Navigating the New River in Fort Lauderdale Florida

Navigating the New River

We’ve been navigating the New River for 4 years, I’m sharing our experience in the hope that others will avoid some of the pitfalls we have enjoyed in that time.

The New River:
As far as Sail boats with fixed masts are concerned: The New River extends from Sand Bar Park up to the New River Fork and then either the South Fork or the North Fork. The South Fork leads to the Fort Lauderdale Marine Center beyond Davie Blvd Bridge, the North Fork leads up to Broward Bvld. My discussion is in regard to transiting the North Fork of the New River From Sand Bar Park - Upstream (Inbound) to 5th Steet Canal just before Broward Blvd.

Bridges:
There are 5 Bridges on the North Fork of the New River, all are normally closed to sailboat traffic but will open on request.  I say upon ‘request’ because the tenders, understandably, get a bit grumpy when someone ‘demands’ an opening. Hailing the bridge tender on VHF Channel #9 normally gets a quick response. The procedure we use that seems to get an appreciative response is:



[Bridgename, Bridgename] Sailing Vessel Eximius [Inbound/Outbound] [location] Requesting an Opening, Over.

-Tender’s Response-

[Bridgename] Eximius – Roger, Standing by on 9




Because our boat has an unusual name, we have it spelled out phonetically at the helm, just in case the tender asks how to spell the boat name.

Echo - eXray - India - Mike - India - Uniform - Sierra

Upon clearing the bridge, we always thank the tender with a quick

[Bridgename] Eximius - We’re clear, thanks for the opening.

The 5 Bridges are:

• 3rd Avenue Bridge
• Andrews Avenue Bridge
• FEC Railroad Bridge
• 7th Avenue Bridge
• 11th Avenue Swing Bridge
• 
  

3rd Avenue Bridge:

3rd Avenue Bridge is a double span bridge and when transiting up the New River, it does not come into view until within about 300 yards of the bridge, so, we don’t wait until we can see the bridge before requesting an opening. We call the bridge as we cross over the ‘Tunnel’ and add our ‘location’ to our call. eg. 'Just passing The Tunnel'

Once the opening starts, it gets to fully open pretty quickly.



Andrews Avenue Bridge can be seen before passing 3rd Avenue, so we request the opening of Andrews bridge before we clear 3rd Ave. It’s a short run and Andrews Ave bridge is slow to open. It’s a single span bridge, the hinge is on the Southern, left side as going up river. We hug the North side fender, we’ve seen sailboats nearer to the hinge side, but it’s not so obvious if the mast will clear as the fully open bridge overhangs the river.

Caution: There is a Pumpout Outflow on the North side of the river just downstream of Andrews Avenue Bridge. That Outflow will push us across the river unless we have sufficient speed through the water. 

Caution: The FEC railroad bridge is about 200-300 yards from Andrews Avenue Bridge - If the FEC bridge is closed, Andrews will most likely not open, which means we will have to hold station between 3rd Avenue bridge and Andrews Avenue Bridge - that could be for just a few minutes to over half an hour if it's a Freight Train passing! Most  likely we will not be the only boat between the two bridges, and it gets to feel crowded really quickly - we do not have a bow thruster - holding station can be tricky, especially if there’s a current flowing - there normally is for us. (see dock note below) We have tied up alongside an empty dock several times, because our boat has prop walk to Port, we will ideally dock port side too between the two bridges. 



Florida East Coast Railway Bridge (FEC Bridge)

The FEC Bridge is a single span bridge and is not controlled at the bridge - it’s a remote control bridge, however, when Brightline (Now Virgin) trains started using the bridge, they were required to have a tender at the bridge. They respond on VHF #9 to ‘FEC Bridge’

Caution: There is a 2nd Pumpout Outflow on the North side of the river when approaching the FEC Bridge from Andrews Avenue Bridge.

The width of the channel at the FEC bridge is narrower than it seems due to the overhang of the bridge, ther have been several boats that have struck the bridge structure because they strayed too close to the hinge side of the bridge.

There is a Website that shows the status of the bridge at https://www.nrbinfo.com/

It is also available as an App for Iphone and Android (Search for New River Bridge Info)

3rd Ave bridge is a double span bridge seen quickly after passing the FEC Bridge, and rounding Sailboat Bend, the bridge generally opens very quickly, so be prepared to rev up to pass the bridge. There are floating docks at Sailboat Bend, but beware their docksides are not nice! Have fenders out and do not scrape the dock, those are not plastic dock bumpers, they are metal! We have tied up at the floating docks several times. If you plan on picking crew up, then they can park in the big lot opposite the Museum and take the 2 minute walk to the floating docks.

Just beyond the 3rd Avenue Bridge, on the North side of the river is ‘cooley's landing marina’. There are quite a few long term liveaboards in the slips at the landing, the current can be quite strong at that point in the river, and the tops of the ramps are frequently underwater during high tides. There’s a parking lot for boat trailers.

11th Avenue Swing Bridge is the least used bridge on the North fork of the New River, but the tender normally responds right away, traffic can delay the bridge opening for several minutes.

Caution: Stay clear of the shallow area on the North side of the river as approaching either side the bridge.

Caution: Do not try to pass on the North side of the swing bridge - it’s impassible to a sailboat.



Pumpout Options 
There are several pumpout options on the New River, we have only experience at those on the South Side of the river. The first is at Smokers Park. When approaching 3rd Avenue Bridge inbound, going up river, and passing The Tunnel, Smokders Park is on the left as passing the corner. (see map) The pumpout is a Free City Service, but it can be reserved, so either take the chance that it’s not reserved and risk being asked by a city employee to leave, - or - Call the New River Dockmaster and ask to use it.

The Pumpout is controlled by a time switch on an electrical box just past the exercise area to the North of Smokers Park, Have everything ready for pump out at the boat before walking the 150 yards to the timer and set it for about 30 minutes, then head back to the boat and connect the pump out hose. It’s polite to suck a few gallons of river water into the hose before stowing it at the pump out station upon completion.

The New River Dockmaster can be reached on VHF #16 but backup with a phone call if no response on VHF Call them at: 954-828-5423



Notes:We keep our boat well up the North Fork of the New River, the canal is subject to shoaling and we can only get out of the canal within 2 hours of high tide, this means that we are probably going to have current flowing in or out as we transit the New River. Ideally we would time our departure and arrival at the dock so that the current is on our bow, it’s easier to transit the New River against the current - holding station for a delayed opening bridge is a lot easier when against the current.



The New River is used by a lot of commercial traffic. There are probably a dozen or so of River Taxis, Tour boats (Jungle Queen, Go to Sea on the Carrie Be, etc.) and then there are the Tow Boats: Large vessels heading to and from the Fort Lauderdale Marine center are often towed as the turns on the South Fork of the New River are especially tricky for a 55’ to 150’ vessel! The good news is that if you are behind a tow boat, the bridges will open quickly for them. The bad news is that if they are delayed due to the bridges, they take up a lot of river.



All of the bridges on the New River close to river traffic during rush hours between 07:30 and 09:00 and again at 16:30 to 18:00 on weekdays - National Holidays excepted.

During the year there are several events which may close a bridge for the duration, such as Fun Runs etc.

See you on the Water.

Replacing Steaming Light - Part II

Part II - cleaning up the mess

It was up the mast again on July 5th.

The boat was at the Bahia Mar Marina for the HISC Independence Day Cruise 2019 - and there was a break in festivities on the Friday, so I climbed the mast again to clean up the area where the old lights were fitted in prep for the new lighting fixture.

It took over an hour of carefully scraping away the oodles of silicone sealant that was slathers all around the old fittings.

I countersunk the outside of the holes to give the JB Weld something to grip to. Polished the area with a plastic scrub pad and then finally de-greased the whole area before applying JB Weld to the holes. (that part is not shown in the pic)

Viewed from the deck - telephoto is great - this was after applying the JB Weld and descending the mast.

Since the last climb, we purchased a West Marine Bosuns Chair - it's far more comfortable and allows for a longer time spent aloft getting the job done. But it has a weakness - it really feels as though one could fall out of the chair backwards and there's a constant need to move my butt back onto the seat rather than in the bucket that is formed between the seat and the back of the chair.

I'm thinking of adding a couple of webbing straps to keep my thighs in contact with the seat and prevent sliding backwards.

Meanwhile the area cleaned an the holes filled.

Next trip up the mast will get the JB Weld bumps smoothed down and the holes redrilled for the new light fitting. I should be able to complete the install in just one more climb - at least that's the hope. If it takes two, then OK, but probably just one more trip up the stick.

The Third trip up the mast completed the project
Here's the Combo Navigation Steaming and Deck Light that I purchased off of Amazon.

See you on the Water.

Paul

Replacing the Mast Steaming Light and Deck Light

Replacing the Mast Steaming Light & Deck Light

After a 10 hour trip arriving at midnight, I noticed that the steaming light was really dim, and from previous trips up the mast, I knew it was a bodged job - The Deck light part of the combo lamp must have failed and someone choose to replace the deck light lamp with a new fitting - ie. now there is a Steaming light and a pair of wires going to a separate deck light (Halogen Lamp). So, time to replace both as it's impossible to fix either lamp.

Step 1 was to remove the old lamps

If you zoom in on this pic, you'll see the amount of silicone sealant that had been used to try and waterproof the fitting.

The wires from the deck light (lower) and the combo fitting (upper) are nicely joined and heat shrink tubed, but again, a huge glob of silicone was used to try and water proof the connection.

The lens of the steaming light is cracked from years of UV exposure - these lamps don't last forever!

The two wires coming out of the bottom of the combo unit are actually soldered inside the fitting and then gooped with more silicone. Click on the pic and zoom in.

Yes, that's my Sailrite machine in the background.

Special Thanks to Steffi Shiffer & Peder Sahlin for coming down to the boat dock to act as Safety while I went up the mast.

I spent about an hour up the mast sat in my bosuns sling (not really a chair) and that's not comfortable, the straps grab right where a guy doesn't want to be grabbed. 

During that hour I was able to drill out the rivets that held both fittings in place and scrape away about 90% of the silicone (another tube) off of the mast. 

There are a total of 12 holes in the mast from these fittings and previous fittings, they will need to be filled and the remainder of the silicone scrapped off and cleaned up - I'm going to get a new Bosun's Chair that doesn't try to cut of important blood supply.

This is the new combo fitting.

It has 9 LEDs in the steaming lamp and 12 in the deck lamp.

The mounting only has 2 screw holes and they look to be the same dimension and location as the removed fitting.

I'll mount the fitting with Stainless Screws using anti corrosion protectant between the surfaces.

I'll also use a SS washer to spread the load over the tab of the plastic wings of the fitting.

A trick I figured out a long time ago, is to grind down the sharp point of the screws so that they cannot catch the running rigging lines inside the mast - I'll use my cordless Dremel to cut off the screws and then grind down the edges of the cut so that they are nice and smooth.

West Marine has a July 4th sale on their Bosun's chairs - so we'll visit there before the weekend. 

Then it's back up the mast to tidy up the mounting area, cleaning off the silicone and filling the holes (JB Weld) I'll also apply a bead of silicone in an inverted U above the grommet where the electrical wires come out of the mast. I'll also apply a bead of silicone inside the edges of the new fitting wings just to encourage water to stay away from behind the fitting. Plan is to not be able to see any silicone when the new fitting is installed.

More later - meanwhile, we'll see you on the water.

Upgrading the Cabin Lighting

Upgrading Eximius' Cabin Lighting

We have a variety of lights in the Cabin, the result of units being replaced by a smorgasbord of fittings. During our New Year's Eve Cruise, the Galley Lamp failed and has to be replaced.

I prefer that they are common fittings so that replacement is easy.

• Galley: 12" LED Strip  - 1 white, 1 red (Both New - replacing broken florescent) 
• Table Reading light: LED lamp White - Blue night lite option. (New - replacing weak LED)
• Nav Table: Red LED lamp (original)
• Port Settee: 12" LED Strip - 1 white, 1 red (Both New - replacing original)
• Stbd Settee: 12" LED Strip - 1 white, 1 red (Both New - replacing original)
• Port Side: 8' LED Strip White - Installed over a year ago.
• Deck nite lites: Low Power LED lamps (Installed about a year ago, white - to be painted with thin, Red, Nail Polish)

Later, when upgrading the V-Berth & Aft Cabins, we'll use the same types of fittings.

Here's what the new fittings look like.

The 12" LED Strips are Self Adhesive (3M VHB tape) from Amazon. they come in packs of 4 all the same color.

In each lighting set, will be 1 strip of white, 1 strip of red and 1 dual switch. I went with the simplicity of dual switches rather than On-Off-On switches.

The 'Sets' will be used at the Galley, V-Berth and Aft Berth and the Bathroom

These switches are small enough to fit on the Wooden battens in the Cabin, Aft Cabin and V-Berth.

One switch will operate the White LED Strips, the other will operate the Red LED Strips.

See the wiring diagram below.

These Reading lights do not require switches, they have a built in Touch Sensitive feature.

This does mean that they consume power when turned off, not much, but any 'always on' lamps will eventually drain an uncharged battery.

Our normal practice is to turn off all systems at the Electrical Control Panel, including the Cabin Lighting circuit, so this will not be a problem.

The 'Touch Sensor' is the thin ring near the top of the lamp (where the finger is pointing)

1st touch turns the Blue rings on, 

2nd touch turns the Reading lamp on Blue rings off

3rd touch turns Reading lamp off.

The Reading Lights will be used in the main cabin(2) and the Aft Cabin, the V-Berth is not really a reading area.

All of the new lamps will utilize the existing wiring, but the switches to lamp wiring will be new.

Amazon Links

• White LED Strips
• Red LED Strips
• Suface Mount Switches
• LED Reading lamp

Wiring Diagrams

Pics of Completed Installations

Red Light On

White Light On

Stormy Regatta

Bad weather story

On Saturday, we took part in the Hillsboro Inlet to West Palm Beach Sailing Club regatta (Lake Worth Florida). We left our dock Friday Morning and headed up the Intra Coastal Waterway to stay the night along side our friend, Peder, Catalina 36, 'Dalecarlia' in Pompano Beach. The trip was uneventful and we arrived at Peder's place while he was in the process of cleaning his boat's bottom in prep for the regatta. There were 22 boats registered to participate. We were in the Gunk Hole class as we really don't race, but the event was a great excuse to sail up to Lake Worth.

Saturday Morning, Peder appeared with an offer for morning coffee, but I had just poured my 2nd cup of coffee and was going through the process of getting the boat ready to sail. His dock is only 3 miles from the Ocean and just 3 bridges. I put my coffee mug down by the Port side dorade while I released the Main sail Halyard - promptly forgot about the coffee.

By 08:15 we were ready to head out, Peder & his crew were ready too. So we headed out, slow, it was near low tide and he had warned me about an obstruction on the South side of the canal entrance from the ICW. Peder should have warned me to stay near the middle of the entrance, as there was some shoaling on the Northern corner of the entrance. Yep, we went aground - soft sand - we know how that feels after previous soft groundings. We were able to slowly move off the shoal and catch up to Peder who had passed us on our Stbd side. At the Hillsboro Inlet bridge, there were at least half a dozen club boats waiting for the bridge to open, then we all passed out of the inlet, some boats peeling off to raise their sails before going out of the inlet.

We totally screwed up the start! Our class was 2nd to sequence through the start gate, each class being 5 minutes later. We crossed the start line just before the last class started - 20 minutes after our start - as I said before, we're not racers and don't normally stick to a schedule. We're Cruisers!

There was very little wind, 'The Rabbit' had his Spinnaker up, but it barely filled as he headed off shore to catch the Gulf stream. We opted to stay inshore where we had 2 knots of current carrying us to the North. Almost all of the other boats headed out to the stream where the current would be somewhere higher, but at the cost of having to head both a couple of miles East to get to the stream and then a couple of miles back to get to the finish line. As we would move a lot slower, the extra speed of being in the Gulf Stream didn't seem to valuable to us.

So we quietly, slowly, almost monotonously, crawled up the coast and our ETA at the finish line was about 16:30 according to our GPS Navigator. Of course, it started to rain, that fine drizzle that soaks everything but was barely reason for donning our Foul Weather gear. As always, we had our life jackets on and the Jack Lines were set just in case we needed to go forwards to adjust anything.

The 'Catalina Motor Yacht', one of those dinner cruise types boats, crept up on our stern, we could see them on our AIS before we could see the boat. I called the skipper to ask if they could see us on their AIS, this would be our first confirmation that our new AIS Transceiver was transmitting. They called us back and confirmed they could see us, they even replied pronouncing our boat name correctly, it's displayed on AIS receivers, along with our Speed, Course over ground and some other info about our boat.

'Catalina' motored off towards Lake Worth and by that time we could see Dalecarlia and 'Gratitude' a Hunter 27' both of which had gone out to the Gulf Stream but were now heading back inshore.

The wind had picked up from an earlier 5 knots at 140º off our Stbd Bow to 12 knots. As per our sailing plans, we started to reef. Two reefs in our Jib and One in the Main. We were now doing 7 knots GPS, not shabby!

I was thinking through the race results: Our rating was 186 seconds per mile, Peder's was 196 spm, and Gratitude's was 228 spm.  With a race distance of about 30 miles, Gratitude could finish 21 minutes after us and still beat us. Peder could  finish 5 minutes after us and still beat us. Both were closer than that, Peder not so sure, but pretty close.

All of a sudden, the wind instrument went crazy, showing the wind changed direction by nearly 90 degrees and ratched up to 20 knots. I looked over to Dalecarlia and saw him heeling hard and spinning around to starboard and thought 'What the heck is Peder doing?' when WHOOSH! we did the same, the wind spiked to above 39 knots, at least that's the biggest number I saw when I had a chance to look at the Instrument! The boat heeled hard over to Port and dipped the rail well below the water line, wave constantly bursting over the side and occasionally over the cockpit combing.

Peggy was hanging on for dear life! Both arms wrapped around the cabin top winches and feet firmly reaching for the port side seat, trying to jamb herself into position. All the while I was trying to see the instruments through fogged up glasses and holding the wheel to stop us bearing off the wind which would have put us beam to the wind, that would have been even worse.

We've been in squalls before, they typically have lasted maybe 10 minutes max, so I told Peggy to hang on, it's going to calm down in 5 minutes or so. It didn't! More than 20 minutes later, we agreed that we should try to pull in the remaining Jib and put the 2nd reef in the Main sail. I didn't think we could lower the main because it was under such stress with the high winds.

I helped Peggy bring in the jib, step by step, we worked together, Peggy jacking the furling line and me taking the line slack up on a cleat. Then Peggy easing the jib a bit more and then more struggles with the furling line. Peggy was pretty worn out by that time, so we took a breather till we tackled putting the 2nd reef in the Main. All the while, the Port side is dipping in and out of the water, still getting occasional floods into the cockpit, but the drains emptied it pretty quick. We were both soaked through even wearing our rain jackets. The wind dropped to below 25 knots, and we tackled the Main sail. Peggy dropped the main halyard about 5' and secure it. Then she passed the 2nd reef down haul line to me and I pulled the sail down to the 2nd reef position. Peggy secure that line in it's line clutch and we did the same for the 2nd reef out-haul line. It was not a perfect reef, but there was a lot less sail up than with just a single reef.

After about 30 minutes, the wind started to ease below 20 knots. I raised the head of the mainsail in order to clean up the reefing, it only needed to be raised by about 8 inches. That made the sail look a lot more orderly, and then the wind died, I mean it dropped so much we were only doing 1 - 1 1/2 knots downwind towards the finish line. Our ETA went from 16:30 to 17:45, time to drop out of the race, so we started the engine and called the race committee to announce we were dropping out.

With the engine running, we dropped the mainsail and headed to the finish line which was now about 7 miles away. I tided up the running rigging lines and we did our best to relax and ease back down from the high stress of the squall.  We heard other boats call in to drop out or announce they were ok. We called Dalecarlia and they were ok, minor damage - bimini split and mainsail jambed half way down. Gratitude was ok too.

We motored in over the finish line. The Palm Beach Sailing Club boat 'Paparazzi' stayed at the finish line until we passed it, we were the last boat in.

None of the Gunk Hole boats officially finished due to the storm, but we all got safely to the anchorage opposite the PBSC marina.  Dalecarlia was offered an overnight mooring ball and we agreed to tie up along side them. We kept clear until they had completed their mooring connection and then I prepped for going along side, getting fenders deployed and lines set.

After healing, probably as much as 50º to port, having water wash all along the side deck, in winds that, according to others, was over 50 knots, anything loose in the cabin was all over the floor including the seat cushions. So it was with amazement that, as I was setting the fenders on the Port side, I found my Coffee Mug, laying within inches of where I had left it before leaving Peder's dock 10 hours earlier!  Go Figure!

Once we were all secure and ready to go ashore for the After Race Party at the sailing club, we hailed the tender for a ride to the club. Ken, one of their sailing instructors, quickly arrived and took us to the club, I think we were the last to arrive.

We sat with a few of our club members and enjoyed the club's excellent dinner and the much needed Cold Beer!

When it came to the awards, the master of ceremonies announced that as none of the Gunk Hole class had finished, and that the club had made 3 really nice Trophies, they would have the 3 skippers tell the story of their experience of the storm and award the trophy according to the applause rating of the audience!

Enough Said!

Our First Racing Trophy

Even if we didn't finish!

See you on the water!

Broken Window Latch

Look what fell off the window?

 This is the Forward Beckson Portlight in the Aft Cabin.
The lower right latch fell off! The insert that attaches the latch to the screw (seen hanging down) broke in two.

Good news is that Beckson is still in business.

The broken latch.

Buddies on the C34 forum pointed out that they were still available from Beckson

Just $15 on line. purchased two of them, if one has broken, probability of other following after 30 years is pretty high.







Found them by searching for: Beckson PRK-W Latch Only

Easy fix.

See you on the water.

AIS Upgrade

Upgrading our AIS from Receiver to Transceiver

We installed our Garmin AIS 300 two years ago and it's been a great asset during our local cruising trips. It alerted us to potential collision situations with some fast moving fishing boats, lux yachts, in all kinds of conditions. Well worth the investment and the effort. The installation simply required a new NMEA 2000 Drop cable to connect to the NMEA 2000 Backbone, a power connection from a spare Circuit Breaker and rerouting the VHF Antenna Cable from the Radio to the AIS and adding a new VHF cable from the AIS to the Radio as the Garmin AIS had a built in VHF Splitter. It really was a quick install.

We're planning on extending our cruising venues and decided that it's worth the extra boat buck to add an AIS transceiver, all we needed to do was determine which manufacture to use and spend the bucks.

Garmin was our first choice, their AIS 800 Class B Transceiver was a drop in! It cost $999.99 and was not available, basically it was on back order for the USA according to Garmin support. 

We looked at Vector and a couple of others, all similar price and all required an external VHF splitter, which was basically the deciding factor. 

Our choice was the ET-413-0086 em-trak B350 Class B SOTDMA AIS Transponder and the ET-413-0060 em-trak S300 AIS/VHF Antenna Splitter.

Installation was a breeze, all done in less than 30 minutes - most of that time taken up on deciding where to install it and drilling the holes for the Transceiver and Splitter. 

The final result is aesthetically pleasing

But the system improvement is amazing. The reception is much better, not sure why, but the ASI display on our Garmin 741SX GPSMap is impressive.

Removing the Garmin AIS was easy, 4 screws, and cables. The replacement did require changing the VHF antenna connection as it previously went to the AIS, now it goes to the new Splitter. And the Splitter requires power, but I simply connected it's power cable to the power cable for the Transceiver. So now when the AIS circuit breaker is on, power is available to both the Transceiver and the Splitter.

I'm wondering if the improved reception is due to the routing of the VHF antenna. Previously it was routed from the Antenna - to a VHF / FM/AM take off and then to the Garmin AIS receive and then to the VHF Radio.

The new routing is Antenna - Splitter - AIS and Splitter - VHF / FM/AM take off then to the radio.

The new unit has a USB connection to the AIS transceiver, but we have not checked that out yet. It requires the Software that came with the Transciever to be installed on a Windows PC (laptop) Shame they don't make it available for Android!

Now we'll see you on the water, and, if you receive AIS, you'll see us on your Chart Plotter.