Arriving at Lake Worth, West Palm Beach FL

Monday 13 Dec, Cape Canaveral to Lake worth, FL, cruising day 16: Boring motoring. Arrive at West Palm Beach at sunset. More leaks, this time Captain induced.

Midnight sees us passing Cape Canaveral where the Disney Princess cruise liner, lit up like a small city, passes across our bow doing 21kts, heading for the Canaveral Cruise terminal. It looks like cruise liners are back in business after Covid. We are almost sad these polluting monsters are back roaming the tourists spots again, billowing out their toxic bunker fuel smoke and thousands of environmentally unaware tourists.
It really amazes us that on one hand you have people trying to get rid of dairy cows because they fart too much methane green-house gases, and on the other hand these super-size cruise ship polluters continue to roam the globe free-range, a law unto no country, with their cheap labour and power generated by the dirtiest of any fuel made by man. Bunker fuel is right up there with coal, if not worse. But there unlike cows, protests are silent on this one. Is it just ignorance? Media bias? Don’t-care attitude? Or all the above.

OK, that’s today’s ranting over. You get the sense of what we feel about the cruise liner industry.
About now, as we pass the Cape, most of the forecast models show the wind swinging onto our port beam, to provide us with a gentle reach for the last 100 miles. And I’ve really been looking forward to that. But no, the wind just keeps on coming from astern at that annoyingly low speed. Low enough that we cannot sail but just high enough for our exhaust smell to drift forward and permeate into the cockpit from the stern exhaust. We could really do with an exhaust outlet on the bow and the stern and be able to switch between the 2 when needed. I must write to Magnus Rassy with that suggestion! He can add it onto the long list of optional extras for new boats.

In the early hours, all our cockpit windows steam-up again. Reducing visibility. But as soon at the sun is up it all clears, and we are subject to heat. Yes HEAT! We like warm, but this is too hot. We are roasting in the cockpit, even with the tent sides and rear panels removed. We vow that at next stop it will be time to put the bimini up for extra shade.

All day we wait in vain for the wind to turn east as we continue to motor south. And, just as I drop the pole and clear the decks, with just 10 miles to go, it does swing. Pfff. Bit late now, thank you. But anyway, I am determined to have a gentle sail after all the hours of droning noise from the Volvo. So sails come out and we peacefully sail the last few miles to Lake Worth Inlet.

We have been here twice before and love the Lake anchorage for its tranquility, no wake zone and, new to the list, no pelicans! At least, not in great numbers like St. Augustine. What we don’t like about these Florida inlets is the power boats. And this really is only a Florida thing. They come in and out the entrance channel at full throttle and always pass very close. They all, without question, seem totally oblivious of the effect of their wake on other boaters. And when I say wake, for a big sports-fisher boat doing 40+kts, this is a 1.5m breaking wave that rolls us like a cork and slaps the hull sides, sending spray over the deck and cockpit. It’s times like this when I’m glad we don’t have firearms on board… because I’d be very tempted!

Once inside, we turn immediately left and anchor next to the super-super-luxurious houses on the Palm beach. This is where Epstein had a house. And of course, it is also famous for Donald Trump’s Florida residency at Mar a Lago resort. It’s a wonder, quite frankly, in this over-policed country that we, pure commoner peasants (!), are allowed to anchor so close to these multi-million $ properties.

Just as the anchor goes down, peace descends, the air starts to cool, and we are treated to a wonderful sunset. The water below us, even in this lake setting, is clear blue and a balmy 26 degC. First thing tomorrow, I’ll be in for a dip. First swim of the season 😊

But there the tranquility ends, when I get a call from Oana in the fore cabin. “Come look at this so you can work out where it’s coming from before I disturb anything”. “FFS, what now!?” is my instant thought. Not leaks, please no, not leaks. But yes, the bunks in the forecabin are soaked and everything in the lockers below too. And there is salty water still dripping from the Ocean blinds that are closed over the deck hatch. How on earth is that hatch leaking like that? I mean, we only had just a bit of water on deck as we left St. Augustine channel, then nothing. How is this thorough soaking possible? But with the blind drawn back the answer is obvious. The damned hatch was not locked down. It was on vent! Aaagh!
I’d left it unlocked after I had worked on it, to seal it with silicon (!), in St. Augustine. And to add insult to injury, “check all hatches closed” is an item close to the top of my departure check-list. Which I did go through before leaving. Just goes to show, a check list is only as good as the idiot checking it! I guess that’s why it makes perfect sense in the airline industry that pilot and co-pilot cross check each other.

Now, I’m not normally a moody person. But this seawater ingress really gave me the blues. In a fury, I throw all the wet salty stuff on deck where I will rinse it tomorrow. And try to wipe down the interior best as possible. Tomorrow the mattress will also have to go outside for a rinse and drying. Luckily, we do have mattress covers, which got soaked too. But they also took the rust stains from several storage tins that Oana had up there, rather than staining the actual mattress material.
I love this boat. But right at that moment I really wanted to just scuttle her and head home. Screw cruising, it’s just too painful. I may have gotten some satisfaction by screaming: “CLOUDY! Enough is enough!”. But for once, this one was not Cloudy’s doing. It was all mine, alone.

An hour later, a very pleasant prawn cocktail dinner with lovely cooling breeze passing through the cockpit and a downed IPA beer gradually cooled my temper back to its normal placid levels. And the rest of the evening was relaxing, with a planned early night, with windows open for cooling fresh air. Lovely. I think we can say “we have arrived to summer”. Now we need to tune ourselves down a notch and really start to enjoy our cruising, with no deadlines.