Titusville - we visit the Merritt Island Mall

Florida likes to keep the dunes natural with lots of grass and plants - to help stabilize them

We rented a weekend car again for $40 (to be returned Monday) and went off to see the Merritt Island Mall, it's he biggest mall in the area. It also had a Barnes and Noble, the primary reason for the trip since Ann longed for a hard to get art magazine. The mall had nothing special that you don't see up north but it's big for this area.

So after the mall we paid another visit to the ocean which looked rather worked up, we're glad we're safely tucked in at Titusville. Heading north, we stopped at another citrus store and bought more of the freshly squeezed orange juice. It bears no resemblance to what you buy in a store, not even the ones advertised as "Not from Concentrate". The juice tastes totally different, much better. It also has not been pasteurized, just squeezed from their own grove oranges.

The locals sit and talk while the dogs interact, nice dog park

Ann took Hoolie over for his afternoon get together with the local dogs and he had a great time running all over the place. There's a local group of people that meet daily around 3:30 or so and Ann likes to be part of that. On Saturday we're headed to explore Orlando and a Brazilian restaurant, the kind that slice meat off a skewer, should be interesting.

Titusville - New battery and moonrise

Nice to see flowers in full bloom this time of the year

The marine store here is not Westmarine but it does have a few of the critical items needed by cruisers. They routinely accept mail for transients, a big help in going down the ICW. The small selection they have is like a subset that includes the most needed items. I was surprised to find that they carried Interstate Batteries. For those not familiar with marine batteries, Interstate is the gold standard of batteries in my experience. One thing to check on when buying batteries of any type is how much they weigh. What you want are the heaviest batteries you can find for the given output desired. The more lead in the battery, the better for long term life. You will find that Interstate Batteries are the heaviest around for a given rating. They also came out on top in Practical Sailor tests. So since they carried Interstate, I replaced the genset starter battery which was showing signs of aging (not an Interstate).

The rising full moon was stunning

On Friday we'll rent a car once again for the weekend at the $10/day rate and explore the area. Enterprise will come and pick you up and take you back when you return the car on Monday, great service. Ann needs to see a Barnes and Noble for art magazines and then she'll get a mall fix next door at the Merritt Island shopping center.

Once again another perfect day. This is the best stretch of weather we've ever encountered on a trip south. Just perfect, calm and warm days. We plan on enjoying them.

Titusville - Massive docks

Moon rising over Titusville

We are enjoying the calms days and moderate weather. As part of the monthly package of $10/ft, the marina also offers free pumpouts. They come to your slip in a pumpout boat, no need to untie and find the fuel dock. Now such things may seem mundane to many people but not to cruisers. Add that to the $1/load washers and $0.50/load dryers and you get the picture of a marina that wants your business. Nice to be wanted.

On the north side, a nice area

The docks here have 14 inch diameter pilings, the most massive I've seen at any marina. They are anchored by 20 inch square concrete columns at the end of each pier. You can feel very secure with such a setup. This year they put in gates at the end of B dock (other docks to be added later) with a card pass required to access the docks. It's a welcomed addition for security. In general we've found that municipal marinas are not as responsive to customer needs as privately owned marinas but Titusville (and also Key West) is the exception.

One thing you need to know on a boat while at an extended stay at a marina is the level of fullness of your holding tanks. This is a complicated matter. We finally settled on a SeeLevel II monitor which includes a printed circuit board strip that adheres to the holding tank. The problem is that it can be fooled by deposits (!) on the inside of the tank opposite the sensor strip. So there's nothing to do other than scraping the inside of the tank at that location, ugh!! On this blog I promised to mention all the duties of the captain on a cruise down the ICW, well that's one of them!

After that bit of unpleasantness, the rest of the day for cool and enjoyable. More boat projects are due tomorrow  but on the weekend we'll rent another car at $10/day and explore Orlando. 

Titusville - No car so boat work

These are known as "Wood Storks", kind of strange looking with the bald heads

With no excuses left, we had to do boat work today. Ann worked inside while I did the outside jobs. I don't remember having to wash the outside of our house but when your home is a boat, outside washing is a must - occasionally. For compensation, the weather was in the 70's so it wasn't too bad.

Hoolie's looking longingly to the smaller dogs just over the fence in front of him, he wants to play

For afternoon entertainment, we took Hoolie over to the dog park for a run. He got so winded that he collapsed in the kiddie pool they keep there for the dogs. That was not what we intended since now we had a wet dog! So it was a trip back to the boat and a hosing down to get rid of the sand and dirt he picked up. Oh well, at least he had a good run.

We've been in touch with Gordon Johnson and Eta who are also coming down the ICW behind us. They are now in Fernandina and will probably join us for a visit in Titusville early next week. They draw about a foot more depth than we do so they went outside from Charleston to Fernandina, missing all the excellent experiences with the shallows along the way. It's calm now and relaxing on the dock, looking forward to tomorrow.

Titusville - Grand circle route through Merritt Island

He sat on the piling just behind Fleetwing, never stirred when I took the picture

My radar display started acting up (typical boat problem...) where 1/4 of the display showed horizontal lines instead of the radar return showing boats, coast, etc. It has to be some driver chip for the screen display but there's nothing I can replace, it has to be sent back to Raymarine. Calling them I was told to send it in for an estimate to their repair shop in Nashua, NH. So off I went to the post office (no FedEx or UPS nearby) to use Priority Mail (flat rate, no weight charge as long as it's under 70 lbs) but the largest box they offered in Priority Mail was 1/2 inch too small! That put me into a box I had to pay for (you don't pay for the Priority Mail box) and I also had to buy bubble wrap (the kind you throw away when at home), strapping tape and labels. So because of the 1/2 inch, I had to shell out about $30 more dollars at least.

A vulture at Merritt Island, likewise bold, they are use to people

So now the radar display is on its way to Nashua for Raymarine repair. I'm due to get an estimate first before repair commences so I'll be waiting with baited breath for that call. It ought to be inexpensive to replace one chip but then it's boat electronics and you can usually multiply by 10x if not 100x over a reasonable charge.

Many flowers around

For the rest of the day we thought we'd explore north of Titusville and visit the Haulover Canal bridge. It's a narrow spit of land connecting Merritt Island with the mainland which was later dug out for the canal. It now has a bridge that raises for boat traffic. It's a hot spot for manatees and much wildlife. But then we have about 20 manatees in the Titusville marina so we can get better photos locally.

Home again (the boat), I left Ann and Hoolie off and headed back to Enterprise to return the car. It's due to turn warmer the rest of the week with temps into the low 80's, nice. 

Titusville Municipal Marina - Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge

A walk through a hammock at Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge

The winds finally dipped under 20 kts today and the temps were in the 60's so we opt'ed to explore the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge. We've been there before but with the seasons and the flyway there's always something new to see. The refuge itself was something of an afterthought from the Kennedy Space Center. They didn't need all the acreage so they turned over part of it for a refuge.

It's situated on a major flyway for migrating birds so there's always something going on. They've installed wooden walkways at several places for a better view of the plants and wildlife without disturbing the brush and there are several drive through areas with pullovers for seeing the latest fauna in town.

The ocean side of Merritt Island had been disturbed greatly by the 30 kt winds

Black Point was not open so we took a less traveled road and found that it was even further out in the boonies than Black Point. We were promised that the road had just been "scraped" (leveled by road equipment) so we set out with confidence. The road was fine at first but then it deteriorated into a one lane road (barely!) with grass in the middle out in the middle of nowhere. We could only do 5 mph due to the numerous pot holes we had to avoid but still was moving along until we met an oncoming car! There was no room to pass. We both rotated our mirrors against our cars and I backed up to a spot that marginally offered just a little more room. The oncoming car then slowly passed with no room to spare. I wouldn't recommend this route to anyone.

We say three alligators in the refuge, we didn't get out of the car

We finally made it out and headed south to pick up the latest crop of Florida grapefruit. We were not disappointed. There is simply nothing like fresh grapefruit, there's nothing to compare to up north. The high Monday is supposed to break 70 for the first time in the last two days, we're looking forward to that! I'll turn in my $10/day car on Monday and do boat work the rest of the week. 

Titusville - House stuff and high winds

The marina at Titusville is very pleasant. Well taken care of with attentive staff

A cold front descended on us today with winds of 20 to 30 kts and temps only in the 60's. It predicted to be even colder Sunday but at least with full sun so the cockpit will be toasty. We had planned on going to Merritt Island to see the wildlife but with high winds we decided to wait for a better day.

Meanwhile we did house things like getting our flu shots, laundry and provisioning. Hoolie even got a chance to run in the dog park, one speed - flat out all the time. In a marina the first question from any cruiser is, "Where's the nearest Walmart?" If you want to pay more for the exact same items, you're free to go elsewhere. We called all around for flu shots, especially for the increased potency version recommended for those over 65 (more potency to better stimulate an immune system that's not what it used to be). Well, the only place that had them was Walmart. CVS was out of stock as were many others.

Titusville Marina is also where we saw a 9 ft alligator lazily swimming along behind our boat one year

We only rent cars on weekends. Enterprise has a $10/day rental special for weekends that costs (with taxes and add-on) $40 with a pick up on Friday and a return on Monday. Normally you would pay that for a single day during the week. The winds are supposed to die down to only 10 to 20 kts on Sunday and we plan on visiting the Merritt Island Wildlife Reserve that day.

So we're settling into our Titusville routine to enjoy the warm weather that's due to return later in the week, into the 80's again. We will be here until November 20th when we head for Carrie's home in Pennsylvania.