Thanksgiving at Malabar

1052 nm   N27 59.331   W080 32.775

Although today was Thanksgiving, we had no special plans or destination.  Our goal was a 41 nm day which would put us near the relatively unknown town of Malabar, just south of Melbourne.

Along the way, we once again got a look at the NASA Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) in the distance, although the view was a bit hazy compared to our last trip.

VAB in the Distance

The VAB, which was completed in 1966, was originally built to allow for the vertical assembly of the Saturn V rocket for the Apollo program and originally referred to as the Vertical Assembly Building. In anticipation of post-Saturn projects such as the Space Shuttle program, it was renamed to the Vehicle Assembly Building in 1965.

Nearby are the launch pads, including pad 39A which launched the moon missions, and is now used by SpaceX for Falcon 9 launches.  Unfortunately, the haze made them hard to see.

Our timing  was just a bit off.  SpaceX had just had a launch the week before we got here.  It would have been awesome to have been able to watch that from the boat!

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful.  We arrived at our chosen anchorage just past 2 in the afternoon,  a semi-sheltered spot behind a spoil island near ICW mile-marker 925.

I know, you're going to ask "What the h*#l is a spoil island?"

Well, most of the ICW had to be dredged in order to make it deep enough for boats.  Down here, the Indian River is wide but very shallow.  It wouldn't have been practical or economical to haul the dredge tailings ashore, so they just piled them up in the river next to the channel they were dredging.  When the pile got too high,  they moved to a new location and started again.  This resulted in a "dotted line" of islands that parallel the ICW channel.

Spoil Islands West of the ICW Channel

Currents have steadily eroded them, creating a series of sandbars that extend to the SouthWest of each one, causing them to resemble a series of commas in the satellite view of the area.

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection created the Spoil Island Project, which has turned these Islands into recreation areas or protected bird nesting grounds.  This particular one is a recreation area, and has 8 feet of water behind it, ideal for anchoring.  The island itself provides protection from waves and wakes from the East.  It was calm when we got here, but the wind was due to come around to the North later tonight, which promised a little bumpiness.

Once we were settled in, Joanie went into high gear preparing a Thanksgiving feed, complete with a Turkey Casserole, Cranberry sauce, and all the trimmings.

Thanksgiving Dinner

We ate very well.

Life is good.