St. Augustine to Stuart – Thanksgiving in Vero Beach

Ships Log - Monday, November 15^th we were up early (6:30 am) and underway to Titusville 39.5 nautical miles away on the awesome Indian River. This section of the waterway is chocked full of wildlife. The North Indian River, south of New Smyrna has dolphin, manatee, eagles, ospreys, pelicans and many, many other species of water fowl. It is one of our favorite stretches. We arrived in Titusville by 2:30 pm and had showers on shore and dinner on the boat. We ran into Santa who was having a little R&R before making his run on Christmas.

 

Tuesday, November 16^th we stayed at the dock as there was supposed to be a front coming through. It was a gorgeous day and we walked to downtown area for lunch at a local diner. We hit the Save-a-lot for a few items and I got a much needed hair cut on the way back to the marina. We messed on the boat listening to news, music and reading books. I went below for a nap and Ginny was on the aft deck reading a book when Mike and Barb from s/v Goose Bumps came to see us. They were heading back to Daytona for a few more months of work before they hit the Bahamas in February. It was great to see them again and they stayed onboard for a couple of hours swapping stories with us.

Wednesday, I was up early writing and just after day break I heard something so I stuck my head up and found Mike leaving the light we had loaned them and taping a note on our door. We chatted for a few minutes and he was off to weigh anchor and head back to Daytona. We feel very fortunate to have met Mike and Barb and look forward to seeing them in the Bahamas. We were with Mike and Barb in the spring when we saw the launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis.

I listened and read all the weather reports I could get and decided we would shower and shove off to Melbourne as the weather was forecast to blow hard starting on Friday. We ran down the Indian River with a 15 to 20 knot wind on our back all the way to Melbourne and anchored south of the Melbourne Indian River Bridge causeway. This was the night we earned our wings (see our previous post about the Osprey).

Thursday we weighed anchor early and moved down to Vero Beach. It was a good run and another good day on the water. On this section of the ICW the homes are awesome and we always enjoy gawking at them. We picked up mooring #57 in the north mooring field, our favorite spot at Vero. We like this spot because of all the wildlife and the views.

The next few days we enjoyed hanging out at the marina, hitting the beach and shopping. Monday, November 22^nd Bill Bartlett on s/v “Memento Mori” arrived in Vero. We spent part of the summer in Brunswick on dock 7 with Bill and will never be able to repay him for all the car trips and selfless deeds he did to help us. It was good to see Bill again and we looked forward to celebrating Thanksgiving together.

Vero Beach Municipal Marina was packed to the hilt with cruisers heading south. On most moorings there were 3 boats rafted together. We signed up for the cruisers Thanksgiving Dinner which was held at the Riverside House. It was amazing to see how this event came together. 140 + people celebrated together with everyone bringing a covered dish. On Thursday before Thanksgiving there were only 4 people signed up on the signup sheet! The food was awesome and the event was a very memorable one indeed. Our table was #8 and we had crew members from “Sirius Endeavour” (Don and Ellen Freeman), “Memento Mori” (Bill Bartlett), “Precosious” (Susan and Wayne), “Talisa” (Joan and Duncan Ellison) and “Wind Dust” (me and Ginny).

After Thanksgiving and while we were still in Vero we enjoyed having dinner with Bill Bartlett (Memento Mori) and his visiting sister Carolyn.

 We also met a new couple who rafted to us for a few days on sailing vessel “Odissea XX” (Laurie and Blair Aston) from Toronto, Canada. A great couple with lots of great stories and a beautiful Morgan 461.