048: New Friends and Old Music

We left Titusville on February 15^th, and headed to New Smyrna Beach “NSM”.   I’ve been neglectful in noting how the scenery really changed north of Vero Beach.   The ICW is within the Indian River through here and there are many state parks and national seashore areas.    It was nice to get away from the mega-million houses with docks right next to other mega-million houses with docks.   We lost count of all the dolphin sightings, but the little buggers continued to prove elusive to our photography; it is as if they knew when we brought out the Iphone to take a picture and they were camera shy.

This is as good a time as ever to continue my rant over Florida boaters.  I won’t even mention the constant stream of large boats “waking us” as they passed by.   One bow-runner runabout passed by us so close that we could almost touch them, and just as passed us, the “captain” swerved in front of us.  To avoid a collision, I had to throw Hygge in full reverse.    At New Smyrna not only was someone fishing in the channel, but they were also anchored in it as well.  And to add insult to boating-injury they were anchored basically under a bridge!   Very dangerous for all concerned.   Matt said something to them, but I was too astounded andhad a rare, for me, a bout of speechlessness.

There were quite a few boats anchored around NSM, so after Hygge found a good spot, we encouraged KatMat to raft up to us.   We actually had “the hook” down but we were concerned that we might swing into the shallower area, so we moved Hygge and reset the anchor before KatMat tied up.   KatMat put out an anchor as well just as a precaution, probably not necessary in retrospect.

NSM is pretty neat place.  We arrived the day of the monthly street fest with the usual arts and crafts booths, food carts, music, etc.    Nancy, Kathy and I went over to the beach and then I traded “escort” duties with Matt as I had to teach that night (I teach a healthcare finance course at UIC, via zoom).

 The beach:

Which you can drive upon:

Around town:

The next morning, we were pointing 180 degrees from the night before and we must have done a “360” as we discovered that our respective anchor lines had wrapped around each other.   Luckily Matt was up to the task of de-tangling them.

On the 16^th we headed up to the Fagler Beach/Palm City area where Kathy and Matt had friends (Larry and Debbie Bell) with a house and dock on the Mantanza/ICW who offered to let us both tie up to their dock for a few days.   They are friends Kathy and Matt from the Prowler Car Club and they could not have been more friendly and hospitable.  They offered up the use of their home as well, so laundry was done and bodies were showered.  

The picked the lot for their house because it is in a very natural area on the Mantanza River as you can tell from the pictures.   Nancy was very excited to see Pileated Woodpecker in their yard:

Hygge and "Chez Bell" viewed from the water:

KatMat and Hygge on the dock:

Larry and Debbie had gotten tickets to see Jefferson Starship at the Peabody Center in Daytona and there were many tickets still for sale, so we joined them.   The guitarist on the left is the only original member of JS, and he is 85 years old!    He told the story of meeting Janis Joplin at the University of Texas and telling her, “There is a great scene in San Francisco, you should come, you can crash on my couch.”   And the rest is history as the saying goes.  He also played with the Grateful Dead and was offered a spot in the band, but he had already committed to forming JS.  It was a short show, only seventy-five minutes, but they played all the big Jefferson Airplane and Starship hits.  Frankly, I’d have paid the money to hear him talk 1960’s and 70’s rock and roll stories for that amount of time.

 The band:

The Ladies:

The Gentlemen:

The next day I had to catch up on work and lesson planning, so I opted to stay behind while KatMat took Larry, Debbie and Nancy on a “three-hour cruise.”   That night we all went to dinner at a local place:

Interspersed with music, cruises and dinner, Matt, Larry and I spent way too much time talking about cars.  Larry is one of the preeminent collectors of MOPAR muscle cars in the U.S. as well as some Corvettes, Prowlers, etc.

 https://www.motortrend.com/features/magnificent-mopar-machines/

The following day was Sunday, and with the Daytona 500 having been delayed a day, and not wanting to overstay our phenomenal welcome, we set off in the rain for St. Augustine.    

Bon Voyage:

We had a steady rain for the entire twenty-eight n/m trip and the best part was we didn’t encounter a single other boat the entire way!    We pulled into River’s Edge Marina in St. Augustine at approximately 3:00 p.m. with no need to rinse the salt spray off Hygge, Mother Nature having done the work for us.

 

Dave

 

Odometer:  2,442