Fort Lauderdale to Charleston Race

Roxane the kids and I have safely brought the boat back to Fort Lauderdale from the Bahamas after 2 months of sailing those beautiful islands. 

I am currently racing from Fort Lauderdale, Florida to Charleston, South Carolina. We have five crew which includes myself, Paul Thornton and the Doeden’s of PCYC.  This race is a 408 nautical mile, almost 800 kms offshore non-stop race. There are 11 boats entered, most of which are serious, semi-pro racers. One of the boats actually has an America’s Cup Crew. Our goal is to complete the race, as this would be a great accomplishment.

The race has been completed since this post, if you want to see some pics goto www.imagesbymarco.com

Will update blog when I return from Charleston Race Week. – A few more pics below….

 

Paul, Ed, Monica, Rick and Mark Doedens. Crew for the race pictured by the pool at the Lauderdale Yacht Club. (c) Copyright 2009

 

 

 

Modeling the sexy new Black Diamond Crew Shirts, sponsored by RadonicRodgers.com

 

 

 

Your confident Skipper Ed. ; )

 

 

(c) Copyright 2009 - Fort Lauderdale Yacht Club flag pole, with the State of Charleston Flag on the lower right. I love that flag, something about it is very attractive. The Club burgee is flown at the top.

Black Diamond FTL to Charleston Crew pictured just before the awards ceremony..

We were 10 mins on PHRF short of a 3rd place trophy. Pity for us.

Jacksonville to St. Augustines, Florida

Dec. 3rd, 2008

Florida is experiencing a bit of a cold spell this week. We actually had to turn the heat on in the boat last night! We can’t complain too much considering that we left much colder temperatures in Canada.

In Jacksonville we were at a marina located on the Intracoastal Waterway. We had two options either head south on the ICW to St. Augustine or head a bit north to the St. John’s river out to the Atlantic, then head south.

 

Calm seas on the Atlantic.

 

We looked at the charts and determined that it was more complicated to go down the ICW. During low tide there were areas of the ICW that would be too shallow for the draft of our boat. During high tide we would have to watch our mast height in relation to the tide and the height of the many 65’ bridges. The forecast for the ocean was calm with 1’ – 2’ seas. We determined that going coastal would be less stressful. On our way out the St. John’s river we just barely cleared two bridges with only about one foot to spare.

 

The kids named this dolphin Flap Jax (short for Jacksonville).

 

The kids were excited to be moving on the water again, so they were both standing on the bow when six dolphins swam approximately twenty feet in front of our boat. The kids were thrilled as they whistled, squealed and banged the hull to attract more dolphins. To our surprised we were surrounded by dolphins all the way to the ocean. Once on open water we did not see them anymore.  Heading down the coast we had to watch out for the many fishing boats in the area. After watching a pretty sunset, and after a couple games of crazy eights with the kids, we headed in towards the Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine.

We called ahead so the bridge master was expecting us, and the draw bridge was raised for us to pass  through. Once in St. Augustine we went to a nearby seafood restaurant and enjoyed a nice dinner. This is a beautiful town, the oldest city in the US, with an authentic Old World look, completely lit up with lights. During dinner we had a view of horse drawn carriages taking people for rides. Alexander was sleepy during dinner, but he completely perked up when the horses went by. In the morning we headed out to town, had breakfast in a nice bakery with free Wi-Fi and uploaded our blog. Today we plan to head further south. 

 

Lift Bridge in St. Augustine

 

In Florida boaters love to decorate their boats for Christmas.

 

Christmas Decorations in St. Augustine.

A St. Augustine fort.

Arriving in Jacksonville, Florida

 

We left the house this morning at 3:30AM, and arrived without problems to the boat by noon. We are just getting organized, and resting up. Tomorrow we plan to do some grocery shopping, and possibly head out. Our next stop is St. Augustine, Florida.

 

Just as we arrived, before boarding with all our luggage.

Below is a picture of our head sail furler. You can see that a bolt is missing. This was shaken off in the tropical depression we went through on our way down. This is not life threatening, it does not hold up the mast, but it does hold the furler together. Surprisingly we sailed for hours like this in the tail end of the storm. I took this picture to send to the manufacturer. We are ordering a replacement bolt before crossing the gulf stream to the Bahamas.

 

Bolt went missing in the storm we sailed through.