Stuck in Warderick Wells

 

 

I mentioned in my last post that, when we were in Highbourne Cay Marina, it rained for the first time in a month. No rain during April and May is the norm here for this time of year but since we've arrived in the Bahamas that wonderful trend has gone by the wayside. The day before we finally departed Warderwick Wells, Hans had to put on his foul weather gear in order to go ashore and pay for our mooring ball.

Before all this unexpected rain we left Highbourne Cay and sailed (finally! even if we only moved at about 3 knots we were sailing) to Norman's Cay where we anchored and Hans snorkeled around a plane wreck. I gave it my best shot but there's just something totally creepy about things being under water that shouldn't be there. Once over the side of the dinghy I only had to take one peek at that wreck to know this was not happening for me. Getting back into the dinghy created a special challenge and Hans had to hoist me from behind where I ended up flopping around the floor like a landed fish. So while I sat in the dinghy and sizzled in the sun, Hans then snorkeled around and through the wreckage, and would gleefully call out, "I just went through the fuselage! You should see it!" "Wow, the wings are still attached! You should see them!" "A whole school of fish is swimming with me! You should see them!" Needless to say there was no joyous response from me and as the tide was starting to turn it was time for Hans to get back in the dinghy, and he couldn't. I ended up creating a foot hold by tying a loose line from the stern to the bow. By placing a foot on the line (which was now just under the water) Hans was able to boost himself out of the water and it was his turn to flounder around the floor. A ladder would be nice but we like to do things the hard way.

The next day we anchored at Hawksbill Cay which is rumored to be one of the prettiest islands in the Exumas and apparently rife with attractions including things like ruins, and a cave. I'd like to be able to corroborate this, but being the lazy people we are, we didn't feel like going through the whole nearly hour long 'preparing the dinghy and motor for launch' procedure and spent the day reading and drinking in the cockpit.

Which brings us to Exuma Park in Warderick Wells. We sailed (I think we were moving at around 2 knots by then but we were sailing!) into the north field with the intention of; A) buying a days worth of internet ($15.00) in order to get weather info, and; B) there's a snorkeling area there that Hans wanted to explore. Two days max, we said, and we'll be on our way.

One week later we were still there. I kid you not. Poseidon and Mother Nature got together this spring and they've been having a blast vexing the Bahamian waters. Each and every day has brought a new forecast of 'weather' due to hit, and this particular mooring field, protected from every direction, was the place to be.

We arrived on a Saturday which happens to coincide with the once weekly held scheduled cocktail hour on the beach. But don't think that schedule kept the twenty or so of us cruising boats, stuck here for all the other days, from holding our own get together every single other night. And what a perfect place to be stuck. We were all a very short dinghy ride away from shore and everyone enjoyed snorkeling in Ranger's Garden (even me, but that's because I didn't see the reef shark darting about here and there) and leaving driftwood mementos with our boat's names at BooBoo Hill.

Our driftwood offering on BooBoo Hill

Our two day plan stretched to a week when we heard forecasts of 50-60 knot winds due to hit and since Warderwick Wells is so heavily protected we stayed. Thankfully, the winds didn't reach that level but we did get gusts of 30 knots. Finally, the day after all of us cruisers were stuck on our boats (thus cancelling our Happy Hour on the beach) due to stormy weather, we all dropped our mooring lines and headed south.

And into even more weather.

 

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Shakedown Cruise # ?

 

The entrance to Fort Jefferson. This is where Dr. Mudd spent four years (all he served) of his life sentence.

 

I'm way behind on posting because we ended up in the Twilight Zone that is otherwise known as the Dry Tortuga's where there is no wi-fi or telephone coverage.

Up to that point we anchored in Bahia Honda (where we dragged anchor. Again), and at Stock Island (where we didn't drag because we were literally sitting on the bottom). We finally got to Key West where I was able to walk Wilbur to a vet and where he then collapsed on the way back to the dinghy dock because he just can't take the heat. We were meeting friends in Key West that day and thank god Hans was with them because he and Bob and Rose were able to find me and Wilbur with their air conditioned vehicle and we all ended up going to lunch. They also took us on a quick provisioning run. You gotta love these friends from the 'burgh (Pittsburgh for those who don't know what I'm talking about)!

At anchor in Stock Island. Actually, no anchor necessary.

 

There was a tri-maran anchored next to us in the Dry Tortuga's and its owners response to our question as to where he was headed to next was, "I'm not sure yet, I just bought this boat and I'm on a shakedown cruise." I made the mistake of laughing and said that as far as I was concerned, every day on the water is a shakedown cruise.

The fort is surrounded by a moat even on the gulf. This was to keep enemy vessels at bay.

 

From inside the fort. Hans is in silhouette while you can just see our Knotty Cat at anchor in the distance.

Wilbur was able to romp about on the beach here (on his leash of course).

 

Aother view of the moat.

 

We departed the Tortuga's the next day hoping that the forecasted N-NE winds would give us a smooth ride back to the Marquesas. The first two hours were rolly beyond belief. At my seat in the cockpit I'd find myself nearly lying on my back one moment and the next second almost standing upright (and remember we're on a catamaran!). Poor Wilbur (who refuses to go below while we're underway) really put his sea legs to use and swayed like a little hula dancer everytime he tried to walk and I actually had to hold onto him while he ate his breakfast in order to keep him in one place. If I'd had my camera on hand, the video I could've taken of him using his potty patch would surely have gone viral. As he hunched up to do his business, his rear end dramatically sashayed from side to side while little turds spilled and rolled about. What a dog though! everything stayed on the patch and he even managed to quick-step over his output without stomping in it.

I gave him a 10 and a gold medal.

This is just a random pic of Wilbur doing his business with a very noisy generator blasting in his face. He's 'da bomb!"

 

We picked up this poor little castaway in the Marquesas. Can you see the fishing line emerging from his beak?

I swear he's asking us to help him.

The seas finally calmed down enough to throw out a fishing line (no success) and after eight hours of motor sailing we were anchored. Yaaay! Shower time! and right in the middle of rinsing my hair I lost water pressure. I thought my shower head was acting up again but then Hans suffered the same problem in his shower (not that he cares what his hair looks like) and we figured our water pump had crapped out on us. This very same issue happened in 2010 during our first attempt at living aboard and I remember nearly coming unglued and I may have even cried and said I couldn't live this way. This time around I simply asked Hans if he remembered where our spare water pump was and then we discovered we'd drained our water tank. We switched over to the other tank and everything was fine. I have to admit I was a bit surprised that we'd used up 70 gallons of water (I'm quite the miser when it comes to water consumption on the Knotty Cat), but at the end of the day; after a week of washing dishes, rinsing salt water off of us and a very sandy pit bull after every single dinghy ride, etc... took its toll on our reserves.

The next day we decided we would motor (no wind what-so-ever) two whole hours (snore) to Boca Grande Key (we passed it by on our trip to the Tortuga's) where we would do absolutely nothing but relax. Then we woke up to nearly dead batteries and figured out our badly damaged solar panel connections had bought the farm and were actually draining our batteries. We decided as soon as we got to Boca Grande, Hans would hard wire the solar panels until we could get new connectors.

In Boca Grande when we dropped the hook and shut down the engines a piercing alarm from the helm went off. This is something that has never happened to us and no matter how much Hans jiggled the ignition key that damn thing kept screaming at us. After restarting and then shutting down the port engine it finally stopped.

And then it started again.

We shut absolutely everything down and with the solar panels taking a back seat to the shrieking alarm, Hans ripped the helm apart while I defrosted the refrigerator, again (I'd defrosted it just 2 weeks prior while at sail). At one point I was upside down inside the refrigerator when I heard Hans say, "I always thought this wheel could come off." I didn't even bother to come up for air to look.

This is a first for me.

Hans finally decided to sever the wire that leads to the 'speaker' for the alarm. He explained why this was an okay thing to do and I said "fine" and would he "please hardwire those damn solar panel connectors so all the meat in the freezer doesn't melt!"

So this is what we did on what we'd thought was going to be a relaxing day. We're still not sure if our batteries are okay or not, whether the job he did on the solar panels worked, or if disabling the alarm was a smart thing to do. I will say that I'm very glad we bought that Honda 2000 generator as it's been a life (if not a sanity) saver.

Friends of ours who were in the Bahamas recently, posted on Facebook. The caption under their pictures read:

"Cruising means fixing your boat in exotic places."

Not a new saying by any means but for those of us living it, that says it all.

-----------------------------------------------

 

Update: the solar panels still don't work. We know the panels are sending juice to the controller but it seems to stop there. Maybe. It's all too confusing. And I've also noticed the refrigerator doesn't seem to ever cycle off. And the water pump? Hmmm, it's working but it doesn't seem to have the oomph it used to.

 

After a long sweaty day of digging around a hot engine room and tracing wires into the tiniest of places, we called it a day. I went down below after clearing up the cockpit and came to a dead stop. "Who the hell stinks?" I exclaimed in an accusing tone and suddenly realized Hans had just emerged from his head where he'd taken a shower. I then took my own personal sniff test and marched myself off for a shower. It may just drizzle but at least I can now stand myself.

So, yeah boy, we're livin' the dream alright.

Possibly the first sun'rise' picture I've ever taken.

In the Tortuga's.

I couldn't sleep.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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On the move again

A dreary day in Lemon Bay (you can't see it in this picture but it was raining)

Nothing of great importance happening here these days. Although due to very strong winds we did stay at our anchorage in Lemon Bay for a day longer than planned. We arrived on a very pretty day with no wind. The next day was ugly, overcast, and rainy so we stayed put and since the solar panels and the wind generator were getting a break we sat around and read all day. And then, Wow, during the night the wind kicked in and we woke up to waves slamming against the Knotty Cat, the wind generator shrieking with glee (or perhaps agony), and the solar panels straining at their harnesses (thank God we'd tied them down tightly the night before). Several times during the day we turned on the helm pod to gauge the wind strength and compare it to all the weather apps and forecasts we read each day. We were seeing consistant 20 to 25 knot winds. I'm sure they gusted higher at times because poor Windy would groan and shudder and shut down when she started pumping more than 15 amps into our batteries.

But holy cow, with all the power we were getting from the wind and the sun that day we actually turned on our inverter (something we never do unless we have shore power or are running the generator) and watched TV and made ice at the same time. All.day.long. and the batteries never went below 13. We did try a little experiment and attempted heating water but that was a no go. As the afternoon wore on and the wind showed no inclination of dying down we finally rolled up the solar panels. We were getting hit with a north wind and it was so cold we completely shut the boat up and fought over who got to sit beside Wilbur (our heating blanket) in the salon. Needless to say he slept in between us last night.

But what a difference a day can make. We woke up this morning to virtually no wind and a cloudless sky. After our morning coffee (somewhere in the vicinity of noon) we cranked up the engines and even though I was worried the anchor might be buried, it came up very nicely.

Nine miles later we came upon our next anchorage and just like that we were set once again. Those two hours were just enough for our engines to heat our water and we both got the first showers we've had since Sunday (maybe TMI but this is life on a boat). This is a tiny little spot and it's surrounded by homes not dissimilar to the anchorage we tried to enjoy in Miami 4 years ago. Active Captain has given it rave reviews and so far no police or angry citizens have approached. We have no desire to overstay our welcome and hope to dinghy to a state park for poor neglected Wilbur and also dinghy up a channel that's rumored to be within walking distance of a Publix.

A pretty, new anchorage

The only other boat anchored here.

It promises to be an interesting day or two.

Tonight's sunset

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Saving money while at sea...

... and yet one more colossal myth of the life of a liveaboard has been debunked.

But it seemed like such a logical idea. No rent, cable TV, utilities, car insurance., Just us, the dog, the boat, a few provisioning runs, and some diesel. Dear God, the savings were going to abound!

Actually, the savings were going to abound if we could get the hell off the dock and therefore keep me out of the stores. Because you see, when you realize you're really going to cast off those lines for good and head out into the wild blue yonder, you really get the urge to shop. At least I did, and normally I detest shopping. But each and every day that brought us closer to launch I'd run (literally as we no longer had a vehicle) to the Dollar Tree (poor Hans was initially puzzled as to why I felt the need to buy 10 solar lights and a child's sand bucket. BTW, he's now been brought into the light), the Winn-Dixie, CVS, or Wal-Mart. It's like you think you'll never see another store again.

My Dollar Tree solar lights at work on our stern

So, with our boat packed to the brim with provisions we finally left our marina and motored a whole half hour to Boca Ciega Bay where we spent the night at anchor. Mostly, we wanted to make sure our new propellors and raw water cooling pumps were in working order before we made the big break. The next day we headed on out into the gulf and enjoyed a beautiful sail and came into the Longboat Key inlet (supposedly tricky but it was well marked). After the bridge opening we carefully (and yes, this part is a bit tricky, just follow your chart and motor along parallel to the bridge) found our way into the achorage at Moore's Crab Shack and dropped the hook.

At anchor in Longboat Key

We were so close to the docks that a dinghy ride certainly seemed to be the order of the day. At least that's what an anxious Wilbur told us, so off we went. Until our dinghy motor died, and died, and died. It never did come back to life and we ended up rowing. Not such a big deal and after a minor skirmish with some mangroves and trying to keep Wilbur from jumping out, we finally unloaded at a dock and had lunch where Wilbur enjoyed some fish paste (mine) and salty sticks (Hans' french fries). Once we were back on the boat we knew there was no way we'd be rowing on back in for the Superbowl (at night with the wind and the tide) and we were able to get our digital TV antenna working right about half time, not that it really mattered.

The trouble maker being towed behind us

We stayed for one more day (crappy weather) and then continued our way south. Before leaving we made arrangements for the Dinghy Motor Doctor to meet us in Sarasota and three hours later we pulled into Marina Jack's where he took her (note, anything that causes trouble on the boat is automatically labeled 'she') off our hands. Marina Jack's has a huge mooring field (we've stayed there twice) but we ended up in the tiny anchorage just north of the marina. Wow! We were saving about thirty dollars a day and boy were we excited. Of course this doesn't count the money we spent on diesel, ice, fuel additives, lunch out, and a trip to Publix (a nice one mile walk).

At anchor beside Marina Jack's in Sarasota

Wilbur has been doing his best to adapt to our new lifestyle. He's been really good about getting his 'business' done on the potty patch regardless of the generator being right in his face. But he does burn a lot of nervous energy during the day and when we're on the move he will not go down below and instead, shivers and pants in the cockpit. Once we drop the anchor he'll gobble down his dinner and pass out in our bunk. It's very strange and almost lonely to spend the evening without a dog snoring in the salon. Our last day in Sarasota was extremely stressful for Wilbur when we left him alone (unforgivable sin in his pitty book) while we walked to Publix and then to add insult to injury we locked him down below when the Dinghy Motor Doctor showed up with our outboard. You see, a dinghy, to Wilbur, is just like a car to other dogs and if he thinks for one second we might try to go for a ride without him he goes nuts. Needless to say we didn't want him screaming like a tasmanian devil at the good doctor.

A nervous and cold pitty

With the motor and its rebuilt carburetor and new fuel line now returned I went down below to check on the little man only to find him puking on the floor of our berth. I totally felt his pain and would have gladly puked with him as we had just received the doctor's final bill.

To the tune of $551.00.

So at the end of the day, we've been gone one week, we've spent over $700.00, and we've moved a whopping twenty miles.

At this pace our retirement funds will be gone by the time we get to the Bahamas.

Let the savings begin!

A warm and happy pitty

 

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Shake Up Cruise (Day 3 &4)

 

With a storm rushing in this guy was trying to get home fast

 

Holiday weekends.

I guess I've been out of touch for too long and forgot how much I hate them.

But thanks to the past couple of days, I've been brought back up to speed (speed being the operative word here).

First of all, I had Day 3's post all ready to go when BAM! I deleted it. So now I'm back to sqaure one so I'll just combine two days into one and call it a day.

We spent a full day on Monday motoring down the gulf because there was no wind. That didn't stop Hans from putting up our brand new main because when you have a brand new main you're itching to use it. We're very fortunate to have an electric winch and all I have to do is push a button while Hans stands by the boom and guides the sail up the mast.

Should be easy.

But when Hans had difficulty threading the halyard's shackle through the too small loop at the top of the sail he let go of the boom and TIMBAH!!!! I've know Hans long enough to recognize when he's losing his balance and heaven help you you better get out of the way. Down he went but luckily he was able to pivot a bit and instead of falling off the starboard side of the boat and doing god knows what to himself, he ended up sliding down the dodger's windshield where his butt landed right on the cleats that control the halyard and furling lines and directly in front of my face thus giving me a full and entertaining view of a very large plumber's crack. From now on I don't care how overly cautious it appears, he's going to wear his life vest when hoisting the main (and perhaps a belt).

We exited the gulf and went into the Longboat Key pass. Of course it wasn't until we were finally anchored later on that I read you should only use this passage with local knowledge as it's greatly shoaled. No kidding! We saw depths of under 2 feet and we're pretty sure we scraped bottom at one point. Once we got through the bridge after fighting a very strong 2 knot current and literally weaving our way through fishing boats that insisted on motoring just feet from our bow we emerged onto one of the strangest scenes ever. It was like something out of an Ira Levin book (This Perfect Day meets Rosmary's Baby). Every kind of power boat imaginable were jockeying and jostling for position with people, kids, dogs and whatnot, crawling on and off and over and around like starving ants at a picnic. We hooked a left turn and got out of there as fast as the Knotty Cat could go.

Motoring through the Intracoastal to our anchorage meant zigzagging for about 15 miles through all the wake created while once again every idiot with a motor boat had to see how fast they could blast past us. Add to that all the jet skis buzzing us like angry wasps, needless to say we were very happy to get to our anchorage.

A lot of wind and rain cooled things down

We ended up with a late afternoon storm on Monday night. Our anchor held nicely through 27 knot winds, and Windy our generator was in heaven pumping up to 15 amps into our batteries. We did start our engines though 'just in case' since this was a new anchorage for us, and Wilbur sat very quietly through the whole thing.

 

Tuesday was a much quieter day as most of the motor heads must have gone back to work. We headed into Marina Jacks in Sarasota and picked up a mooring for the night. We put the dinghy in the water with minimal drama and the only casualty was a boat hook that we dropped but luckily it floats and we got it back. We ended up eating dinner at O'Leary's which is pet friendly and Wilbur enjoyed attention from many fans and was rewarded with his own water bowl and salty sticks (french fries).

Of course another storm was brewing so we finished up quickly and took off in the dinghy back to the boat. Just in time too, because the skies opened up and we could barely see the boats beside us.

 

So after a pleasantly cool night we will be leaving the mooring and heading to another anchorage just a short distance away. It's actually in a tiny body of water surrounded by huge 'estates'.

Why do I wonder what they're going to think of the Knotty Cat dirtying the view. I'll let you know.

So far this has been a very memorable Memorial Day Weekend.

 

This is Wilbur's favorite perch while underway. That's the captain's cooler and it's full of ice. It makes a comfy spot for a hot pitty.

 

 

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Shake Up Cruise (Day One)

 

At least one good moment

 

Hans finally managed to get a week of vacation and we decided to use it and take a small cruise down towards Caya Costa. We haven't gone away on the boat for more than a weekend since Thanksgiving of 2012 which I fondly recall as 'The Turkey Tour'. This trip is going to be remembered as the Shake Up Cruise (we've already experienced a couple of shake down cruises, this one is just shaking me up).

And just like the Turkey Tour where we managed to run aground within the first few miles and Hans broke a tooth, we've already had our first brush with excitement at our anchorage just around the corner from our marina. We had been sitting here on the hook for just a couple of hours and I thought I should write something on our blog to commemorate our first day of vacation but what's to write about sitting in an achorage you've sat in a bazillion times before?

And then honest to god, I'd just fired up my iPad when I heard Hans say, "What the hell?" I looked up and noticed a dinghy floating a few feet behind us and stupidly asked, "Why isn't there anyone in that dinghy?" And then I realized it was ours. Our painter had simply come apart in the middle and and the dinghy was bobbing away from us in a very jaunty see you later kinda way.

Everything happened at once; Hans jumped into his swimsuit, I opened the lazarette and dug around for his flippers, and Wilbur got in everyone's way. At first it appeared the dinghy was right behind us and not moving but in that minute or so of scrambling around it had drifted quite far from our stern. Hans leaped off the boat and took off swimming. And wouldn't you know it, Wilbur scrambled down the steps and only paused for a moment before he did his best Underdog impression and took a great dramatic leap into the water. Hans couldn't hear me yelling to him and found out the hard way that Wilbur had followed him when great big pitty paws raked down his back. I grabbed my camera and got a couple of quick videos but I had to put it down because things weren't going well.

Hans had to keep fending Wilbur off and then he had to turn around and swim back toward the boat in order to get Wilbur to come back to me. While I was yanking the dog back onto the boat I had to point Hans in the direction of where one of his flippers was floating because of course it fell off during his fracas with Wilbur. By now the dinghy was almost a distant memory and I could barely see it on the horizon where it was heading toward the eastern shore as there was apparently some kind of dinghy party it was late getting to. Now I was starting to worry about sharks (I always worry about sharks) and Hans was getting harder for me to see. I shot down below and turned on the instruments in case I was going to need to broadcast our location and when I came back up my heart jumped into my throat when I didn't see Hans. It took a moment but I spotted that bald head and he was still no where close to the dinghy. My heart jumped again when he turned around and waved his hands over his head in what I thought was a distress signal. I was about to grab the radio but I could see he was making good progress back to the Knotty Cat and soon he was back aboard. I forgot about the dinghy for a minute when I saw Hans' lip bleeding and his chest and back covered in bloody welts thanks to Wilbur's lifesaving efforts. If I'd been worried about sharks before... As for his arm waving, Hans was trying to tell me he couldn't see the dinghy and was trying get me to point it out. I'm just as glad I didn't know what he wanted because he was never going to get there on his own, and even if he did the current was so strong I don't know how he could have rowed back.

Wilbur was frantic and screaming up a storm while Hans was in the water and I had to tie him up to keep him from jumping back in

 

While getting the anchor up I managed to keep an eye on the dinghy and by now it was nearly on shore but still in water deep enough for us to manage. We were pretty close when a sailboat motored right past, snagged it for us and then shoved it to us as they went by. I caught it with a boat hook and secured it to the stern. Needless to say when we re-anchored that sucker got trussed up tighter than its ever been.

 

After his lip stopped bleeding

 

What a mess

 

By the time things settled down the boat was filthy. Wilbur shook salty dog hair everywhere, for some reason the floor of the cockpit was covered in muddy water, and all the stuff that I'd yanked from the lazarette was tossed everywhere.

When we finally got everthing squared away Hans stated, "Well, this was day one and we're only a couple of miles into this journey, what do you suppose will happen tomorrow?"

He probably shouldn't have asked that.

 

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Happy New Year's Eve (I Hope)!!

Wilbur does his sniffy thing at our anchorage

I'm attemping to use Blogsy from my iPad and I'm not feeling too good about it. Here's keeping my fingers crossed that I can actually post.

After a quick trip to Publix this morning I have to tell you I feel far safer here at anchor than on land. Something I've learned since moving to the land of Newly Wed's and Nearly Dead's is this; keep clear of all Cadillacs. This is because whether parked or in motion, those that are parked may soon leap into motion and those that are already in motion don't have a clue as to where they are going and often mistake the accelerator for the brake. But let's not discriminate here. The occupants of all the other vehicles are either on their cell phones, texting, and the true multi-taskers are texting in addition to swooshing their fingers over their iPads (and you can't blame them as concentrating on the road must be so boring).


So after dodging a couple of Cadillacs in Publix's parking lot alone and then wading my way through a myriad of people just to get a couple of very necessary items (bourbon and beer) I was hugely relieved to arrive back at the boat where Hans had everything ready for a quick getaway.

Now, I've taken the boat out of the slip quite successfully a few times now and I had no doubt I'd be able to do it again today. But I didn't count on the fact that the Knotty Cat loves an audience and she hates to be taken for granted. And after today's launching I have a feeling that our new neighbors on our port side with their beautiful Beneteau, and the captain on the boat directly across from us (and right in our forward path) whose huge frightened eyes still burn in my brain, are telling everyone in our marina to stay clear of the crazy blond on the Island Packet Cat.

So yes, I do feel safer at anchor right now but imagine how the poor folks at our marina feel knowing that we'll be coming back in tomorrow.

 

Turkey Tour (Day Three)

Once we finally got to our Anchorage in Mandalay Channel and dropped the hook we decided instead of getting up early the next day and heading on to the next anchorage all of 2 hours away, we'd just stay put and enjoy the day.

  

For anyone wishing to go to Mandalay, go at high tide (we went in 2 hours after low tide and left 3 hours before low tide). Where our charts showed 13 feet we saw 5,  where they showed 7 we saw less than 3. Steer very clear of red markers 10 and 12, and follow the narrow channel on your chart plotter.

This trimaran was having a blast in the 15 or so knots of wind whipping around the anchorage.

Enjoying the strong winds

Captain Hans takes it easy

Wilbur and I relaxing in the cockpit

My new best friend sitting at the stern. A GENERATOR!!!

We played rummy (I won!), Scrabble (I won!), drank some very good coffee (with Bailey's of course), napped, and then ran our new generator for a while so I could make ice (anyone who knows me knows I need coffee and ice) and just generally get to use power while anchored.

We were worried that Wilbur might not like where we placed the generator since it's right behind his potty patch .  We were happy to find that need over rode fear and I have to admit I laughed when from where I stood in the companionway it would appear that Wilbur was literally kissing the generator as he hunched up to do his business (always with his back to us, he likes his privacy!).

Next stop, Tarpon Springs.

Daytona Beach

Well, just a bit further from Daytona.

We ended up at Seven Seas Marina in Port Orange yesterday and it's a bargain at 90 cents per foot! It's family owned and has been in business for around 30 years. The docks are fixed as opposed to floating but if you tie up properly there are no problems. It's also a DIY yard and they have a nice ship store.

They have one bathroom each for men and women but it's shared by Pat's Riverfront Diner which is open from 7 AM to 2 PM. We had breakfast there this morning and they appear to have a lot of business and I noticed it was packed until they closed.

However the showers (with fantastic water pressure) are in the bathroom too, so unless you feel comfortable locking the customers out while you get cleaned up, it would be a kindness to them to wait until the diner closes in order to use the facilities. The washer and dryer are located in the entry way to the potties and you can say "Hey" to people as they pass by. The staff is just as friendly as can be and will even take you to Publix, at no charge, so you can stock up.

Today, when Bob dropped me off at the store it was a muggy 80 degrees. A half hour later when I called for him to come and pick me up, the temperature had dropped into the 50's, icy sheets of rain were slashing through the parking lot sideways, and horror of all horrors the lottery machine was down due to high winds! When I got back to the boat Hans told me he'd clocked the winds at 36 knots.
Tornado warnings had been issued and I'm glad we weren't at an anchorage.

Anyway I love a Mom and Pop kind of place so this really worked for me.

Just one of the many bridges here in Florida.

Colorful chairs along the ICW.

Yesterday I was worried about finding a good anchorage between St. Augustine and Daytona but luckily Greg, from Harvey, found a nice little place at a now defunct cement plant and he let us know that he saved a spot for us.

After we got ourselves settled in he rowed on over in his dinghy and we had crackers, wine, and cheese.

Wilbur loves company and after a wild welcome, settled himself down and snored the whole way through happy hour.

I forgot to take a picture!

Greg's dinghy can be folded for easy storage.

Hans had considered one of these at one point but I told him I would never get into anything that resembled a row boat with him!

Been there done that!

This was one of the calmest anchorages we've had since entering the ICW.

Tomorrow we hope to get as far as Titusville.

Wish us luck!

On the Lighter Side

Happy Hans the Traveling Salesman shows off his boo-boo.

As I looked at this picture, I was like... what the hell is that on Hans' head? And then I realized that peeking over his hat is a stuffed fish (designed to hold CD's) that's sitting in a basket on the shelf behind him.

Woe is me, I'll never make a living as a photographer.




Where's Wilbur?

Yesterday was a cold, gloomy day (we motored a whole foggy 13 miles before anchoring), and Wilbur, who usually spends his days in the cockpit (second guessing Hans' navigation), went below and hid under his blanket.








It's been years since I've played Monopoly and it may be many more years before I attempt it again after the other night (which I won't go into at this time), and I was thrilled to find that the tokens haven't changed a bit.



Hans was the battleship (go figure), I was the thimble, and Wilbur was the dog (go figure once again!).

Wilbur spots the Monopoly Dog for the very first time.

"What the hell?"

And the reaction.

"But I thought I was the only dog on this boat!"

Last night we anchored in Kilkenny Creek (GA) in heavy winds and strong currents and I'm thrilled to report that we held firm throughout the night.

Today when we realized it was going to be very windy we (I) decided to pull up to the Kilkenny Marina (just yards away from us) and spend the day changing our oil and rearranging our dinghy.

After a very busy afternoon we crated a very unhappy Wilbur (whom we could hear screaming all the way up the dock) and walked over to Marker 107.

I was expecting maybe a local watering hole (which would be fine with us) but what a beautiful place it is! The owner was there for a few minutes and mentioned that after he bought it, he fixed it up.

And fixed it up he did! Even if you're not anchoring or in need of a marina, Marker 107 is well worth the trip up Kilkenny Creek!

We shared a bowl of 'she crab' soup and a blackened grouper sandwich while looking over the waterway. Isn't it funny how peaceful the water appears to be when one observes it from on the hard as opposed to from the sea?