Friday, April 11, 2014 We had clear skies last night to see Jupiter, Mars, and even Saturn (I think, according to the report.) We were tucked up close to shore and so things were much quieter. I did wake up when a couple of light rain showers moved through, but other than that everything was good. The wind switched directions this morning around 7:30 and with the added noise, we decided it was time to get up. We took our time, as we didn’t have far to go today. Bob took Auggie to shore today for his morning walk while I stayed back to prep the boat to leave.
We hauled anchor around 9:45. It took awhile to get it up—it was really deep in the bottom. It was covered in thick black mud and made a big mess on deck. I used the deck hose to wash it all off, while Bob slowly motored us out into the ICW and we were on our way. We motored along at a leisurely 6 mph since the area was “slow–no wake”–defined on the sign as “little or no wake–completely settled in the water”. There’s no guessing there. It was partially sunny, temps in the 70’s, with an easterly wind and no humidity. It was a great day just cruising along listening to tunes on the radio. At Juno Beach, we could increase our speed as we approached Jupiter Inlet. People were touring the lighthouse as it stood sentry at the Inlet.
It can be very dangerous going through that inlet, so not too many boats attempt it. As we crossed and turned in front of the inlet, we could see this smaller boat battling the seas as it made its way toward the inlet.
The freighter was moving south across the inlet and doing much better.
As we crossed into Jupiter Sound, the water turned that beautiful aqua blue color. More people were out enjoying the water swimming, tubing, paddleboarding, fishing, and of course, boating.
The clouds came and went all morning–sometimes dark and threatening, but it never rained on us. We did see it raining behind us though, but it didn’t show up on the radar.
We left Jupiter Sound and crossed into the larger Hobe Sound, adjacent to Jupiter Island. We did not need to have any bridges open for us today which was nice. We decided to try a new anchorage today–one that we had picked out on our way down. It is Peck Lake across from Loblolly Marina where our friends, Pam and Don, spent a couple of winters on their boat. We chose a spot in Peck Lake adjacent to the beach/park and dropped anchor at 1:00. Our first attempt didn’t get the anchor to hold. Our second try did. There is a dredger working nearby and we’re hoping they will stop working soon and not work through the night. That would make a quiet, peaceful evening for us.
Two other boats came in to anchor for the night. This anchorage sits between the ICW and the beach, so we have a good view of all the boat traffic going by. We relaxed awhile before taking the dinghy to shore to check out the beach. This is a popular spot to come by boat on the weekends, we read. At this landing, I spied the perfect spot for a picture.
It reminded me of a tropical island. Wait…..I was on a tropical island! We took the path through the “tunnel” to the beach.
The beach was pretty empty except for a few people who came by boat or the ferry from the Loblolly Marina across the ICW from us. The wind was blowing from the SE sending some pretty big waves crashing to shore.
We watched this guy for awhile trying to surf a wave with his paddleboard. It was very entertaining!
I took a walk down the beach and found some interesting shells. Each beach has its own “footprint” when it comes to the kind of shells you can find there. I also found the shell of this crab waiting for me to find it.
We sat for about an hour at the beach and then the wind finally got to us, so we packed up our chairs and went back to the boat. I took this shot of the boat at anchor from the shore.
We had cocktails and appetizers before dinner and watched some very dark clouds pass to the south of us. With any luck the rain will miss us. It seems to be going to the north and south of us for now. After dinner, we took Auggie to shore and he really enjoyed running up and down the shore off leash. We spotted two small stingrays in the shallow water along the shore. It doesn’t look like the clouds will allow us to look for planets tonight. Oh well. We relaxed the rest of the evening.
