We had a choice of taking the inside route to Miami on the Intracoastal Waterway or taking the offshore route in the ocean. The forecast was for a south southwest wind shifting to Southwest and West later today in advance of a cold front. I decided that even if we had to motor south for a while we would get favorable winds and good sailing conditions later. We took the ocean route,and that was a bad choice. It was important to stay close inshore to avoid the northerly Gulf Stream current so we needed to maintain a course approximately due south. The wind did pick up to 15 to 20 knots but we never got the expected Southwesterly shift. In fact, it backed to due South. We ended up heading directly into the wind under power, and the the going was rough. The waves were only four to six feet, but were close together, steep, and occasionally breaking. Carina did fine but sandy and I got much more pitching and rolling then we wanted. A long and very uncomfortable 20 miles.
Once we entered government cut to reach Miami the going was relatively smooth but we were later than we had planned so instead of pressing on to Coconut Grove we ducked into the anchorage at the Miami Marine stadium.
All told a rough day but we are much consoled after evening cocktails and a good hot dinner. We have had more than our share of headwinds so far. I chose to go the clockwise route around South Florida to avoid bucking the prevailing east and southeast wind in the keys. So far we have seen no east or southeast winds. Ah well.
We are about at the halfway point of our planned six hundred and fifty mile route.
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