Status Update: Leaving Ft Pierce

Well, we’re finally moving! I’m writing this while motoring down the Florida coast from Ft. Pierce to Lake Worth, where we’ll anchor for the night. Our sails are up, but mostly for decoration: the two knots of apparent wind are almost enough to blow the sail into the right shape when a gust comes along. But I’m leaving them up, because the wind is supposed to pick up a little as the day goes on, and because Villa Veritas is a sailboat and she should look like it, even if she has to pretend a little.

I’ll say more about this leg of the trip, but first some updates. You can now follow our progress on a map on the Villa Tracker page, courtesy of our new Iridium Go and Predict Wind. It should update roughly hourly whenever we’re moving, so if the timestamp is a little stale, that just means we’re sticking around. You may also see the new banner at the top. This is courtesy of the super-talented Rachel Lang, who designed our boat cards and included this wider version. The card:

So, tonight, we anchor in the Lake Worth Inlet. Tomorrow, we continue down the coast to Bay Biscayne, just south of Miami. Hopefully, we rent a mooring ball for a couple of nights there, while we wait out some big winds through probably Thursday and Friday, before crossing to Bimini in the Bahamas. That should give us a chance to finish some of the last tie-downs, because of course despite spending the last six months getting ready, we’ve still got some things to finish.

What’s taken us so long, you ask? Well, most of these things would make full-sized posts, but since we’ll probably not get to them: since arriving in Ft Pierce, we’ve replaced the front and starboard side windows, installed classy fiberglass deck boxes with custom cusions on the transom, filled those boxes with scuba equipment and standup paddleboards, tracked down an 8′ longboard, replaced the fridge gaskets, updated the lighting fixtures, installed a watermaker, invented creative ways to store a more provisions, and filled every nook and cranny with bags, bottles, and cans of food. And, of course, we went to Harry Potter world in Orlando.