Stuart to Hobe Sound

Tuesday, April 1, 2014 Happy April Fools’ Day! I hope you didn’t get caught playing the fool today! We had a sunny blue sky, light winds, a perfect kind of day! Auggie and I headed out after breakfast for an exploratory walk, so we wouldn’t get in Bob’s way while he changed the oil in the engines. We walked along the water past this beautiful tree with three trunks coming out of the base.

Continuing on past the commercial fishing docks we spotted this carved statue dedicated to all commercial fishermen–past, present, and future.

We went along the boardwalk past the sportfishing fleet which are docked here at the Pirate’s Cove Marina.

As we walked back along a shaded street, I heard some loud squawking high in the trees and looked up to see a band of 7 bright green parrots (Budgies, as I like to call them) having a very heated conversation.

Auggie and I stopped to check them out and after awhile they all flew off to converse elsewhere. We were gone about a 1/2 an hour and returned to find Bob deep in the bowels of the engine room. I took the extra time I had to “swab the deck” this morning from the dew and clean the chair covers. Auggie found some shade to relax in. I made my regular “first of the month call” to my brother and we got caught up on a few things before he had to go and start seeing his patients in the office. He said he would call back later. The marina was a busy place with boats departing for fishing trips, giving tours, and all kinds of workmen doing various jobs on the boats. Bob finished the oil change in an hour–no fuss, no muss. We checked our charts and discussed where we wanted to anchor tonight. I helpled Bob get rid of all the old oil and filters and we were ready to go. We untied the lines and pulled away from the dock at noon. We drove the short mile to where the ICW comes into the St. Lucie River and turned south. This area was all new to us as we had never gone south on the ICW from here–only north. It was a beautiful day to be on the water and there were many boats moving about. There were many huge estates along the shore.

The houses along the shoreline thinned out until all we saw were mangrove trees and bushes. 

We traveled a slow 8 mph since we didn’t have far to go to get to our anchorage and we wanted to take it all in. Much of the area was a “slow–no wake” zone anyway which slowed us down even more to 6 mph as we crawled along past Peck Lake, The Narrows, and Jupiter Island to Hobe Sound. 

We dropped anchor in Hobe Sound at 2:00 and relaxed the afternoon away, discussing plans for the rest of the week. Bob sat in the shade while I had my first chance to lay out in the sun on the bow of the boat in my swimsuit. I laid there listening to the radio, just relaxing, and maybe even snoozing a little.

Right before dinner, we took a dinghy ride along the shoreline south to check out the next anchorage. Auggie was anxious to go for a ride.

The homes along this stretch of ICW are huge estates on an acre of land or more. This one reminded me of the Great Gatsby’s. This picture doesn’t begin to do it justice. The banyan trees in the yard were so cool!

Here’s another one that looks like a gingerbread house—kind of out-of-place here.

Auggie enjoyed the ride immensely sitting perched on my lap like a hood ornament on a car.

When we got back to the boat, another boat from Racine, WI had anchored in the same area near us. What are the chances? We had a cocktail before dinner and grilled chicken. We took Auggie to shore before the sun set and returned to the boat to shower out back in the cockpit. We watched a little TV on the few channels we could find and went to bed around 10:00. It was a fabulous day!