routine

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Bridges over the ICW

Single Bascule bridge- very roomy

Today, we began planning our trip to Miami from Velcro, I mean Vero Beach. We have easily fallen into the habit of saying “Velcro”. Rolls off the tongue so smoothly.  Our raft buddy. POLAR PACER, left today as did our mooring neighbor,  SANUK. I think the wind kicked up more than expected for them.

As I looked ahead in our ICW guide, I couldn’t help but cringe at the plethora ( yep, my word of the month) of restricted bridges and thought now was as good a time as any to describe these structures and their role in our trip.

The 1,095 miles of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway (ICW for short) contain 137 bridges of which 81 need to open for sailboats (and many powers too). In the last 130 mile stretch there’s 41 opening bridges of which 22 are restricted.

The styles of bridges are varied: swing, bascule (hinged and raises open from the hinge), fixed (non opening) – 99% have 65′ clearance at high tide, lift (railroad only) or pontoon. We’ve only encountered two lift bridges, both just south of Norfolk. They function as the name implies, they lift up parallel to the ground attached to metal tower-like structures on each side of the waterway. Massive describes them well.  The ICW contained one pontoon bridge which we show above. Two weeks after we went through, it was taken out of service having been replaced with a fixed bridge. The ICW also has one automatic single-bascule railroad bridge at Mile 876 (Titusville (NASA)) which we passed through on our way here. It’s usually open, but when a train in due, the green lights will change to flashing red and a horn continuously sounds four blasts for eight minutes. At that point the bridge will close as long as the scanning equipment shows nothing under the bridge.

If a bridge is of the opening variety, then life becomes more interesting and boredom can be greatly reduced.  The flavors are: restricted, on-demand or a mixture of the two. The flavors can alternate between weekends and weekdays.  If a bridge is always restricted to a set schedule you simply have to adjust your speed and take into account the myriad of factors that can influence your speed and ability to make the desired opening time. A common schedule we encountered prior to Florida was “Open on the hour and half hour”, but there were bridges that only opened on the hour. When you have several of these types in a 15 mile span, the calculator and chartplotter are your friends. Florida has a plethora of bridges, but we were recently on a joy run of no opening bridges for 79 miles!
On-demand bridges provide an opportunity to talk, however briefly, with someone new. If you want to communicate with a bridge tender, you call him or her on the appropriate channel using the VHF marine radio. Most states use Channel 13, but some like Florida use Channel 9. Channel designation is regulated by the Coast Guard. Channel 16 is the “monitoring” channel and the one used for distress calls.
A typical bridge hailing would go something like this: (first be sure you are on the correct channel) “Wappoo Creek bridge this is the southbound sailing cat requesting an opening.” With any luck you have another boat or two behind you. The bridge will acknowledge your call and indicate that they will open when all boats are close enough. For some reason that we have yet to figure out, bridgetenders will often ask for the boat name AND where from. This occurs when several boats are making the passage. Once you are clear, most vessels will thank the bridge tender for the opening and say they have cleared the bridge.
Most bridge tenders are friendly and courteous.  One clearly enjoyed her job and she was a hoot! A real southern accent and she was talking to each boat like we were best friends.  “Keep it coming darlin’, watch that crab pot in front of ya. That’s it. Y’all have a good day now.”
The trick to ensuring a prompt response to your call is to use the correct name of the bridge, be polite yet confident and provide the necessary info clearly. If you see a boat a short distance in front of or behind you, indicating that you will slow down or speed up for the opening is always an appreciated gesture.
We can’t wait to do the bridge dance again, real soon.

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A Typical Cruising Day

Dinette table in cruising mode

Welcome to a sneak peek into the cockpit, command central aboard Ortolan.  This shot shows the dinette fulfilling its daytime role as nav station. We have roughly two different types of traveling days; one is when we are in the ICW traveling through the dredged channel in rivers, sounds, bays and man -made land cuts and the second is non-ICW travel which was the 622 miles before reaching ICW Mile 0  at Norfolk, VA and any day we “go outside”.

The primary difference is that with non-ICW days we use the laptop as a backup chartplotter to the one installed at the helm. If the main chartplotter were to misbehave, we would have the laptop already running.  I generally keep an eye on it and make sure it jives with the main.  The ICW is well marked and getting the laptop up and running wouldn’t need to happen in a blink.

A typical ICW day flows something like this:
Breakfast before departing (most nights we are at anchor) around 8 – 8:30am. Until recently we had to run the heat to warm up but the Florida mornings are warm, a balmy 50 so far. Russ is at the bow using the electric anchor winch to raise the anchor as I man the helm and move the boat in the proper directions based on hand signals. No shouting allowed so we have devised our own signals when we can’t hear the other person easily. No, we don’t use THAT one.  The anchor rinsed and secured, moving ahead slowly, we head off.

I am in charge of the log book and will make the “start of the day” entries as soon as we are underway. Then it’s on to washing the dishes, being careful to conserve water.  We carry 136 gallons of water, 2 tanks in each hull but getting water only occurs at marinas- either when you fuel up or spend the night. We don’t do much of either.

Our typically cruising speed, when not greatly affected by currents is 7 knots (8.06 mph). When adversely affected by current or tides, which in Florida’s ICW change frequently with all the inlets, our speed drops dramatically.

Electronics are great, but nothing beats paper for lack of susceptibility to malfunctioning. Therefore no sailor worth his salt will be without paper charts. For the ICW we use a great flip style one that shows pretty much only the ICW, marks every five miles and contains notes along the side about bridges that need to open for boats and the schedule, if any. Bridges- well that’s another blog entry by itself. We also have another booklet that lists, mile by mile: good anchorages with comments, marinas, bridges with opening notes if they are ones that open, inlet info, and other helpful notes about transiting the ICW. I follow along with the two booklets while Russ runs the boat. I take over from time to time.

Lunch is eaten underway and we take turns so that one person is always at the helm. The auto-pilot is often keeping the boat on course but in ICW close quarters, taking one’s eye off the road for too long can lead to running aground or into something.  Ok, I exaggerate a bit, but some sections of the waterway are very narrow, with barely room for two boats to pass. Most of it is not like that but keeping in the channel is important.
Most days we arrive at our destination by 5pm. Dropping the anchor is generally successful on the first try. Ours is oversized; dragging is near the top of the “never want to do” list.

I finish up the log, having made notes about our day, what we saw, who we met and other things we want to remember. We also record mileage, engine hours, fuel consumption and where we end up each night, both by name and the latitude and longitude.