We left the North Palm Beach Marina and traveled less
than a mile to anchor for a few days in a nice quiet spot off of the ICW. After being in the Bahamas for a month, we
needed to catch up on paperwork and a few maintenance tasks.
As we continued north, we passed the Jupiter Inlet Light,
first lit in 1860. The tower is 105 feet
above the water and can be seen for 25 nautical miles.
We passed through the St Lucie lock at Stuart and stopped
at the River Forest Yacht Center along the Okeechobee Waterway. We left the boat there for a little over a
week while we drove to Cocoa to visit family and friends, then flew to Indianapolis
for a follow up doctor appointment (which resulted in a clean bill of healthJ).
The weather was kind to us as we continued west crossing
Lake Okeechobee, the largest freshwater lake in the state of Florida, and the
seventh largest freshwater lake in the United States. Its maximum length is 36 miles long and 29
miles wide with a surface area of 734 square miles. This is a huge body of water, with an average
depth of less than 9 feet and a maximum depth of 12 feet. A windy day can make this crossing very uncomfortable. There are two marked navigational channels to
follow, one cutting across a portion of the lake, and another channel, known as
the Rim Route gives some protection from the open water. When traveling east in January, we took the
lake route and planned to take the Rim Route on the way back. An emergency repair to a bridge on the Rim
Route was not going to be completed until March 31st so we took the
lake route coming back.
After crossing the lake we stopped at Clewiston Florida,
the location of Roland Martins Marina. Roland Martin is a professional sport
fisherman and is the host of “Fishing with Roland Martin” on the NBCSN
television channel. Roland Martin was
the first professional bass fisherman to be inducted into all three Halls of
Fame (IGFE Hall of Fame, Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame, and the Professional
Bass Fishing Hall of Fame).
To enter the marina, we had to pass through the Clewiston
Lock; the lock is normally open unless the lake level rises to a point that
could cause flooding. The marina is mainly
designed to accommodate fishing boats, but a long dock, along a narrow canal is
provided for larger boats.
The only problem with the long dock is we have to back
out from the dock and pass between the rock shoreline and other boats tied to
the dock. Backing up a narrow channel is
not my favorite mode of operation……but we made it without any issues.
We continued on the waterway then passed through two locks
on our way to La Belle, Florida.
The La Belle City dock provides boat slips, power, and
water without a fee. This is a good stop
to provision and to visit local restaurants.
It’s also a good place to hang out for the weekend to avoid weekend boat
traffic on the waterway.
We left La Belle and stopped about 9 miles from Ft Myers
to visit our friends David and Barbara Dolye from “Miss My Money”. They have a house along the
waterway with a dock, so we stopped for a great visit and spent the night at their
dock. The next morning we continued on
to Ft Myers a calm sunny day without a cloud in the sky. The smell of grapefruit was in the air as we
passed a few groves along the waterway.
We approached a railroad bridge located a few miles from
Ft Myers and after passing through, noticed what we thought was fog, but
instead was smoke. This area of Florida
has been very dry and several fires have plagued this area over the last few
months. We’re not sure if this was a
control burn or not, but it defiantly engulfed the city and waterway.
We reached the city marina just after the smoke cleared,
and met our friends Merrill and Jan from Terre Haute, for lunch. We had a great visit, and topped the
afternoon off with ice cream at “Scoops on First”. Our plan was to leave Ft Myers early the next
morning and head to our favorite anchorage at Punta Blanca Island, but when we
woke up, we were surrounded by fog.
After a couple of hours or so, the fog lifted and we were
on our way. We arrived at Punta Blanca
Island with our fingers crossed that no other boats would be anchored
here. Luckily we have the whole place to
ourselves. This is a small anchorage,
room for two or three boats; we anchored here in January and saw a huge
crocodile, a sea otter, Manatee’s, and Dolphins.
