We made it to the beach today!

We had a lazy morning at Uncle Henry's Marina on Gasparilla Island.  As I was walking to the bathroom, I heard a snort and saw the back of a manatee.  Waited, but he was under water.  After my trip to the restroom, I came back to slip #51, and there he was.  I went to get George, and the big guy was still there when we returned.  We stayed and watched and filmed.  Three manatees came into the slip.  They are slow moving, brown fellows.  This was my first time to see a manatee's face, and I did note the trunk look.  "Are manatees related to elephants?" I asked Google.  Yes, elephants are their closest relations now.  So cool.  Enjoy these movies. (Movie had to be removed in order to print this.)

We motored over to Cayo Costa State Park and anchored in Pelican Bay.  The entrance is shallow, but we got in fine.  There are several sail boats here too.  We paddled our dinghy over to the park, walked to the beach and found shells.  It was warm enough at 3:00 pm to go barefoot.

The path to the gulf

The water colors are lovely.

I wanted this shell, but another animal had already claimed it.

Feels lucky to find a whole sand dollar.

The view as we left to walk back to the dock.

When we arrived at the park, we were just in time for the tram ride to the beach side.  A young French couple was with us.  They were camping for 8 days, and their stuff filled the truck that was pulling the tram.  We helped them unload at the campground and then walked to the beach.

Just now we heard a horn sound.  It is a guy standing on a sailboat just beside us (anchored a bit too close, really) blowing on a conch shell.  Where are we?  Is this the islands?  Does that signal happy hour?
I hope so.

Aunt Aggie likes Uncle Henry.

Today we went just a couple of hours to Gasparilla Island.  We are in a wonderful area near Ft. Myers, and we just want to putter around and visit different islands before leaving our boat at Ft. Myers for Christmas holidays.  

Several years ago when George got the idea for the Great Loop trip, we chartered Patience, a 32 foot Grand Banks, and went to several islands.  We had a great time, and we found that the motor noise did not disturb us.  So here we are on a return trip.

This morning was cold and clear and sunny.  Lovely day for travel on the ICW.  It seemed that everyone was coming outside after our three grey days.  We saw an older gent with a shovel on a sand bar, digging for oysters perhaps?  We saw a paddler on Lemon Bay; bird watchers at Cedar Point; the ubiquitous fishermen.   In fact, a fishing boat caught a mess of mullet right beside our boat while we were still docked this morning. A dolphin followed us for several minutes, racing Aunt Aggie and leaping in the surf.

He has a boat parked out of the frame, but he's walking along the sand bank.  We left at low tide and really had to watch the channel.


In this video I'm trying to show how shallow the water is outside the channel.

Here's the dolphin beside our boat:
(Movies had to be removed in order to print this.)

We were moving pretty well down the ICW in Lemon Bay, and a ferry pulled out in front of us.
We put on the brakes and watched him move across the narrow waterway.  When we checked our map with Active Captain, it said the ferry has no schedule, so watch out.  We need to look ahead, behind, and 360 degrees.  Here's the loaded ferry.

We came into Uncle Henry's Marina at noon.  It is beautiful here.  We took a long walk and tried to get to the beach, but it is blocked by expensive houses.  (Tomorrow we will be at Caya Costa Island, so we can beach walk then.)  Now I am drying three loads of laundry.  Oh, our life is romantic!

Check out the new, entertaining boat name George found. (See the Witty Boat Names page.)  Remember Seinfeld?

Rather Tired of Learning Lessons.

Yesterday we stayed on a mooring ball outside Sarasota, FL.  It was quite windy.  We had tried anchoring, but we felt as if we were not well protected, so we moved to the nearby mooring field.  Here's the view of Sarasota at night from Aunt Aggie.

This does not do justice to what is a glittering shoreline.  I felt a bit guilty gazing at it and not going into the city.  The truth is we are not on vacation:  This is our life.  We are often tired at night and don't want to go out.  Also we prefer to eat at home even though almost every night there is a good restaurant near us.

Someone asked about how mooring balls work.  They are used often to protect reefs in the islands. In Florida they are used to keep boaters paying for space instead of letting us just drop an anchor for free.   Instead of dropping an anchor, the boater grabs a line from the ball and threads it through a line from the boat.  Here are two photos from this morning that show the connection.  

A funny moment from yesterday:  While Jimmy at Cortez Cove Marina replaced our battery, I went into the restroom and had a shower and washed my hair.  It was such a treat after Sunday, when we tried not to use any electricity. I'm picking up some behaviors I may not be able to use at home.  

We spend a lot of time looking at the world.  We spotted an osprey today and could tell the differences between it and an eagle.  Also we motored by Siesta Key and were quite impressed with the real estate.  There were many fancy houses with private pools.  One modern house was white stucco blocks with purple railings and a 2 foot purple wall surrounding the pool.  Sounds tacky, but it wasn't.  Another house had three stories and the pool screened.  No bugs will bother those folks.  Here is a mansion right on the end of Siesta Key.  

We saw this side first, but it's actually the back of the house.

Then we came around and saw the front.  Wow!

Yesterday's lesson was to check the engine and generator before leaving a marina after a long break.  The lesson for today is don't leave an anchorage or marina in Florida until you have another place lined up.  We knew we wanted to stay in a marina tonight due to high winds coming in.  So George chose two marinas that sounded great.  We took off from Sarasota and had no issues with wind.  It was chilly, so we moved below for most of the trip.  When I called our marinas, neither had space for us.  Oh, no!  So I started looking and calling, and we ended up at Royal Palm.  This is a place with a better past than present.  There are old, abandoned boats docked.  There is no loaner car or laundry.  The bathrooms are inside a restaurant.  But we are off the water, well tied and warm.  The sun is out.  Another lesson learned.

Bump in the Road becomes Opportunity for Lunch

Last night we anchored out in Bimini Bay.  George had the idea to charge his computer and watch a movie.  When we tried to turn on the generator, it was dead.  Uh, oh.  We had felt so ready to leave today.  We realized that we hadn't used the generator for a month.  The batteries were dry.  We added water.  No luck.  We adapted our evening plans:  using only one light, no showers, no computers, cold dinner.  It was a plain Jane evening.  Happily, each of us had a great book to read:  George is reading Going Clear about Scientology and L. Ron Hubbard.  I finished The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer.   Here's a photo of us with our reading lights.

The wind was strong, and we were pushed around by loud, confusing waves for most of the night.  It was hard to sleep.  Finally, in the wee hours, the wind calmed.  We made lukewarm tea for breakfast since we couldn't use the coffee pot.

We called Cortez Cove Marina at 8:00 am and told them we needed a battery checked and maybe replaced.  Then we went over (about 7 miles) and Jimmy did the work for us.  He was terrific.  (We had read reviews of the marina and Jimmy on Active Captain, so that felt good.)  While we waited for the new battery to arrive, we walked around and found Cortez  Cafe with home cooking.  The food was just ok, but the atmosphere was perfect.  I think their strong suit is breakfast.

George said, "A bump in the road becomes an opportunity to eat out."  

Since we got a late start at 1:25 pm, we only made it to Sarasota today.  We tried to anchor, but we were getting a lot of pounding again from waves.  So we moved over to the mooring field at Marina Jack's. We still seem to be having a lot of movement and noise, but we are on ball #1, so maybe life will become quieter as night arrives.  At least we are not getting waked by boats coming under the bridge.  

We got some exercise today: walking around Cortez and paddling to pay for the mooring ball.

Tomorrow is supposed to be very windy, so we probably will travel just a bit and go to a marina.  The sun did come out once we arrived at Sarasota.  

This is a fountain across from the office of Marina Jack's, a fancy marina with two bars.  We decided to paddle home and have our happy hour.  

A Cloudy Day in Paradise

What? Every day is not going to be sunny? We have had such lovely days.  We are spoiled!  We wanted to leave Gulfport today, so we listened to the marine weather forecast from NOAA and did our chores and waited for the tide to rise.  We left at 11:20 am after getting a pump-out at the marina.
We had an easy trek planned - across the bay to Anna Maria Island.  The sun never really broke through consistently.  There was fog in the offing and damp wind.  About half way through the trip, the waves grew and pushed against our starboard side.  We rocked so that I had to stay seated and couldn't relax.

Here is the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, a misnomer today.  You can see how gloomy it is.

Once we ducked into Bimini Bay behind Anna Maria Island, the wind died down, and the sun peeked out.  I envisioned us paddling and walking across to the beach.  We anchored in 13 feet of water.
Lots of other boaters came out too.  But the sun quickly exited.  It is just a grey day.

We are surrounded by houses on this small bay.  Here's the view from our starboard side.

At home this day would be perfect for reading and sitting in front of a fire.  We are reading and napping and being glad that we are cozy here.  We're tired after staying up to watch the ACC Championship game last night.  Too much excitement and food and drink for too long.  Tech and FSU both played great, but Tech lost.  It was a terrific game.  We walked to town and visited several spots, trying to find the best seat in front of the tv.  We came home from O'Maddy's at 11:30 pm in the Swoop Taxi.  This is a stretch golf cart with seating for seven plus the driver.  It's free.  You just tip the driver.  Cool idea.  Sorry I didn't get a photo.

As we walked to town, we saw Christmas decorations.  This one has a naughty and nice list on the pole to left.

Happy Captain in his Tech sweater.

The sun is sneaking out between layers of clouds again as I write.  I bet we get a good sunset.  

Chores done; waiting for ACC Championship Game.

The weather here is delightful:  warm, sunny, and breezy.  Today we did some chores in Gulfport. I put the second coat of paint on my kitchen stool.  I bought this stool on the day of our crossing.  Just walked across the street from the Carrabelle marina and begged a gift store to sell it to me. I was a bit desperate.  The stool was a bit rickety, but it was our seat for the lower helm.  The store owner let me pay $40 for it.  Now it has two coats of Harbor Blue.

George built around his computer, so it will be secure when we bounce on the gulf.  He also added a wooden brace to the wall beside our shelf. We can bungee the baskets onto the shelf, so they won't fall off.  We hope these changes mean our belongings can stay in place as we travel.  When we made the crossing, we put most things on the floor.  Still we had some banging and crashing when we hit the waves poorly.

Here's a panoramic view of the "great room." (Ha!)  This is our study, dining room, kitchen, and living room.  See the baskets with bungee cord on the left; then the fridge and kitchen; and the lower helm with its wheel.  George is sitting at his desk, working at his computer.  He does some CAD work, which he enjoys and which brings in marina money.

Last night we missed the Christmas boat parade.  However, we did see two boats parading through our marina.  They were loaded with children, which was festive.  Just like riding on a float at home.  Plus these actually do float!

I'm trying to hang our Christmas lights, but the directions say not to hang on metal.  What?  I may just hang on the clothesline with our prayer flags.  We're heading downtown in a couple of hours to go the O'Maddy's and watch the game, surrounded by Florida State folks.  Hope they are jolly.

Back on the Boat

We returned to Aunt Aggie last evening just before dark.  We unloaded our rental car quickly and decided to have a welcome home drink and watch the sunset.  This is the view from the boat:

Then we went out to walk around town.  We needed to stretch our legs, so we parked and walked a few blocks.  Lots of folks were around, even though it was a Thursday. 

There are four volleyball courts right in town.  They seem to have a league.   So here we were in December, watching people playing volleyball in their swimsuits.

We heard reggae music from an upstairs deck and went up there for nachos.  There was a musician playing tunes.  The air was soft, and the night was friendly.  A woman entered and began to dance.  Another woman and I joined her.  It just felt right.  

Today we have done lots of chores:  unpacking, grocery shopping, painting a kitchen stool, cleaning up.  George also did two hours of drafting work.  This bird has shared our day.  He perches on our stern line and makes loud, crackling commentary.  Perhaps he moved in while we were gone and is unhappy about our return.  He's not easily moved.  

He is an immature cormorant.  He has a pink throat and brown furry neck.

Tonight Ed and Laura Parvin, who live in Dunedin this winter, are coming for drinks.  Then we're going to watch the Christmas boat parade in St. Petersburg.  Decorating your boat for Christmas is a thing.  I bought some lights today at Ace Hardware along with harbor blue paint for the stool.  (The unveiling will be tomorrow.)   Happy Friday!