We are relieved the tropical storm effects were fairly minor in our protected marina in Vero Beach, although amazed this was “only” a tropical storm passing over 300 miles away.  We were under a Tropical Storm Warning with 2 days of winds reaching 30 knots with gusts over 50.  Although the storm has now passed to the west end of Cuba, there are still significant winds, rain & squalls continuing all week.  While up to 5″ of rain was forecast, we only received an inch with another inch possible.  Further south towards Miami it was much worse with up to 14″ of rain resulting in major flooding.

Although the entire marina is well protected, we temporarily moved from our T-head slip to this regular slip in which we could completely cross-tie ourselves off the dock preventing our fenders from even touching.  Our only storm effect was a slight swell from the rough Indian River coming in thru the narrow marina entrance.

Eta will next head north into the Gulf of Mexico, hopefully weakening & dissipating.  That would be nice as at one point, the NHC thought it would likely strengthen into a  Cat 1 hurricane in the warm Gulf waters, curve in to hit the Tampa area, then heading inland towards us.  No thanks – once in enough!

I jinxed things by recently commenting that this was to be the first year out of 9 cruising years we didn’t have to detour, hide-out or change our plans due to a tropical storm or hurricane!  So now our record is intact 😦

We eagerly anticipated our November 1st departure as a nasty cold front complete with gale storm warnings was due that evening.  We had just enough time to arrive at our marina near St. Augustine for the stormy weather.  Wait … our insurance policy doesn’t allow us to cross into Florida until after 12:00 noon on the 1st!  Back to the insurance underwriters – of course they’ll let us leave 4 hours early (in sunny & calm weather) to arrive at a safer location??  Nope!  So that left us stuck up the creek for another 1 1/2 days of high winds.  Our anchor drag app shows our twirling path over our 1 1/2 weeks anchored in the Brickhill River as the strong wind & current fought each other.

Our Roseate spoonbills waving goodby!

Passing by the Kings Bay Sub Base in Georgia. That guy in the patrol boat isn’t fooling around – his hands are poised on that big gun.  A lot has changed since the 60’s when as a kid, we used to be able to boat right up to the subs at the Groton Sub Base in CT.  During the Vietnam war, protesters would sneak aboard the subs at night pouring animal blood on & paint anti-war messages on the conning towers.

Paper mills are frequent sights in the south. Almost picturesque from a distance, but noisy & stinky to dock near – think millions of burnt pizza boxes – but worse!

Our first rocket launch viewed while anchored 25 miles away in Melbourne. Was MUCH more impressive in person!

Yeah!!  Finally made it to St. Augustine on November 3rd!  Time to relax & enjoy St. Augustine for a few days.  Nope!  Remnants of Hurricane Eta coming our way?!?  Better hurry up & zoom to our protected marina in Vero Beach.  We were booked beginning on the 15th anyway with doctor & dentist appointments scheduled.  So 4 days enjoying St. Augustine was replaced by a single afternoon rushed $275.00 grocery store trip (it’s been weeks!).  Early spaghetti models showed everywhere in Florida was in the possible path of Eta.  While not arriving as a hurricane, an enormous area of moderate winds & many, many days of rain predicted.  We’ll be relieved to be at our protected marina in Vero Beach & think will just hide out until 2020 is over!