North Star on the Great Loop Journey: Stuart Florida

Preparing for the trip

Captain Jerry has been making the final preparations to North Star, our 32 foot Cape Island down east trawler. We are anxious to leave our landlubber lives behind and begin our long awaited journey around the Great Circle. Join us as we travel 10, 000 kilometers: through the historic Trent Severn Waterway; the pristine waters of Georgian Bay; the North Channel of lake Huron; and hop from beach to beach on lake Michigan. We will visit Chicago and begin our trek along the rivers: Illinois; upper Mississippi; Ohio; Cumberland: Tennessee; Tenn-Tom Waterway and the Black Warrior. We will have transited through 68 locks at this juncture. We have chosen the inner route from Mobile Alabama to Tarpon Springs Florida and the shorter Ocheechobee Waterway to reach the East coast of Florida. We will skip over to the Bahamas to wait out the winter before heading North on the Atlantic Inter Coastal Waterway.
The 10 years of researching and planning are finally at an end and we invite you to come along on our adventure.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Stuart Florida

We travelled 55 miles today which was the longest day since crossing the Gulf in November. The bridge tender at Torry island informed us that we had plenty of clearance so we only had to have the Port Mayaca lock opened and we drove straight through without a lift. The St. Lucie lock was open and waiting for us so it was an easy day. The lake was nice and calm. They were burning sugar cane today so lots of smoke and ash flying in the air.
We are tied up to a free dock at Sheppard Park on Fraser Creek in Stuart. They say only a 4 hour stop is allowed but we are told they do not enforce it. We are planning to stay overnight. I need to get a few things at Publix and we need to top up our water.
We will soon go off to explore the city by bicycle so more on Stuart tomorrow.