We should have thought this one out before leaving Miami and heading up the ICW. It was Saturday, it was still Spring Break in south Florida. We had no idea we were going to have to dodge thousands of boats, large yachts, small center consoles, large fishing boats, even racing catamarans in the middle of the channel. I was amazed and a bit stressed. Ed was fine, calm at the wheel but had to stay on extreme guard for the whole day, boats were roaring past us at such close proximity it seemed like we were invisible to them, and we probably were.
There were 10-12 racing catamarans zipping back and forth between the markers, but cool to watch
One small span under the bridge with boats zipping through from both ways
A blow-up of the picture will show hundreds of boats along a sandbar. This went on and on until well past Ft. Lauderdale
A lovely condo, complete with palm trees on the top floor
Miami bustling with spring breakers, even early in the morning
How many babes can you fit on a bow of a boat?
Brickell Point, downtown Miami
Even the REALLY large yachts do the sandbars
Another shot of the boats at the sandbar
The next challenge to overcome was the Julia Tuttle fixed bridge. As noted once before it is always a challenge for us. The height of the bridge is right at the height of our mast. We managed to approach the bridge at mid to low tide this time, and alas, we had a few inches to spare! Whew! We got under once again.
Haulover Inlet Lighthouse
We got a tip from fellow cruisers about Maule Lake, just north of Haulover Inlet, Maule Lake. What a great spot that was! We followed the rather narrow channel between condominiums and the water opened up to a large lake with Condominiums all around it, except for a small area of woods. A storm was brewing and we were tired, so we were happy to find this spot with lots of deep enough water to anchor. We set the anchor, had dinner and watched a pretty sunset through the tall condos. We set the anchor drag alarm and turned in early.
As par for the course, at 2:00 am the wind picked up drastically, so quickly that the boat rocked hard. The wind changed direction and the drag alarm went off, telling Ed to go topside and check things out. It was raining and blowing hard. Ed watched the storm for a few minutes, as he always does, when he heard a roar in the distance. It sounded like a train and immediately started thinking tornado. He was about to wake me when he heard a train horn. OH YEAH! We were no longer in the keys and it really was a freight train, not a tornado!! We were apparently closer to shore than we thought. The storm passed over without further incident.
The following morning we went dinghy exploring. The small area of wooded land was part of the Oleta State Park, which we had explored previously when anchoring by the FIU campus. We spent most of the morning in the dinghy, snapping photos of birds and wildlife and exploring the mangrove shoreline.
Look close, Iguana!
A look at the narrow channel as we left the anchorage
Maule Lake proved to be a great stop, we relaxed and were ready to move on. Breath in, breath out and move on to manage the bridges!
