We were looking for something to do today and thought a beach day would be in order. As we looked at opportunities we found that the Banana River just south of Cape Canaveral would be a good anchor spot as it would be near the manatee centre, a ramp to leave the dingy to head to the beach and also a decent depth. The river seems to have several very shallow spots so we called our marina for local knowledge. He stated there would be a launch of a rocket at Cape Canaveral. We know have our mission for the day.
We head out from Sebastian on a northward path. It’s an easy pass the entire distance. We see those dolphins today but none of them want to play. Several Loopers are heading north as we pass them. The more humble homes of the catch our attention. There are lots of causeways heading to the Oceanside. We pass Vero Beach and Melbourne. The only way we know we are passing these cities is by the causeways and our charts. There are no high hotels and condos. We did put in the video from the day that they were jumping in our wake. Please ignore my dog training response squeals for the performance by our dolphins.
We make our way to the Cape Canaveral Barge Canal and head east. There are anchor spots at the north and south part of the entrance to the Lock. The Canal itself has 2 marinas available where the locals go for hurricane holes for their boats. It is a natural setting with a no wake zone the entire canal. Several fisherman are here in the canal as well as boats getting ready to go through the lock and head out to the Atlantic Ocean.
As we exit the canal the area opens up to a large area. We see several day boats beached on an island to the north of the lock and several sailboats and trawlers to the south of the lock. We head to the northern side where the island is. At Ski Island we take the dingy in to this tiny 200 foot island. It’s crowded on a Saturday. The island effect is quickly over as more and more people show up. We hop back in “Low Voltage” and head over to the next island and through the bay where there are 3 cruise ships waiting to disembark.
Now we wait for the launch. It’s a Falcon 9 capsule on a Delta 4 rocket. It is a military communication system satellite that is being launched. Apparently it is more powerful for the military comm than all of the combined systems available now. There are 6 countries involved including Canada, The Netherlands, USA, Luxemborg, and a couple more. The window for launch is from 7:44 to 8:59. It’s now 8:02 as there is an issue with a swing arms. So we wait…….8:08…….T minus 4 minutes.
We had lift off at 8:18. Awesome!!! Spectacular! Tick off another item on the bucket list!