Center behind

Happy to be cruising again

Dolphins escorting us south

Our view at anchor in Daytona

Day two brought us to Titusville. Along the way we had to pass by the spot in New Smyrna where we ran aground almost two years ago. The shoaling has been dredged since our grounding but we made sure we passed through during high tide. It was a relief to find plenty of water under Mystic's keel. I took photos, facing my fears head on through the lens. I expected drama but it was a quiet easy morning on the ICW.

Green marker where we ran aground in 2017

Looks innocuous but there is a sand bar hiding over there!

We passed through Mosquito Lagoon and the Haulover Canal, one of our favorite spots on the ICW. We were entertained by osprey, dolphins, and colonies of manatee. The canal is an environmental wonder filled with all kinds of wildlife in the water and air. It sits on the edge of the Black Point Wildlife Refuge. We were in awe the entire trip.

Haul-out Canal Bridge - a great spot to look for manatee

Each mound is a manatee

Cormorant with catfish lunch

So many Osprey chirping above us

Dolphin racing Mystic

Dave was keeping a close eye on the engine all day and discovered a small drip from behind the water pump impeller. This would have to be addressed so we decided to make a stop at Titusville Municipal Marina to take a closer look. The leak is minor and appears to be caused by an ill-seated impeller. Dave reinstalled it with extra lubrication and kept an eye on the pump as we moved south.

The leak is small 

Impeller with cap off

We slept well at the marina then spent the morning preparing Mystic for anchoring. We cleaned, checked the engine and filled our water tanks. We used two short hoses that are linked in the middle. There is a leak at the joint. I had my head in the water tanks when I heard Dave yelling on deck. I raced out of the cabin to find him looking over the dock into the water next to Mystic. Two manatee were slurping the dripping water from our hose. It is illegal to give fresh water to manatee here so we adjusted our hoses (after getting photos and video of course) and watched as they slowly moved on. This was such a cool experience watching these gentle giants in their own environment.

Manatee sipping water from our hose

Two Manatee next to Mystic's hull

Barnacle covered manatee

Manatee with nose peeking out of water

Manatee floating under Mystic

We left the Titusville dock around 1:00 and cruised down to Cocoa where we anchored with a fleet of  sailboats and power boats. It was a windy night but we just rocked and rolled and swung on the hook like everyone else. The weather prediction was for the wind to pick up and thunderstorms to come in on Friday. We decided to make the run to Vero to seek protection in the city marina basin. We've been to Vero before and really liked the town. It sounded like a good idea but it was a long day of 20 mph head winds for over eight hours of covering 54 miles. We were exhausted when we arrived.

Cool boat anchored with us at Cocoa

Going under the Cocoa Bridge

Cocoa landmark

Sunset at anchor in Cocoa

We had reserved a mooring in Vero and were directed to raft up to a Caliber 45 sailboat, My Dream, sitting close to the dinghy dock. We've rafted many times but never on a mooring ball. The owners were not on board but we figured things out with ease. While we were settling down for the night, Dave heard a yell and was delighted to see Shirley and Jim Honerkamp from Perfect Love going by on their dinghy. We met them in Mobile, AL at Turner Marine. We had a nice chat and promised to look for them back up in Cocoa where they planned to hang out for a while. It's always so cool to run into old friends on the water.

Making our way to Vero

Learning to sail on the ICW

Mystic on mooring in Vero

Mystic & My Dream rafted in Vero

Dave Relaxing in Vero

Sunday morning we pointed our bow north again and headed back toward Titusville. The weather prediction called for increasing winds throughout the day. We decided to make the hop to Melbourne and anchor for the night. We approached the entry channel to the Melbourne marina then angled to the north just outside the channel. Dave was on the bow ready to drop the anchor. He asked me to put the engine in neutral. When I did, we just kept moving forward. He told me to put it in reverse. I put it in reverse, but we just kept moving forward. Something was wrong. Luckily, Dave resisted saying I wasn't shifting correctly, because I was, and we were having an engine issue! Dave directed me to do a circle and repeat my course. When we were facing the wind he instructed me to cut the engine. Once we slowed our forward motion, he dropped the anchor and we were safe. Dave took a look at the engine and found that the u-shaped bracket that held the shift cable was missing a screw. It must have vibrated loose. This would be an easy fix. He replaced the missing screw and added double locking nuts to prevent this from happening again. THIS is what a shakedown cruise is for...finding things to fix!

Motor-sailing north - very little wind

We saw many osprey on our trip onrth

In the morning, we moved up to Cocoa and anchored on the north east side of the bridge hoping to be protected from the increasing winds. Dave wanted to go ashore to celebrate his birthday with a cold beer. We took the dinghy over to Doc's, a rustic bait shop and bar that claims to have the coldest beer on Merritt Island. We order a 16 oz Pabst for $2 and drink it on the patio with the locals. They let us leave our dinghy at the dock while we walked to the store to pick up seafood, fresh bread and key lime pie for a special birthday dinner. We enjoyed the seafood alfredo but the pie was the bomb. We finished it in one sitting.

Happy Birthday Dave!

Inside of Doc's bait & bar

The dock at Doc's

Birthday Boy

Ms. Apple's Crab Shack - next to Doc's

Mystic anchored off of Cocoa

Mystic at anchor

Birthday Key Lime Pie - We ate it all in one sitting!

The rest of our shakedown cruise was without incident which makes us lucky! When boats sit, things go bad, hoses rot, engines gunk up, everything ages even though it's not being used. We got off easy, had some great experiences and rebuilt our confidence. We'll stay in Titusville for the month of May, make repairs, enjoy the town then head north to work on the second half of our America's Great Loop Adventure!