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Before
we left Vancouver we had prepared ourselves for the unavoidable. We were going away for 4-5 years and knew that we would eventually
need to celebrate, commiserate and grieve with friends and family while far away from home. Two sets of our closest friends
are currently expecting their first kids, another their second, and some others that you may have already read about were
married not long ago. We had expected things like this, but nothing prepared us for the sad news we received during our stay
in Fernandina Beach. We received the worst possible news from home. A good friend of ours had died. I’ve known Pawan for 10 years. He passed away early
Sunday morning shortly before his 30th birthday.
Pawan came all the way to Vancouver for my farewell at the Flying Beaver, one of the last times I would see him. He sent me an email a few days before his last. He was excited about his recent move home and promised to come visit. True to his nature he finished with some corny joke about me becoming a pirate.
Jaime
and I spent the next few days trying to make it to an airport. Our plan was to get to Jacksonville and then rent a car to
drive to Orlando. From there we could fly back to Calgary in time for Pawan’s funeral. We forwarded our plans to a friend
back home and left Fernandina Beach in the middle of a gale. The marina was crammed with boats trying to find a safe haven,
so trying to leave was a real treat. We called up everything we could remember about pushing off a dock in a headwind with
a following current in a crowded marina, and even had the boating and seamanship guides spread out all over the table before
we left. Our collective knowledge on this subject did not amount to much but despite the odds, we somehow still managed to
get ourselves out of the “parallel parked” scenario we were in, turned around 180 degrees, and out of the marina
without hitting anything. Now if we could make it to Jacksonville the rest would be easy.
From the deck of a cruise ship you might consider this situation comical. From my perspective, the deck of
a 9 foot inflatable dink with a 4 hp Mercury engine, it was dire. I decided to make a test run alone to see if this was an
idea we should see through. At the moment it seemed suicidal. Jaime cast off the line and I was alone. Just me, the dink,
and the gale, rapidly being separated from the mother ship with the force of the wind. If the little outboard engine failed
now, Jaime and I had a pre arranged plan to meet up in Fort Lauderdale.
In the late 1800’s apparently this guy Flagler was really busy over here. A hotel
and railroad magnate, his name is on everything from streets, to colleges, hotels and even parks. We keep seeing signs of
his influence all over Florida. In St. Augustine we visited Flagler Liberal Arts College and snapped a few pictures. Formerly
a hotel, it was built in 1888 and as impressive as any church or fort that we’ve seen so far. If you wanted to learn
about liberal arts this would probably be a fine place to do it.
By the time we got back to the dink, the wind had probably dropped 10 knots or
so. Our ride back was a lot less traumatic, but we still managed to get good and wet.
Today you would find us 50 miles or so south of St. Augustine anchored in front
of a sprawling mansion that looks more like a 5 star hotel than a home. Their boathouse is bigger than anybody’s house
that I know. Kind of funny how water can be the great equalizer; our neighbors are worth millions and we drive an old dingy. The weather
has cleared up and for the first time in nearly two weeks we can see the sun. Things are looking much more like the Florida
depicted on all the postcards. Our jackets are put away and we’re finally back to the standard slapdash uniform consisting
of board shorts and bathing suits. In preparation for our visit to Daytona Beach we watched Talladega
Nights. Not sure how that will help but it’s the best we could do. In a little while we’ll go to shore and get
ready to “shake and bake”. I don’t know very much about Daytona Beach, and since Ricky Bobby was from Virginia
or something I can’t even rely on Hollywood for an accurate rendition. To us the name just seems to conjure up images
of Bikers, Spring Breakers, and NASCAR nuts. I’ll let you know after we spend a day or two here if our sweeping generalizations
are anchored with even a kernel of truth. By the way if
our neighbors happen to be reading this, come on over! We are the little white catamaran in your backyard. I’m sure
you can see us from at least 35 or 40 out of the 50 rooms in your house. We’ll make you KD and wieners and I promise
not to pee off the back of the boat while you’re here.
One of the challenges of anchoring out
all the time is the never ending quest for dingy docks. You would think you could just pull up in any old place, tie up and
be on your way. That’s just not the case. Most water front is privately owned. If not then there’s the bridges,
highways, railroads and marina’s. That’s why we were happy to find The Stock Exchange. It’s a great little
waterfront bar in Daytona Beach, Halifax Harbor. Go there between 4 and 7 pm and drinks are 2 for 1, and yes, there’s
a spot right out front for your dingy. We stopped in (just to be sociable) and while Jaime went to the bathroom to make herself
less…salty, I ordered up some “Gator Bites”. When she returned of course I let her know that some chicken
chunks were on the way. We were half way though before I told her the truth and by that time the verdict had already been
reached; Gator Bites are some good eatin’. Before
long we got to know all the local celebrities. There was the captain, the visiting fire chief, the bartender, the bartenders’
mom, hoteliers, some left coasters and a computer animation dude who worked on Shrek but who’s real claim to fame that
night was for eating not one but two of the biggest steaks we have ever seen.
On Tuesday we set out to do some myth busting, but soon discovered that all of
our sweeping generalizations about bikers, NASCAR and spring break were pretty much true. There were bikers everywhere, and
apparently we just missed “Biketoberfest”. Not only that, Daytona is not only NASCAR central, but as they like
to say here; “the birthplace of speed”. The hard packed sand on their straight and long beach was being used to
set all kinds of speed records decades ago. They have the self proclaimed words “largest NASCAR store”, and even
a theme park near the speedway. Oh, and by the way, remember the people who live in that little shack that we anchored in
front of? They own it. Yep. We know because we met their full time, live in Chef. Myth confirmed.
Speaking of driving and beaches, this is the first place that we’ve been where
you get to combine the two. Like every self respecting beach this one had sun, sand, surf… and traffic signs! There’s
posted speed limits and cars everywhere. Seriously you have to look both ways before crossing the beach. There are these little
toll booths at every beach access point and after you pay your 5 bucks you’re free to drive on.
Last night the wind kicked up again. After a couple of nice, calm, quite nights
at anchor we were both kind of surprised to wake up to the wind howling and the waves slapping again. We must be getting used
to it though because after a couple of groggy comments about it to each other we went right back to sleep. The timing was
good this time, we had a 50 mile travel day planned and the north wind would be a nice boost. We go about our pre-departure
tasks pretty smoothly now. There are the engine checks, lowering the drive-leg, hoisting the dink and raising anchor. It’s
probably 20 minutes from rolling out of bed to being underway; less time than it used to take us to get out the door for work
in the mornings. We had the headsail opened wide within minutes of pulling anchor and enjoyed a nice motor sail away from
Daytona. Not long after that we were able to shut off the stinkpot, raise the drive leg and continue on under sail for most
of the afternoon. This is the first significant stretch that we’ve actually been able to sail and we loved every minute.
There were 20 knot tail winds that whisked us along just inside the Atlantic for a good stretch. Dolphins swam alongside the
hull from time to time and we hardly had to touch the sails. It was a nice taste and we can’t wait for the next leg
of the journey which will involve a lot more.
We were settled right into this nice sail but had to think about bringing them
in for a 90 degree turn that was quickly approaching. It was a hard right that led directly west; away from the Atlantic and
back inland through a narrow waterway. There would be a bridge shortly after the turn according to the chart but it also said
that it would only be closed during “space shots”. We didn’t know what that meant but decided that it sounded
pretty rare. It would be difficult to bring the sails in now with the strong tailwind and probably easier once inside the
shelter of channel if we needed to at all. Besides, we were excited to be making such good progress and neither of us really
wanted it to end quite yet. Those were the factors that led to the following terrifying moments. It’s always when you
least expect it. We approached the turn and managed the sail easily, but could see that it would be a
little tighter than what we had expected. There were jetty’s made from piles of rock jutting out of each side that we
would have to skirt around. We had a full genoa and a 20 knot tailwind. Still, not unmanageable and we did just fine until
we cleared the corner. Then we saw that the bridge was closed. In itself this wouldn’t have been a problem; we would
have easily furled the sail and started the engine while we coasted to a stop well before the bridge. No biggie. The problem
was that the bridge had apparently been closed for quite some time. As a consequence, we were now looking at seven boats stacked
up between us and this bridge. The stretch we were now in which would have been maybe two city blocks long and 50 yards wide.
Claustrophobic by sailboat standards. There are all these boats bobbing around struggling to hold a position while waiting
for an opening, and here we come ripping around the corner like a bowling ball headed for a bunch of white pins. To make matters
worse (I’m not making this up) a trawler entered the channel behind us soon after we made the corner, so now we had
our only exit blocked as well. If you count the masts and hulls in the picture, I think 7 or 8 boats went through in front
of us.
The scene on the slapdash over the next 90 seconds or so was not pretty. In fact,
it was probably one of the ugliest episodes of seamanship imaginable. First order of business was to slow our headway. I pulled
the helm hard into the wind and Jaime started pulling like crazy on the line that furls the headsail. It only took a few seconds
for us to be blown dangerously close to the jetty, so we also had to drop the drive leg back into the water and get the engine
started. We weren’t sure if the drive leg was locked into place when it was lowered, so now boathooks were being tossed
around the cockpit to press down on and latch the drive leg into place. With the engine now running we were able to point
the boat into the wind, get the headsail furled, and narrowly escape the jetty. The Trawler had worked its way past us which
gave us enough room to turn around and regain some composure. It happened really fast and probably looked like rabid monkeys
having a yard sale, but the crisis was unquestionably averted. In the future we have decided to avoid taking blind turns with
a bunch of sail being offered up to 20 knot tail winds, especially right before a draw bridge. Tried it once, didn’t
really work out so well for us. On an aside, we have not found a conclusive definition for “space shots”.
But this bridge was very much closed, and according to my Intracoastal Waterway guide it only does so during space shots so
we can only be left to assume that we were indeed experiencing some this afternoon. To add to this puzzle, less than an hour
prior we were sailing along peacefully when two explosions rang out. They were only a split second apart and thumped like
thunder, but had the sharp crack of shotgun blasts. I don’t know if these things were in any way related, but intend
to find out. We are going to see the NASA boys and girls over at the space center tomorrow to get to the bottom of this one.
thursday november
8,2007 (titusville, fl) It didn’t take long to solve the mystery of the double explosions we heard yesterday.
After breakfast we packed up our laundry and
shower kits and headed to the marina. This was supposed to be a great marina and have all the amenities that a couple of people
living on a boat anchored out in the bay could ever need. It did. The laundry was cheap (a buck a load), and the showers were
about the same. It’s always luxurious to have a shore shower; as hot as you want and as long as you want. Land lubbers,
don’t ever take it granted. I digress. After a few exploratory incursions down various piers in the marina trying to
find the dingy dock, we came around the corner to find that this one section had a bunch of big boulders sticking out of the
water. They were big, grey and rounded like the kind of boulders you would expect to see in a river. These were no ordinary
river rocks though. These peculiar Titusville marina rocks had the ability to disappear and then reappear a moment later in
a different spot. I shut off the dingy motor and Jaime pulled out a camera from my backpack. We drifted a little closer and
without the engine running could now hear that the rocks were making a sound that I can only describe as “snurfing”.
Kind of the cross between the sounds a big dog would make if it were nuzzling you, and the sound that you would make right
after you lifted your head up from under water to blow the water out of your nose. Clearly these were no boulders. They turned
out to be giant manatees, like a half dozen of them right there in the marina! I say giant but that’s because the only
frame of reference I have is the manatee mailboxes that you see all over Florida. In comparison these were giants. We had
no idea they were so big, maybe the size of big sea lions. We snapped a bunch of pictures and moved on. You will see why we
initially thought they were rocks but each one of those bumps is actually a big manatee.
We got turned around and found our way to the dingy dock but on the way there we saw another one, and this guy was working his way around the hull of a sailboat. The owner came out and told us that they are big pests, slurping away at any drain or the algae that grows on the underside of every boats’ hull. Jaime got a shot of this one as well and you can see his big face pressed up against the transom of the sailboat, kind of like a giant hairless aquatic wrinkle dog.
NASA BOUYANT AFTER SUCCESSFUL MISSION
Admission for two to the Kenneday Space Center, 80 dollars… Your first NASA soft serve ice cream cone? … Uh, yeah. That’s gonna run you another 4 dollars.
That giant silver thing Jaime is leaning against which looks like a mutilated
piece of the Michelin man is the F-1 engine; the most powerful liquid fuelled rocket engine ever produced. It was used to
power the rockets used during the Apollo moon missions. Just one of these engines creates more thrust than all three of today’s
space shuttle main engines combined. It was totally bad ass. That next picture is of the Saturn V rocket, the largest operational
launch vehicle ever produced (36 stories high and over 6 million pounds). Get this, they strapped 5 of those F-1 engines to
it which created 7.5 million pounds of thrust. At the time, except for a nuclear explosion, the launching of this rocket was
the loudest man made noise ever produced. Sweet. Jaime wanted to be a rocket scientist and I was trying to
fill an astronaut opening but they wouldn’t even hire us at the concession stand. So we did the next best thing and
met this guy, Mark Lee. He’s been to space 4 times, twice as payload commander. It’s the first time either of
us have ever met an astronaut, so we reminded him that he has Canada to thank for that big gangly space arm thing. We even
got to see one, and I took a picture.
Anyone from Canada reading this is laughing
right now because although it may be a pretty cool space arm, I guess it was basically our only contribution to the space
program but that doesn’t stop us from flogging it like there’s no tomorrow. You can’t see a Canadian government
sponsored video of brochure without some kind of reference to or picture of this space arm. Well fellow countrymen, I’m
happy to tell you that the men and women at NASA are all well aware of our contribution and appreciate the appendage very
much. It actually got a lot of play here which surprised us both. Kudos on the arm Canadian government, now if you could only
figure out a way to have our boat registered for less than a thousand dollars. Oh, you’re still paying for the arm?
Sorry. That next picture of us doing
our best hero walk with the orange bars around us is actually the very same service arm that Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong,
and Michael Collins (yes, there was a third guy) used to board the Saturn V rocket on July 16th, 1969. A little
while later they were on the moon. Well two of them were, that poor Mike guy got left in the shuttle which
is why you have never heard of him.
friday november 9, 2007 (titusville, fl) We were actually going to head back to the Space Center again today, but after we finally got to shore we realized how tired we were from the day before. We decided to just take it easy, have some breakfast, update the website, and do a bunch of driving just because we could. We had the car until noon.
On the way back to the boat, I decided to try and stand up in the dingy while driving
it. We’ve seen a bunch of other people doing this and have always wondered why. We thought they were just trying to
look cool, but I decided to try anyway. At first I was a little shaky, but immediately recognized the benefit; I was staying
dry from the knees up. Normally you would be getting splashed in the face, now it was just my legs. A few seconds later I
think I figured out the real reason why they do it. I guess because my weight was shifted a little further forward in the
boat, and centered which allowed the dink to get out of the water and start to plane instead of plowing through the water.
This dink has a little 4 horse power outboard (jealous NASA?) so I never imagined it capable. The difference is that you go
at least twice as fast and skip over the waves instead of driving through them. Once you get it to plane, you can crouch back
down again and don’t have to stand up. So I think there is still a bit of “cool guy” factor going on there
with the stand up guys. saturday november
10th, 2007 (melbourne, fl) Today we passed under the NASA Causeway bridge. It was the same bridge we had to drive over on Thursday to
get to the Space Center. Fittingly, we were stopped to wait while the bridge opened and then closed for some lousy sailboat.
The delay provided us with an interesting new perspective; that being from a car stuck on the bridge waiting for a lousy sailboat
to go through. Nevertheless before the lesson really had a chance to take hold we were back where
we were most comfortable; on slapdash with traffic stopped on the very same bridge so that we could amble through underneath.
Sorry cars, but it’s not our system. Don’t hate the player, hate the game. Initially
we were only going to go as far as Cocoa Beach. There is a launch scheduled for sometime tonight between 8PM and 10:30PM and
that is supposed to be a great spot to watch from. I’m a total space nerd now after our NASA visit so I really wanted
to see it. It’s a military launch so there isn’t a whole lot of information, apparently an early warning missile
detection satellite or something. There’s also this cruising seminar thing in Melbourne that Jaime wanted to check out
though, and if we stayed in Cocoa Beach we would miss it. I figured that because it was only another 20 miles along, we would
probably still be able to see the launch and get to the cruising conference thing in the morning so here we are. It was
a pretty uneventful travel day filled with the usual trip routine. Except for this one thing, this morning we didn’t
start our engine at all. We have been wanting to try this and today the conditions were perfect, only 10 knots of wind and
a big spacious anchorage. We just raised the headsail and used the wind to bring us around to raise the anchor. Once that
was done it was just a matter of turning the helm over and we slipped away with the wind in total stealth mode. I’m
sure its no big thing for any sailor but it was the first time we had tried departing without the engine to help free the
anchor, and we felt very smug about it thank you very much. The only other thing out of the ordinary today was lunch.
The last owners left a couple cans of spam in the cupboard so today Jaime made fried SPAM sandwiches… and you know
what? They were really tasty. Who knew? It’s 8PM and I’m off to the front deck now with a blanket and a bottle
of wine. If this rocket goes up tonight I’m not going to miss it. The coast guard has been on the VHF all day setting
up a safe perimeter for the launch and the navy boats and helicopters are buzzing around all over the place too. sunday november 11, 2006 (melbourne, fl)
monday november 26, 2006 (peck lake, fl)
If we had actually left on our originally planned departure date this slaplog would have been written 8 days ago. For this reason we will utilize the moniker “Velcro Beach” for the remainder of this log. There was a flea market planned for Sunday (last Sunday). We need a bunch of stuff and had a bunch of stuff we needed to sell, so decided to stay. We’re glad we did. We made some new friends in the process. One was a cool couple in a boat named Zing who, among other things, taught us how to make Bailey’s from scratch. Rum, condensed milk, vanilla, and instant coffee; the gift that keeps on giving. We first sighted Zing back in Daytona and after a passing VHF exchange, we finally caught up to them in Velcro. Zing can also claim responsibility for talking us into the Bahamas excursion and learning the slapdash crew a thing or two about topics ranging from stuffed mushroom caps to planning a safe passage across the gulf stream. Needless to say we spent some time with these guys and are looking forward to catching up to them. You will likely see their names pop up in a log or two down the road.
On another day in Velcro Beach we patronized
the aforementioned flea market hosted by the friendly neighborhood West Marine. This early morning, preceded by an especially
long night at Zing Island, we packed up our dink with a bunch of stuff we didn’t need and
sputtered on over to the other side of the ICW. When we got there we commenced with a game of seek and hide which involves
seeking a place to tie your dink and hiding it there so it doesn’t get towed away or stolen. We found a waterfront city
park within striking distance from our destination and locked up the dink to a small and rusted over oyster encrusted ladder
that reached down to the water with three rungs. From there it was only a few blocks to West Marine and the flea market being
hosted in their parking lot. We arrived late but with plenty of time to set up and peddle our wares. As it turns out we set
up beside this nice old guy that had probably 50 rods and reels with a pick-up load of weights, lures and other assorted fishing
tackle. He set me up with everything I’ll need from the fishing department for the next four years for less than what
you spent the last time you went out for dinner (before tip). I paid and looked up just in time to see Jaime grinning from
ear to ear sitting on top of some rusty old beat up boat bike. You know, the kind with miniature wheels? They fold up and
fit in your pocket. I knew without a doubt that we would not be leaving this place with fishing gear alone. Hours
later we headed for home. One of the guys from West Marine kindly offered to give us a lift since we had far more worldly
possessions in tow than we had started out with that morning. Sure, the possessions that burdened us now had changed in description
and purpose, but the fact that we had more stuff that we did 8 hours earlier was indisputable. This had more than a touch
of irony since we had stayed all this time for the sole purpose of lightening our load at this sale. Not content
to only congest our boat with these “new to us” trappings, we headed for the biggest dollar store on earth, or
at least the biggest one we had ever seen on earth. Our plan was to fill most of the spare cabin with stuff easily attained
by us but difficult to procure for the inhabitants of the countries we will soon be visiting (one in particular famous for
Mojito’s and cigars). Every single item to be found within these walls was a buck so you can imagine how much stuff
we left with. More than we could carry. This time there was no nice guy from West Marine to give us a lift though, so we had
to make the best with the Velcro city transit system; what a gong show we were. When we finally got home that hot and frustrating
day we filled any remaining spaces on our boat with our new crap. Not finished. Even after
all this slamcrammery we decided to take it a step further. With an imminent departure from the land of box stores and boxed
wine we felt the need to dip in one last time. We filled our cupboards with necessities like batteries and Pringles. Vodka,
Gin and the champagne of beers are also fighting for the same space. This last foray into the world of mass consumerism took
place two days ago; Saturday night. We piled this crap up into what has proven to be an apparently unsinkable dink and took
a picture to prove that we had. If there were some way to illustrate to you how hard it is to get from a boat floating in
a bay to a store where you can buy this much stuff, and get this much stuff back to a boat floating in a bay I would insert
it here. A picture, a poem, an interpretive dance; even with the charitable ride from a stranger factored in, it’s still
far beyond my abilities and would likely take every artist from Paris to Paraguay to accurately express to you the energies
and emotions spent in a trip like this. I know, you feel really bad for us so on a positive note we won’t need beer
or wine for a decade and will be able to supply every school from Bimini to the Balkans with pencil crayons. But we did it,
and our boat is positively stuffed… or so we thought.
With a crew of four we made about 30 miles past the mansions of Palm Beach and under a record breaking 12 bridges. That’s only counting the ones that have to open for us. It would be more if we included the fixed bridges, but those don’t cause any delays. Today’s record won’t stand for long though; tomorrow we’ll need to pass under 15 bridges in the 30 miles that separate us from Fort Lauderdale.
The weather has been great for Ken and Pam’s visit with the exception of an uncooperative wind. We’ve had a strong southerly for the past couple of days. The compass has been within a few degrees of 180 (due south) since we left Velcro so that puts wind and wave right in our teeth. There’s no room to tack in the waterway so it’s been all diesel. Our sails aren’t getting any love.
We have booked an appointment with the Canadian government approved tonnage experts tomorrow afternoon. This will be another expensive step towards having our boat properly registered, something that we would really like to have behind us. Fort Lauderdale will also be one of our last places to get any last minute supplies before we leave the US. We have only a couple items left on our laundry list though, so it should be relatively painless. A backup handheld GPS and some anchor chain should pretty much do it. Ken and Pam leave on Saturday, so we’ll probably hang out there for a day or two and see what kind of trouble we can get into. There’s rumors circulating the boat about some kind of Pirate festival in Key West this week. We can’t miss that of course so may have to trade up for some speedier land based vehicles. Of course they will have to be Pirate approved… Harley’s anyone?
The section we passed through on our route from Pecker Lake to Fort Lauderdale is known as the “Canyon”. It’s heavily developed and has concrete embankments on both sides. Good for preventing erosion and provides solid footing for all of the multi million dollar mansions that line both sides, not so good for absorbing boat wake. Because it’s a relatively narrow waterway any waves created by passing boats are sent ricocheting and reverberating off the sides. They slosh around like water in an enormous bathtub, so instead of just hitting you once they catch you at least a half dozen times and from every conceivable angle. The water will go from being incredibly smooth to monstrously uncomfortable with just one good sized cabin cruiser passing by. And because this is southern Florida you can expect to see a lot more than one. For the most part the traffic we did encounter did their best to keep wakes low so things went pretty smoothly. We heard some stories about people who have made the same passage during a long weekend or after a boat show and it sounds like things can get a whole lot worse than what we saw. I guess our timing was good; we passed mid week and early in the day so traffic was pretty light.
All the hotel sized homes pretty much monopolized the view the whole way. Allegedly Tiger and Celine have shacks on one of the islands we passed. I’m not surprised; none of us had ever seen so much money in one place. Surely this area must have one of the highest concentrations of bazillionairres in the US. I bet the trick or treaters take in a pretty good haul.
As we approached Ft. Lauderdale it became pretty clear that they had earned the title of yachting capital of the world. We would hear that term again and again over the next few days. There are boats of every imaginable size, shape, proportion, purpose, color, all right here. Cruise ships, container ships, tankers, cigarette boats, fishing, cruising, sailing, homeland security, jet skis, pretty much everything you have ever seen on the water is here somewhere. They stack them 5 stories high, literally. There are subdivisions and neighborhoods with canals carved throughout. West Marine takes up two blocks. Boating is to Ft. Lauderdale what gambling is to Las Vegas, what oil is to Saudi Arabia. We spent the first couple of weeks of this trip without sharing an anchorage with another boat, now we would be lucky to find a patch of water not already occupied. Our first couple attempts were unsuccessful. There wasn’t room to anchor the dink, never mind the slapdash. But as the saying goes, third time’s the charm. We found a fantastic anchorage a few hundred yards off the waterway. It’s a small patch of water rather optimistically charted as a “lake”. It was crowded but offered good protection and strong holding. We elbowed our way into a spot and tucked in for the night. thursday november
29, 2007 (ft lauderdale, fl)
Ken turned 57 today and to commemorate the occasion we headed over to the neighborhood
bike shop. We picked the Dyna Wide and a Soft Tail and set about making our way in style to the southernmost point in the
continental US; Key Largo.
It was about a couple hundred miles each way so it would be an overnight trip. With all of the appropriate insurance coverage declined we pulled away just after lunch time. The sun set shortly after we had crossed the 7 mile bridge after Marathon. This was the scene of the “not for sale” boat from back in September so we gave our most ferocious sneer as we thundered past.
With our sunglasses providing the only windscreen, riding in the dark wasn’t much fun. By the time we pulled into Key Largo after the 4 hour ride everyone was pretty happy to get off the bikes. We dropped our bags and gear at some crappy hotel and after we had rendered the towels and wash cloths pretty much unusable from cleaning off the road grime that had accumulated on our faces, hands, arms and legs, we left to find some trouble on Duval St.
friday november 30, 2007 (ft lauderdale, fl) The bikes had to be back by 1PM so we had an early start. We were up at 7, out of the crappy hotel, and on our bikes before 8.
After the requisite pictures in front of the mile zero monument we hit the road and retraced our steps from the day before.
For a while it looked like we were going to get a brutal storm, but the clouds parted and other
than sitting out a little spattering of rain at a roadside diner we had perfect weather for the ride home. By the
time we got back to Miami everyone looked
like raccoons from the road grime and had taken a few hits from kamikaze insects of various descriptions but we all had big
toothy grins. Great day, great bikes, great ride. At one point we were ready to sell the boat and buy Harley’s, so needless
to say would recommend this trip to anyone. Go rent the biggest Harley you can find and ride the highway that connects the
Keys one gorgeous sunny day. You won’t regret it.
We had booked the tonnage guy for the same day. The plan went off without
a hitch and after we dropped the bikes off we were back at the dock just in time to meet up with him. Since all of us wouldn’t
fit in the dink, Ken and Pam had to wait it out on the patio with a couple of beers while Jaime, the tonnage guy and I hopped
in the dink and made our way back to the boat. He was there for about an hour and turned out to be a pretty cool guy. He was
a delivery captain before he took up the dark art of tonnage surveying and spent some time commercial fishing in Alaska before that. These are the things we chatted about
as we sat and watched him run around the boat with a tape measure. He took a few measurements, wrote down a few serial numbers
and was through in about an hour. He took three pictures and that was it; done. We could hardly believe that this would be
the anti climactic conclusion to the great slapdash tonnage fiasco. But it was as finished as the one beer that I had time
to drink while he satisfied the requirements of Transport Canada right before our very eyes. We took a picture of him in action to honor
the occasion.
Seriously though, this whole process was a complete joke and is an ongoing joke
to these guys down here. They’re happy for the business but say that the red tape and paperwork required by TC is unrivaled
by even the Banana Republics. It must be a conspiracy. Some high ranking Canadian government official probably owns these
surveyor companies or something. Okay maybe not, but I am sure of one thing; that was without a doubt the
most unsatisfying $700 we have ever spent. The good news is that we are probably only 10 days away from finally having the
boat registered properly. That means we can complete the name change, and most importantly, leave the country! |
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