8 hours travel time
3 locks (14' drop)
After arriving in the dark last night at the Roland Martin Marina in Clewiston, we strove for a much earlier departure this morning. We were only moderately successful. We had a departure process on Sea Moss and well knew each step to be done prior to leaving port. Since it is all new on Sunset Delight, Clark has a written checklist for startup procedures. It takes time working through the list, which consists of more steps than we had with Sea Moss.
We needed to make an about face when leaving this morning as the boat was facing the wrong direction by 180 degrees. While pushing ourselves away from the dock at the marina this morning to make that turn, Clark engaged the stern thruster, or should I say attempted to engage the stern thruster. It failed to operate. No biggy! We pulled away from the dock without the power assist. Just another item to add to our "it's broke" list, or so I thought.
Shortly after entering the canal, however, our navigation system went haywire and kept rebooting itself. With upper and lower helm displays, we actually have three integrated screens that took turns rebooting over and over and over again. We lost about a half hour chasing that one. Finally, Clark and I came to the same solution together - hard reset. He told me to flip the circuit breaker to off, count to ten, and turn it back on. That solved the problem. Although as yet unproven, Clark believes that the failure of the stern thruster caused a power dip which screwed up the Nav system intelligence!
After we got that settled, we went on our merry way towards our first lock of the day - Moore Haven Lock with a 3-foot drop. In comparison, yesterday's only lock we worked (St. Lucie) had a 14-foot lift. Unlike yesterday's two-hour experience at the lock, this lock displayed a green light when we approached and we sailed right on in! With a 3-foot drop, we sailed out the other side in record time. The day was definitely looking better!
Then it happened! That starboard engine that failed for no apparent reason failed again, i.e. it shut down completely. With a twin engine boat, the two engines work together to keep the boat going straight or to make turns. When one engine shuts down unexpectedly, the boat suddenly turns direction pushed by the working engine, so the first step in this situation is to get the boat heading the right way.
Since the engine failed in a narrow canal, Clark had to correct our misdirection caused by the lost engine in a hurry. Then he threw both engines into neutral to go address the problem. Given yesterday's experience, he knew to try restarting the engine as the first step. He did; it started; it failed again (two more times). During the third stall, he was already on the phone with the broker asking for suggestions on how to troubleshoot this worrisome issue.
My first suggestion when the engine stalled yesterday was the fuel situation - did we run out of fuel to that engine? did we have a bad fuel filter? Clark said no to the first and went to check the latter. He came back saying that the Raycor's indicated no problem on the filter status. Okay, so not the fuel. I was out of ideas.
Today, when he talked to the broker, the broker also suggested the fuel filter, so Clark went to check it again. This time he came back with the comment that he thought the Raycor gauge on that engine was not functioning. Based on further input from the broker, he switched to the backup fuel filter, and we are hoping, since it did not stall for the rest of the trip, that the fuel filter was the culprit. "Will we make it to Fort Myers today?" I wondered. Add two more items to list - fix gauge and replace fuel filter!
With the starboard engine finally running without stalling, we continued on our way. As we traveled through the marshes, I noticed that egrets stood at the edge of the canal every few feet usually just five or six feet apart from each other and sometimes interspersed with bushes filled with cormorants or other birds I cannot name.
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| Egret fishing the canal |
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| Birds gathered along the canal |
Besides lots of birds, we saw two alligators swimming in the canal. They each looked like logs floating in the water, but they were definitely alligators since last I checked logs do not change direction at will or swim. The first one we saw swam near shore. I managed to capture a picture albeit not a very good one.
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| That is an alligator in the water. I swear it! |
As the boat got closer to the alligator, the gator quickly decided he did not really want to visit the far side of the canal after all and turned back the way he came. As we got closer still, he decided we were too much of a threat and dove underwater, or as Clark said "he went submarine". Of course this occurred before Clark could get a picture of him.
I wonder if alligators are no threat to cows since we saw more of them today idly standing at the edge of the canal as if they had no worries in the world.
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| There is a cow in that bush. I swear it! |
After having exhausted the supply of Florida's wildlife along the canal, we got to play another game - "judge the bridge clearance". Before leaving Fort Pierce, we measured Sunset Delight, as best we could, to calculate the distance from the waterline to the topmost item on the boat. We came up with just under 22' in height. Based on that, we should fit under anything with a vertical clearance of 23' or more.
When we approached our first questionable bridge today, we could see (using our binoculars) that the ruler on the side of the bridge showed a center-span clearance of 24'. We asked ourselves two questions - 1) did we measure correctly? and 2) is the ruler accurate? We approached the bridge slowly with me standing as far back on the flybridge as possible, jumping up and down to get a visual comparison, and trying to guess if we would hit or not. With an unspoken agreement, Clark planned to keep going unless I yelled stop.
As we passed under the bridge, Clark said, "I assume we are okay", and I gurgled an answer of "uh-huh" as I saw how very close the top of our tallest point came to the bottom of the bridge. I concluded that we had about 6" to spare. So, instead of needing 22', we need 23.5'? Whoops!
We got to play the same game a second time. This time the ruler on the side of the bridge showed the vertical clearance to be 23' at the edge with an additional 3' in the center. Okay, so 26' for us then on this one. Looking up as we passed under the bridge, I could see we definitely had more space than the first one, but certainly no more than 2.5' -- perhaps even less than that. Looks like a 23.5' clearance requirement may be our minimum - better make that 24' so we don't scrape as we go under. In comparison, Sea Moss had a minimum requirement of 16'. Looks like we will be waiting for a lot more bridges to open.
Although we have not yet seen one, we have passed through a large number of Manatee Zones on our journey from the east coast to the west coast of Florida. Slow speed, no wake manatee zones are more plentiful from November 1st to March 31st. As we passed a construction zone today, we saw the signage there said "All project vessels must shut down when within 50 feet of a manatee." I must say that impressed me!
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| Project Vessels at construction site must shut down within 50 feet of a manatee. |
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| Construction Zone on the Canal |
Today's trip included two more locks - the Ortona Lock (8' drop) and the W.P. Franklin Lock (1.5' drop). We got very lucky with locks today as each one we approached was open and ready for us - no waiting. With relatively short drops, we completed each lock rather quickly.
Even with the luck at the locks, we arrived a few miles outside Fort Myers slightly before 4:00 with the sun low in the sky. Just before sunset is the worst time to travel west which is what we were doing. Clark put on two pairs of sunglasses to reduce the glare while I pulled the brim of my hat down over my eyes.
Shortly before we got to Fort Myers, and while trying to see past the sun glare, we came to a multi-mile "slow speed, minimum wake manatee zone". We could see Fort Myers in the distance and wondered just how long at minimum speed it would take to arrive there - ah, so close, but yet so far from our destination!
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| Sun glare with Fort Myers in the background. |
Following a police boat, we watched the speed limit signs carefully. They became silhouettes in the sun glare and basically impossible to read from any distance whatsoever. Suddenly, after miles of excruciating slowness, the police boat took off like a bat out of hell. As expected, when we reached the sign where he sped up, we read "Speed Limit 25 mph". Hooray! Finally! We do not travel at 25 mph, but we could at least accelerate to our desired 11 mph! Through it all we did not see one manatee.
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| Almost there ... Just 3 more bridges between us and Legacy Harbour in Fort Myers, FL |
We finally docked just before 5:30 after over eight hours en route. I guess Clark was worried about dinner because as soon as he saw Joe's Crab House, he said, "I don't want to eat out." Confused, I asked what he was talking about, and he explained that he thought I would want to eat out again since it was another long day. The thought had not even crossed my mind. I cooked dinner on board while Clark went in search of boat manuals.
The list of issues with our "new" boat has become almost overwhelming. Clark can handle lots of problems one at a time, but he is struggling with the avalanche we are experiencing. Our first goal is to prioritize the punch list. Things we thought were top of the list have fallen down several notches in priority as we discover new, more serious issues. Once again tonight he has surrounded himself with, and is pouring over, a mountain of user manuals for the boat systems. As I type this blog entry, I can hear him in the GSR (guest state room) rummaging through the manuals and see him going back and forth through the boat as he works on the various problems.
"Are we having fun yet?" Well, we're trying! Tomorrow starts the AGLCA Looper Rendezvous that brought us to Fort Myers this week. We are hoping to see some folks we met along the way on our Great Loop Adventure!
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