Beauty and the Beasts

The Seas were predicted to be 5 to 7 feet for the next several days, so we decided to take the inside route. (ICW) The ICW is a great way to travel up and down the East Coast when it is to rough to go out into the ocean, and the stretch between Palm Beach and Miami is one of the more interesting sections with all the HUGE beautiful homes, HUGE yachts, (hundreds of them) cruise ships in port, and great cities you pass right through the center of (the beauty), but the bridges (the beasts) are a pain in the butt. We could pass under a few of them with the antennas down, but we needed to have 19 open for us. Having a bridge open isn't a big thing when they are on demand, but the bridges in this stretch are on a schedule. Some open on the hour, some on the half hour, some on the quarter hour, and others open on the three quarter hour. If you get there too early you have to hold your position in a narrow channel with other boats and wait. We try to time them, but you have no wake zones, slow minimum wake zones, manatee zones, and you don't know where they are until you get to them. We do know how far the next bridge is, so we can do speed and distance planning if it weren't for the different speed zones. Well, you get the picture. Speaking of pictures, I have a ton for you that we took through this stretch of the ICW. Now you know what I meant by the beauty and the beasts

September Song (a love hate stretch) out
Bob


The first of 19 bridges we had to have raised between Palm Beach and Miami. It takes us two full days to go 70 nautical miles.