Stuck in West Palm Beach, Lake Worth, Florida, 10 June 2016, 26:42.631N 080:02.829W
Five Islands
John & Sue
Sun 12 Jun 2016 22:28
Ok, so this part of the ICW is known for the large number of Bascule opening bridges, and to travel the 37Nm from Ft Lauderdale to West Palm Beach we went through 19!!! Some open on the hour and 1/2hour, some open on the 1/4 past and 1/4 to the hour and others open upon request (signal). They are fairly co-ordinated if you can travel at between 6kts and 8kts, which we can’t always do unless we have some favourable current. For example we went through Las Olas Bridge at 0745  and made it to Sunrise Blvd (1.1Nm away) by 0800,  through Oakland Park Blvd (2Nm) by 0815 and so on. We achieved around the 6.5kts (sometimes hitting 7.4) with the assistance of the current but had to wait up to 30mins at a couple of the bridges because we just missed their scheduled opening and had to wait for the next. When we reached the East Palmetto Park Rd Bridge the very nice lady bridge operator informed us that the Linton Blvd (second next bridge we were due to go through) was down for maintenance and that it could be several hours before it opened. As we were turning around and heading for an anchoring area to wait it out, she came back on the radio to tell us that she had spoken to the Linton bridge operator and that they would open the bridge for us when we got there. We made it for the 1130am opening and another lovely lady operator told us we had made it just in time (we had averaged 7 knots on this run) and opened the bridge for us to go through. Once through, she announced on Channel 09 (bridge traffic) that the bridge would not be open again for the next several hours - how lucky was that. The bridges come in different sizes, colours, opening configurations (centre or one side only) and one or two adjacent spans.      So how many of these damn things do we have to go???? The adult version of “Are we there yet”.       The next piece of information we received from a bridge operator was 3 bridges before our anchorage at West Palm Beach to let us know that the Flagler Memorial Bridge was closed until Thursday 16th June (six days away). The bridge is being constructed to replace the existing bridge at a cost of US$93 million. We decided to press on to the anchorage (another storm was on it's way) and make a decision over the next few days as to whether to stay in West Palm Beach or go back and find a way out to the sea through an inlet to travel north. Our intention had been to spend the weekend at West Palm Beach before moving anyway.  The bridge in the foreground is the Royal Park, the last bridge before our anchorage. The bridge in the background is the Flagler Memorial (the one with all the barges, cranes etc in front of it). The ICW is like one long canal housing estate with lots of smaller canal estates running into it.    This home was under construction but featured a glittering mosaic on one corner. Would be interesting to see it completed as it looks like a piece of art already.    While waiting for the Royal Park to open we spied the ‘Australian Dock’ at this marina.  Safely anchored at West Palm Beach off the City Docks.  And the view at night is almost as good as Miami and we are a lot closer to them.  The early morning colour across the lake looking toward Palm Beach was fairly nice as well.  The Royal Park Bridge  The early light reflected off the coppery glass. I think we are going to enjoy this place for a few days or more. We may be stuck but not sure we mind. Although it was a bit of a chore going through 19 bridges, this is what the ICW experience is. You can’t do this in too many places so we count ourselves lucky that we are experiencing another unique part of the world. |