December 14 15 New Smyrna Beach to Titusville and First of Three Lay Days There With Car 35 Miles

Motoring in the ICW is not a peak experience. During this trip and while at Titusville, there was almost no wind. It was sunny and not as cold. I put up a head sail for about an hour but then the wind was gone again. Companions make it more interesting. These guys, from New England, said that they were in training for the spring racing season and wanted to be on our "wake". They kept up with us, motoring at 5.7 knots, for about half an hour before turning back. They said "Were your dolphins!"

We also saw more dolphins than ever before, in small and large pods, close to a hundred total, during the five hours we were underway.

In Titusville one simply takes an available mooring and then calls the Marina to tell them the number. The Indian River is as much as three miles wide but with a depth of only one to six feet, except for the ICW channel with twelve feet depth that is perhaps 50 yards wide. Near Titusville the river has a piece that is seven or eight feet deep and several hundred yards wide. This is the anchorage and mooring field. We took a mooring near the ICW and near the outer end of the private marked channel leading from the ICW to a large marina with many slips that was dredged in the western (mainland) side of the River. The chart showed three low bridges, one shortly before we arrived and two further south. The first is for a railroad and is apparently open unless a train comes. The second was replaced by a beautiful new high expensive bridge, shown here from ILENE at sunrise,

and so only the third requires us to request an opening. I think they made a mistake in deciding which of the two car bridges to replace: the high one leads to the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and is little trafficked. The remaining low automobile bridge also leads to the Kennedy National Space Center at Cape Canaveral and has a lot of cars and buses to be detained. Id be interested in what local politics caused the decision to replace the wrong bridge.
We took both our dinghy lights (so others can see us) and our flashlight (so we could see the unlighted channel markers and find our way home after dark). We had some wine on Autumn Borne with Dean and Susan. They are planning to haul, do their bottom and visit relatives back in Buffalo and will catch up with us later on. Also aboard were the crew of Seeker, Earl and Kathy, and friends who sail but live in Florida and did not have their boat here: Eric, an engineering colleague of Dean, and Joyce, a biker and tennis player, from Holland. When Erik and Joyce had to leave, the rest of us had dinner at Crackerjack, by the foot of that new bridge.
Next day was the first of our three with a rental car. After breakfast out we went to the Kennedy Space Center. We took the bus ride out along the path that the mammoth mover travels carrying the rockets (at one mph), and saw about four videos, each in its own theater, walked through a lot of objects, large and small and heard a great talk by former astronaut Don Thomas, who made four shuttle flights, the highlight of the day, actually.

Each stripe in the flag is eight feet wide!

Lift off!

End of Stage Two, with me, below, to give a sense of scale

Lene by capsule, looking lovely, as usual .

The Rocket Garden

We were there from 10 to 4 and were quite tired by the end of it. We have access to a movie house here and Interstellar was playing but no, a quiet evening aboard.
The Space Center is operated entirely without government support, it brags: But taxpayers pay for it. Driving there for two seniors includes a $10 parking fee and $97.00 admission. it was not as expensive 25 years ago when I was here last.

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