Hygge Adventures: 046: Super Sunday and a Super Anchorage

We left Stuart on February 10^th, having to once again negotiate the two low bridges that are so close. The eastern bridge is a railroad bridge which are typically open most of the time, and lowered only for when the train comes by. The western bridge, which we came to first, was a more-typical street bridge. Nancy dutifully called the railroad bridge, and they assured her that they would be open “at the top of the hour” so we proceeded out. With the railroad bridge open, I called the street bridge to request an opening, which was promptly done. As we started to go under the street bridge, the railroad bridge’s lights went from green to red and they announced on the VHF radio that they were closing it. I momentarily thought about rushing through none-the-less, but cooler heads (Nancy’s) prevailed and I remembered that a red light does mean “stop.” Also, as I noted to the street bridge tender later, “I didn’t want us to be on a YouTube video.” (Plenty of YTV’s of boats hitting bridges as they close.)

The double low bridges:

Our destination was Vero Beach for two nights in their “rustic” marina. The Great Loop guidebook which I have mentioned in the past does not cover the Keys up through Ft. Pierce as it recommends cutting across the state through Lake Okeechobee, but now we were back on the guidebook path so to speak. Previously I noted that many of the “must see places” it recommended were not that great IMHO. Vero Beach was the reverse; the guidebook pretty much panned it as “nothing much to see,” but we really enjoyed VB.

The first night we walked over to the beach area for a good burger and ice cream. On Super Bowl Sunday Nancy and I had breakfast at a restaurant on the ICW and then walked over to a nice park and then over to the beach again. After the obligatory beach stroll, Nancy walked over to the VB Art Museum and the Mckee Botanical Gardens, while I went back to the boat to work on a few things.

Breakfast:

Beach:

Art Museum, Botanical Gardens and Veterans' Park:

Exhibit, not a person:

Later in the day we joined up with Kathy and Matt and walked over to the restaurant for dinner and the first half of the Super Bowl. For the second half we went back to our respective boats to take in the game, the commercials and the Taylor Swift sightings.

On the 12^th, we headed up to Melbourne and anchored just off the shore at what is known as “Eau Galle North” and had just a perfect anchorage. The winds were pretty strong from the west, but we were very protected and took the dinghy into town. Matt and I had some drinks at a waterfront bar while Nancy and Kathy scoped out the town. Later Matt and I joined them for dinner at a craft brewery. Nice little town.

The anchorage location: