Day 15     April 25, 2018     Lake Worth to Ft. Piece

In almost every Florida channel you will find large container and cruise ships transversing accompanied by a pilot boat out ahead, warning of their entrance or exit.  This morning motoring slowly out of the anchorage, seeing the pilot’s flashing lights, but not the ship, Captain slowed Aurora.  AIS describes them as having “limited maneuverability,” i.e.; they’re huge!  When this big girl came creeping around the corner and into view, we were thankful for the pilot’s early morning alert.

Several huge dredgers with long tubes sucking up sand to return back to the eroded beaches were moving parallel to the shore today.  Maybe that’s what need on the Gulf Coast to replenish after storms wash our sandy playground out to sea.

In 2012 we anchored in the Ft. Pierce channel, but unable to purchase fuel there today motored a short way into the Ft. Pierce Marina on the Indian River.  With 237 dockage slips many live aboards on all sizes and shapes of boats call this cruiser-friendly marina home. Walking around downtown and a waterfront market didn’t take long and left us wondering how a mammoth Federal Courthouse came to be there.  Afterwards we wound up back at the marina’s tiki hut using our 20% off coupon for dinner. 

Tomorrow we are planning to do an overnight 170 miles to St. Augustine.  Forgetting to get ice until 8:30 we called and the friendly dock hand quickly agreed to meet Dennis and get us some.  Couldn’t get any better customer service, definitely a 5 star marina!

Nautical Miles: 49.7