Slowly, We Head North

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July 8, 2023

We are on the move, but seem to be moving slowly. We just don’t have a plan. Perhaps a plan for late Winter, early Spring, but for now we know we want/need to head north to get out of the heat (ha!) so we can get back to New Mexico, and just because we are ready for a break.

Titusville

Visiting Birds

We did leave Ft Pierce with the plan of going to Titusville so we could visit the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. The Refuge is on Cape Canaveral land and thus pretty protected. There is an agreement between NASA and Fish and Wildlife who manages the reserve. We’d been there in the Winter and birding was phenomenal. We knew it would not be as diverse but was still quite good.

It has been so sweltering hot that even the Great Blue Herons are looking for shade. We were happy to be bird watching from the comfort of our airconditioned car.
White Ibis are everywhere in Florida. Like a Scrub Jay in New Mexico. But these guys are big which makes it more interesting. They are such pretty birds!
This Osprey was watching the Ibis and his/her partner like a … hawk from a near by branch. We’ve seen very few eagles, but lots of Osprey.
Anhinga’s are also very common here. They are also called the “Snake bird” because of their long necks. They have webbed feet and are very good swimmers, can dive to 60 feet spearing fish meal. Another large bird, they stand nearly a meter tall.
There is a place where the ICW passes through the Merritt Island NWR. it is also a hot spot for manatee viewing. We always see them from the boat when transiting here. We took our rental car and drove to the viewing location. There much have been 30 of them nibbling on the water grasses and “frolicking.” They are mammals and do need to come up for air but can stay under for 20 minutes if they wish.
A manatee cluster. There were 6 or 8 of them in this little corner in the shade.

Flying, Not Like a Bird

While there we learned there was a launch the next day of a Falcon 9 carrying the European Space Agency Euclid Telescope. We’d seen night launches from Fort Pierce but seeing a daytime launch from 7 miles would be fun. The best free place to see it is from the end of Playalinda Beach. We head out at 9 for the 11 am launch. The crowd slow gathers among the beach goers.

Playalinda Beach. You can see a tower in the distance, part of one of the launch facilities. “Our” Falcon 9 cam from just behind the lower green to the right of the visible tower. 7 miles away. The beach at the far end was cleared. Ultimately we about to go about 1/3 of the way down this beach. For manned launches, this beach is closed.

My video of the launch. Hand held with ~ 200mm lens. Pretty cool to watch!

After the launch we visited a space memorabilia museum in town. Lots of interesting donated items from all eras of the space program. Jim was a happy astronaut.

Sea Turtles

While at the rocket launch we found out that the very beach we were on is a hot spot for sea turtle nesting. On Friday and Saturday nights, this and another beach a bit farther north take visitors to see the turtles coming a shore and nesting. A must do! We manage to get a spot on the norther beach. An hour driver, but worth it! We arrive around 7, get a briefing, watch movies and wait until the turtle tracking crew finds a turtle who has come ashore.

FINALLY, they find one, are issued red flashlights and caravan in our cars to the nearest beach parking lot. We get there and a turtle, not the one they had spotted is busy trying to maneuver through the steps to a suitable nesting spot. The boards on the stairs are having none of it and she finally gives up and heads back to the ocean.

We had been trapped on the stairs to not interrupt the turtle. By the time she left, the turtle they had found had finished laying her eggs, covered them and returned to the sea. One other turtle did come ashore briefly but decided things were not to her liking and headed back to sea.

So, we got to see turtles but not see they laying their eggs. And, you do not get to see pictures and cameras of any sort were not allowed as the light can bother the turtles. Yes, if no flash they it would be fine, but we cannot be trusted.

No, not a sea turtle; a Gopher Tortoise we happened to see on our way to our turtle viewing. He was about a foot long, so good size. Best I can do!

Making Tracks

We had now done the necessary things around Titusville so headed north. We though we’d stay around New Smyrna Beach as I’d marked what looked like a nice anchorage when we headed south in April. Oh, silly us. We FORGET about holidays. As we neared New Smyrna Beach it was CRAZY!!! There were boats everywhere, cutting in front, behind and around us. The beaches were packed with people and beached boats. The pretty anchorage was not so pretty. We did try to anchor there but found there was not enough water where we wanted to be.

I could not bring myself to take pics of the chaos on the beaches and on the water. But, I was amused at these two folks who found solitude in front of an abandoned sailboat left over from some storm, perhaps from Hurricane Ian last year. There are abandoned boats all over the place and it is very difficult to make them go away. If they are on land, the land owner has to sort it out. If on the water, there is all sorts of international maritime law that must be sorted.

With all the crowds, our aborted anchoring and nothing better looking ahead in a reasonable distance, we dropped the hook (in the middle of a cluster-f of boats zooming everywhere), checked the weather, made a route and headed off shore for Georgia. We were ready to be out of Florida and do not much like the piece of ICW ahead.

Back Offshore

We left from the Ponce de Leon Inlet around 3 PM and arrived at the St. Mary’s Inlet on the Florida Georgia border around 4 am. Miscalculation on our part; we had a pretty good push from the Gulf Stream (or some other current???) and thus arrived nearly 2 hours earlier than we’d expected. We kept slowing down while underway but it was not enough. Down here there is no real dawn like we are used to in New Mexico; the sun just comes up. We did not want to enter a strange inlet and anchor in the dark.

By the time we got fairly far in the inlet which is 4 NM long from where we entered (half an our travel for us), we were starting to see some light.

We hug out outside the inlet with following sea which was fine when behind us but not so fun when we had to turn around. We finally gave up and headed in. The sun did slowly come up and by the time we got to our anchorage, it was fairly light.

Rincon Feliz happily anchored off Cumberland Island. There was roughtly 7 feet of tide at Cumberland Island and we’d see several knots of current, turning the boat 180 twice a day. Our anchor held beautifully, even through several “decent” storms.

We anchored off Cumberland National. A private island with an agreement with the National Park Service. A whole story in itself for another post. Stay tuned!

We see dolphins every day and sometimes they come and run with us for awhile. I’ve probably said this before, but it never grows old seeing them.

Comments

Slowly, We Head North — 2 Comments

  1. I love the adventure updates. That sunrise photo is amazing. It’s extremely hot here too.

  2. Yes, I hear you guys have been getting it pretty bad there. Here in Sunbury, GA, the heat index was 111. About the same yesterday. Ug!