At noon on Wednesday, we concluded our maintenance work with the installation of the Clarion amplifier and proceeded north on the ICW to Jupiter.
The 13.4 mile two hour run up the ICW was, as usual, slow, uneventful and scenic with many very exquisite homes. One was particularly interesting as it had our boat, a 48 Sundancer parked in front on a lift.
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| 48 Sundancer on a lift in a high rent district |
Another interesting landmark was the beautiful Jupiter Light House along the Jupiter Inlet.
Our destination was the JIB Yacht Club and Marina on the ICW just north of the Jupiter Inlet; at least that was how it was identified in the cruising guide. Turns out it was not a yacht club. It was just a small marina associated with a condominium development. The only amenity was a small swimming pool. They assigned us to the face dock as shown in the photo below. Strangely, our satellite TV and air card reception were blocked by the condo building just to the east.
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| Guided Discovery at the JIB Club and Marina |
The connectivity problem and remote location prompted us to move to Stuart, a destination that had been on our short list. We departed JIB Club and Marina (it's real name) at 1:00 PM and headed north along the ICW. This 3 hour run, which covered 24 miles was made at low tide. This turned out to be a plus as most of the sandy shoals are clearly visible. Again, the real estate was high priced.
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| Folks walking on a sand bar along the ICW |
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| We think the bow of this 100 foot yacht is sitting on land |
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| And they are still building high priced properties |
We arrived at the Harborage Yacht Club and Marina around 4:00 PM. Our first activity was signing a lease so that we could stay here until April 6 at a monthly rate ($800) that will average out at $40 per day; the lowest cost dockage thus far.
On top of this we are at a first class facility with two restaurants, a pool room with a good table, a workout room and a lovely swimming pool. This is a real yacht club.
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| The pool room |
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| Intimate restaurant |
Our second activity was finding a home for Kodi while we are in Chicago. This was solved fortuitously as we were walking down the dock. A gentlemen overheard our conversation, introduced himself as a local school headmaster and gave us the name of the school's librarian Monica who with her sister, Wilma, host dogs in their home ONE AT a TIME. PERFECT!!! We made contact with Wilma and she and Kodi hit it off.
Harborage is located on the St Lucie river, which is the north east entrance to the Okeechobee Waterway (the shortcut to Fort Myers on the Gulf). The historic downtown area is located to the south across the river. On the evening of our arrival we walked a mile and a half across the Roosevelt Bridge with Kodi and explored the downtown area. Stuart's historic downtown is magical with no franchised shops, lots of restaurants, a river walk and an active Lyric Opera.
The downtown is also accessible by water as the city maintains a first class courtesy dock, the best we've seen thus far. The signs say you can dock for four hours but I suspect this is not enforced.
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| Stuart's courtesy dock |
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| River walk |
Since our arrival four days ago we have ventured downtown three times; twice with the dingy. Our Sunday excursion included the ArtsFest, which turned out to be over a 1/2 mile long and first class.
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| Stuart ArtFest |
At the entrance to the marina we discovered the unique 52 foot multihulled express cruiser below. There was no manufacturer's name on the hull. On Tuesday, I noticed a person on the boat and stopped to ask a few questions. It turn out he was a design engineer with a Naval Architect firm (Ocean5) who was onboard to assess the logisics of adding 10 more feet to the boat. He explained that the boat is a custom design built by Meilhan, a company with headquarter in Elmhurst, IL. The yacht is named
Gemini II. Its a powercat (two hulls) with a top speed of 50 MPH and a HOT TUB in its cockpit. Check it out with this link to a
virtual tour. This is a unique boat.
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| Meilhan Gemini II powercat custom yacht |
Diana will by departing on the 24th for Chicago. Kodi and I will host my daughter Lesley and her boyfriend, Scott, over the weekend. I will depart for Chicago on the 31st for a whirlwind set of visits with friends and the wedding of Tom Scott's daughter Ann on Saturday. Kodi will stay with Wilma and Monica until our return on April 5.
Life is good in Stuart.
Written by Les.
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