Scott made his way from Nashville to get the boat ready and put back in the water for when Aiden and I would fly in. He had a great flight and landed in West Palm Beach Airport where he rented a car for a couple days. Conductance is scheduled for a splash the day after Scott arrived. She’s dirty and a bit dusty after being on the hard for a couple months. Until then Scott must spend the night with no power, water or amenities and it’s hot. Not a breeze.
During the day Scott heard news that the railroad bridge just east of the marina had a maintenance issue. They closed the swing bridge blocking boat traffic for those higher than a few feet. Boats were backed up and anchored on the waterway until Saturday morning. The marina became full.
Aiden and I would be landing a day later coming in on Friday. Unfortunately there was a large storm over NYC where our plan was coming from which delayed us for over 2 hours. Scott drove from the marina to Orlando, a 2 hour drive, to meet us after dark. Scott was able to catch up on some maintenance, laundry and make some new friends. There are a lot of Canadians in this marina. We eventually arrived back at the boat and settled in for the night around 1:00 AM.
Today, Saturday, we heard that the bridge was opening occasionally and then closing at 6:00 pm for the night. A work crew is out there trying to get her working but opening manually throughout the day on a scheduled basis. We were doing groceries, washing the boat, cleaning up and trying to get everything put away and missed the openings. We decided to stay at the marina 1 more night. That led to coconut hunting, husking and eating fresh coconuts.
Now that the night has fallen the sun has a warm glow on the horizon above the tree line. We are lucky to have resident alligators, flying fish and the boys saw an armadillo. The boys had made their way to the Okeechobee waterway and flew Aiden’s plane. He’s been excited to fly again and the regular boats had stopped coming now that the bridge is closed for the night.
We have 12 hours of sunlight now. It’s daylight savings time with the clocks going forward tonight which gives us an hour less of sun in the morning to leave early. Sunrise is 7:30 AM.
Tomorrow we are anchoring however the forecast is for thunderstorms and rain. A cold front is starting its way through. We’ll see how long it lasts.
