With another couple of days of bad weather coming in, we had hoped to stay longer in Eau Gallie. The pie may have had something to do with that. However, there was no room at the inn. We called up the coast and tried to get into the Titusville Marina, but they were full, too. After a couple more tries, we found a slip at Ocean Club Marina in Port Canaveral. It was a bit off of the ICW, but gave us a chance to dust off our locking skills as there is a lock separating the port from the inland waters. We threw off our lines at 10:15 for the short 28 mile trek to Port Canaveral.

We reentered the ICW and headed north. Right after crossing under the SR528 bridge, we entered the delightfully named “barge canal” to go east to Port Canaveral. There is some shoaling on both sides of the entrance to the canal, so we got directly perpendicular to it, made a hard turn to starboard, and entered. We didn’t see less than 5 feet on the track.

From the entrance to the canal through the lock, we saw dozens of dolphins. It appears that they like to fish (hunt?) in the area and there’s a large pod. We slowed to a minimum wake speed for the rest of the trip.

From here we could see some of the Kennedy Space Center to our north including the massive VAB (Vehicle Assemble Building). I am a bona fide space nerd who attended Space Camp and its brother, Aviation Challenge, four times. Wendy and I toured Kennedy several years ago and I still geek out as seeing these portals to other planets. Thankfully, I managed to stay between the buoys as my eyes were drawn to the northern horizon.

When we got to the Banana River, I hailed the lock and asked for a lock through. The rather gruff Lock Master just said to have a PFD on and wait for the light. We didn’t have to wait for long. We had a stiff south wind, so we entered the lock and let the wind push us into the north wall. We were the only boat there and as soon as they closed the doors behind us, the other doors opened. The lift seemed to be less than a foot with light current. There were a couple of dolphins and some fish locking with us.

Once we cleared the lock, we went under the 401 bridge. The 401 bridge is a draw bridge that joins the main town to the northern shore of the port where Cruise Terminals 5 and 6 are. That’s where the Disney cruises, NCL, and others dock to exchange passengers. The bridge opens on demand EXCEPT from 6:30 am to 8:00 am and from 3:30 pm to 5:15 pm. That’s the height of the traffic for cruisers. Thankfully, the bridge has a closed air draft of 25 feet and we clear 18 feet with our antennas down. We just scooted through.

Immediately after going under the bridge, our marina was on the starboard side. We already knew that our slip was the first one on the backside of the fuel dock. I radioed into the marina and the they came out immediately to help us get into the slip. The docks are long floating concrete docks and our boat looked tiny next to the 60 footer in the next slip. I like a slip with plenty of elbow room.

After tying up and cleaning up, it was still only 3 pm. Short sailing days make for great touring days!

We walked out of the marina and headed east toward the Exploration Tower. Everything is closed in the tower because of COVID except for the gift shop and the observation deck. That’s all we needed. We took the elevator to the top and braved the wind to get a good view of the port. From there we could see all four of the cruise ships currently in port.

After enjoying the view for a while, we headed back down to ground level and walked around the port a bit to watch the ships leave. Getting hungry, we got a window table at Fishlips and watched the Disney ship leave as our food came.

We got back to the boat after dark and settled in for the night.