Happy New Year

Bob & Ilona, the crew of sv-Ihana, wish everyone warm weather, fair winds and following seas for 2013. Have a wonderful holiday.

Voyage Plan

The next 176 STatute Miles; six days (moving)

currently at - Camachee Cove Yacht Harbor, St. Augustine, FL [STM 776]

21 miles to - Marineland Marina,  [STM 797]

34 miles to - Halifax Marina, Daytona Beach, FL [STM 831]

15 miles to - New Smyrna, FL [STM 846]

32 miles to - Titusville, FL [STM 878]

40 miles to - Melbourne, FL [STM 918]

34 miles to - Vero Beach, FL [STM 952]

This falls into the realm of "bound for …", which mariners know is not necessarily the same as "going to …".  [Your mileage may vary.]

These will be shorter travel days because: 1) the days are shorter now that we are near the winter solstice, 2) it is too cold to spend too many hours in our exposed cockpit, and 3) we can only move when the weather is favorable, which is maybe half of the days. And we are still timing the tides and currents [see separate blurb].

Add to that - conditions out in the ocean usually involve big seas and unfavorable winds at this time of year, and you can see why we are slowing down and staying inland in the ICW.

We are now about 2 months behind schedule [we had a schedule?] We had hoped to be in South Florida a couple of months ago, when the days were longer and the temperature was warmer.  We had several delays [coincidently, about 8 weeks of them], most of them planned or expected - to pickup/dropoff crew, visit with Naomi in Toronto [Mississauga], spend a week in the New York area visiting with our son and local relatives, attend the Annapolis Boat Show, sit out Hurricane Sandy, and travel to Berkeley for Thanksgiving. And now, St. Augustine is such a great town that we hate to leave.

We're here through New Years – informal get together today on New Year's Eve here in the Camachee Cove Captain's Lounge.  Then, the next weather window, and we are out of here [we think].

Tides and Currents

For South Carolina, Georgia, and Northern Florida – tides on the ICW can range as high as 10 feet (!), and currents are often 2 knots (sometimes 4 knots). This makes for some interesting and complicated navigation, especially when deciding when to travel and how and where to anchor:

THE TIDES --

Low tide – bad time to go through areas with thin (i.e. shallow) water. We have had to avoid passing through some bad areas at low tide. 

Rising tide - If we get stuck hard aground, all we have to do is set an anchor and wait for the rising tide to float us off. [As we did where Catskill Creek joins the Hudson River and dumps its load of silt to form a bar.]

Half-tide and rising – the best of both worlds.  Unfortunately, this happens only twice a day.

High tide – great for passing over the bad (shallow) spots but dangerous: if we get stuck hard aground, we won't be able to get off by ourselves, or maybe even get pulled off by another boat.

Spring tide – when the moon is full or new, the sun and moon are aligned and the tidal range is higher (and lower) than normal.  This can lead to flooding, and if we get stuck we won’t get off until the next Spring tide – two weeks away!

Falling tide – not so good.  If we get stuck, we would have to wait for the tide to drop, then rise back up after low tide until it is higher than when we ran aground. We have to be very careful traveling when the tide is falling.

Half-tide and falling – the worst of both worlds. Thin water, getting thinner, and the problems described above about getting stuck.

Hard aground with a falling tide – if we are stuck on our keel, the boat will tip (heel) over, until the tide reverses.  With a 5-foot draft, this could mean that we will heel enough to take water in over the cockpit combing, possibly flooding and sinking the boat.  The one time we were stuck on the Hudson River, we only dropped a foot or so, with about a 15-degree heel.  Imagine getting stuck at high tide when the water level is going to drop – up to maybe 10 feet.  Ouch!

Hard aground with a rising tide – nice.  Just wait; will float off within a half-hour.

And, to make it as complicated as possible: The tides vary with location – need accurate tide data for the whole route.  This is especially true near inlets to the open ocean.  The further inland, the more delayed the tide will be compared to the ocean.  And then there is the current coming in (or going out) as we pass the mouths of rivers that enter (or leave) the ICW.

Anchoring consideration: We have to put out more rode – sometimes a lot more – to have enough scope for the highest tide level.  This means we need a lot more room to swing (current reversal, remember), and makes crowded or narrow anchorages more of a problem.

MEASURING TIDES -- Our depth gauge gives us the approximate depth under the boat.  The soundings on the charts give us the theoretical mean low water depth. The corrected, local tide tables give us the expected depth above low water. Higher mathematics gives us the actual tide where we are.  But we don't have the time or interest in doing this.  Our keel is a pretty good indicator of the actual depth ...

THE CURRENTS -- These also vary and have to be considered:

Slack current – around the time of, or after, the maximum high or load tide, the current is a minimum; it turns around sometimes pretty quickly; at other times it is a gradual stop-and-start.  

Anchoring consideration:  The boat will probably swing 180 degrees; hopefully the anchor will reset (we bought a Rocna, supposedly great at resetting).

Fair current [tail current] – nice for moving, as we get up to a 2-knot boost. Bad for docking, though, as we have to come in at higher speed to maintain steerage.

Foul current [head current] – slows us down, sometimes a lot. Great for docking at slow speed.

Anchoring considerations - The 180-degree swings.  Stronger pull on the anchor and rode. Might want to med-moor, i.e. set two anchors on the bow, one forward, one back, so we always have one pre-set anchor to hang on, but then we have to unship the dinghy to set the second anchor.

Inlet and Outlets - We can either ride or fight the current when going in or out through a pass to or from the ocean.  This worked perfectly on our outside run from Georgetown SC to Charleston – fair current both ways: Falling tide as we went out in the morning, then rising tide as we came back in, in the late afternoon.  But it could have been the other way around …

MEASURING CURRENT -- Our Raymarine tridata gives us our speed through the water. Our Garmin chartplotter gives us our [GPS] speed over the ground. Subtraction gives us the current.

WIND AND CURRENT --

Coming from opposite directions – bad. Sometimes very bad. Can lead to standing waves (square waves) and extremely rough seas.  NEVER be on the northbound Gulf Stream with a northerly wind!

Coming from the same direction – better.

PUNCHLINE –- A lot to consider when choosing if, when, and where to travel.  And sometimes we just have to go and don't have a choice …

Time Out - hanging around St. Augustine

We're here for who-knows-how-long.  At least through New Year's.  Maybe a few weeks more?  We do want to get south, but this is a great town. There is so much to do - restaurants, bars, biking, walking, and just enjoying the warm(er) weather.  Temperatures were 60 to mid-70s highs, 39 to 50 lows.  Downtown is about 2 miles by bicycle; same by marina's loaner car except parking is impossible. And the holiday lights are spectacular!

St Augustine downtown

St. Augustine waterfront

Yesterday we biked downtown, then stopped for lunch at J.P. Henley's bar. This wonderful pub has about 70 (sic) different beers and ales on-tap, and lots more in bottles.  We had pints of Blue Point's Toxic Sludge IPA, and Green Flash's West Coast IPA - the two best ales ever! On tap! Across from the St. Augie Marina! By bicycle. Shorts & T-shirt. With Ilona. It don't get any better than this.

J.P. Henley's Pub

Menu page 1, of 3 pages of beers and ales

St. Augustine Downtown City Marina:  advantage - right across the street from this pub.  disadvantage - high current, expensive, exposed to ocean currents, some noise.  We prefer it out here at the Camachee Cove Yacht Harbor, even though it is a 2 mile bike ride into town.

Camachee Cove Marina - pictures

 t'was the night before xmas, and all through the marina ...

Camachee Cove Marina, St. Augustine, Florida

s/v Ihana (and others)

St. Augustine

s/v Ihana arrived in St. Augustine this afternoon, 12/24/2012.  Cold on deck, as usual.  Now 69 degrees F in port.  Staying in the Camachee Cove Marina for several days.  Yea! We get off the boat.

another day on the IntraCoastal Waterway

A Tale of Two Beaches

Sunday, 12/23/12 - left Fernandina Beach, FL; arrived Jacksonville Beach, FL. 

Wonderful dinner tonight in Jax Beach with David & Barbara Doyle, m/v Memory Maker Too - who we met in Little Falls, NY, on the Erie Canal. They live in Jacksonville.