DeLand to Ft Myers.

Sorry again for the delay in getting this out. I left y'all hanging all fall....

The trip bringing the boat back from DeLand was also my sister Kathy's retirement cruise. That makes 2 retirement cruises in 1 year. Either we're on to a great idea or it's just that all our friends and family are getting older...not sure. Anyway, all the pictures in this post were taken by Kathy except the first and last. The first is mine because I have the longest arms.....

We left DeLand on Labor day weekend but the St. John's river had pretty light boat traffic except around the few towns along the way. This is cruising "Old Florida" and really back to nature until one gets closer to Jacksonville. The scenery along the way is fantastic but we never did get that gator picture, plenty of birds though! Like this eagle....

And plenty of Osprey.

Along with the elusive Rosetta Spoonbill. One of only 2 pink birds found in Florida (can you guess the other?)

It only took 2 days travel to arrive back in civilization and Jacksonville. We stayed again at The Marina at Ortega Landing, we really enjoy the area. It's located on the Ortega River just a bit off the St John's and a few miles from downtown. You have to pass though a very narrow draw bridge on the way and the day we left they were doing some work and could only open 1 side. It's a heck of a way to get your blood pumping in the morning!

Once past downtown the river is pretty industrial with many shipping terminals along the way as well as some really well done graffiti.

We timed our departure with the outgoing tide and it was an easy run downriver to the ICW. It was good timing as shortly after turning south we heard a "securite" call in a very proper British accent announcing the arrival of the HMS Queen Elizabeth in the St. Johns river. I've never encountered an aircraft carrier in a passing situation and didn't want to start now...it would have been cool though!

We mostly took our time heading south and spent more than one night at the towns we stopped at. Our goal was shorter travel days and more sightseeing. Most of the towns we stopped at you've seen before in this blog so I won't bore you with repeat pictures. We did get some shots of interesting things we hadn't seen before. The first was an odd thing at sunset in Daytona. While watching and photographing the sunset....

If we turned 180 degrees and looked toward the East the light made a strange "V" in the sky.

Anyone seen this before? No, it's not coming up from land, it definitely tied into the sunset and was gone when the sun was gone. Please chime in with a comment below if you know what causes this. In all our travels and all our sunset pics we've never seen it before.

The next odd thing we saw was in Titusville. We had gone to dinner and come back after sunset. It was dark as we approached the boat and were astounded to see the 4 A/C discharges exiting the boat were glowing neon blue!! It took a few seconds to realize we were looking at Bioluminescence
We had heard about it before but had never seen it. We quickly moved to the bow of the boat and you could see fish glowing blue as they swam. I took an unused dock-line and tossed one end in the water...it looked like a glowing blue snake as I pulled it back in...amazing!! We tried many ways to get a good picture without much success. Kathy was able to get one from inside the boat, ingenious!! Click on it to get a better view.

As we got close to Stuart we decided we were having too much fun to head home and continued south to spend a few days at Ft. Lauderdale. After the brief detour we headed back to Stuart and turned west toward Lake Okeechobee and home. The scenery was soon rural again and a big change from the hi-rises we had seen along the coast.

And passing the Fort Denaud swing bridge on the last day.

It was a great trip and hopefully Kathy had as much fun as we did!! We did make it home in time for the grand opening of Southern Latitudes and have been taking friends and family there ever since. If you ever get a chance to visit Naples and enjoy good beer & wine be sure to check them out!

Soooooo that's where we are for now. Been busy visiting friends and going to boat shows (just looking). In a few weeks we're having Chasing 80 hauled out for a bottom cleaning and a few other projects. Our next trip is back to the Keys for a month or so starting in early February. After that....who knows... The blog should be pretty quiet until then unless something cool happens.

Until next time...Merry Christmas!!! And remember, down here even the skinny squirrels get into the Christmas spirit....Ho, Ho, Ho...

 

Summer Fun

Well it appears the plan is holding at this point. We've enjoyed our time at the house but we're ready for more boating adventures. First a bit about our last trip.

We headed up the east coast of Florida in early June. We were lucky enough to catch a night SpaceX launch from our slip in Vero Beach. They are always so impressive at night...I won't bother posting the blurry pics, just trust me. The next day we continued north and stayed at an new marina for us very near the cape. Too bad we weren't here the night before! We got secured just before we started getting weather warnings on our phones. Luckily the marina had a nice safe bar for us to take cover in.  Note the 50 foot version of our boat to the right in the picture. That's us at the end.

Next day we were in Daytona and got to visit a bit with Jill's cousin who lives there. Hopefully we'll get to catch up more on the trip south. After a few more travel days we were in Jacksonville on the St. Johns River. They have a free city marina right by the football stadium and a brewery (go figure).

The trip upriver (south) from Jacksonville starts out with a very wide river but narrows dramatically after Lake George.

There are not many marinas for bigger boats the father upriver you travel but we found a couple in the towns of Palatka and Welaka before we landed in DeLand. In Palatka we found Angels Dinner reported to be the oldest dinner in Florida.

When we got to the St. Johns Marina in DeLand we found it to be a nice secure spot where we felt comfortable leaving the boat for a couple of months. It seems many of the boats there don't get out of the marina much but the people were friendly and the price was great!

Spanish Moss on the anchor

DeLand is only about 3 1/2 hours from the house so we were able to travel to the boat every couple of weeks and get some projects done like waxing. We also found they have a Central Florida Ale Trail with lots of brewery's close by for after work....how nice! One of the projects was brightening up the sun on the back of the boat. It's amazing how much it's faded here in the Sunshine State.

Back at the house we have had some projects too. Jill agreed to help out our friends who are opening a Brewpub in Naples called Southern Latitudes. They will have 72 beers on tap and each sign is hand painted by Jill...

Below is a shot after we test hung them but before all the trim is installed.

My little artist also decided we needed something to hang our pool towels on and came up with a creative plan...I got to build it but she did the painting! I think she has a future!! (Any advice Tim?)

So that's been what we've been up to the past couple of months. This morning my sister Kathy flew in to join us for her retirement cruise while bringing the boat back to Ft. Myers. We plan to start moving on Sunday the 2nd so check out the tracker. As always, dependent on weather....wait...the Atlantic is starting to wake up now?? This should be fun....

And finally, from the "you don't see that everyday" file. While enjoying a brewery stop in Sanford Fl these fellas popped out of the restaurant next door!!

Till next time....

Plans.....

Boaters like to joke that our plans are written in the sand at low tide. We have embraced this idea.

I posted earlier that we had "planned" on visiting the Chesapeake this summer....well, plans have changed! After our Bahamas trip and some time off for maintenance and rehab we've decided to scale it back this year.

One of the areas we had hoped to explore either on the way up or back is the St. Johns river in Florida. We've decided there isn't enough time left to see everything we had hoped to see this summer and be back in Ft. Myers by October 1. We are now on the Ortega River just outside Jacksonville and, starting tomorrow, will be heading up (south!?) the St. Johns. The "plan" is to do some sightseeing and then find a nice hurricane hole marina to leave the boat for a couple of months while we return to the house. We'll return in early September and start the trip back to Ft. Myers....at least that's the "plan".

Tune in next month and I'll recap our trip and let you all know what our "plans" are next.

Bahamas Recap

First some business...As I opened Blogger today I got a notice that the new EU compliance rules may change the way some things work in the blog. I'm not sure how links I provide will work but since I'm not really savvy on computer stuff we'll just keep doing the same thing and cross our fingers.

This installment will cover the rest of our Bahamas trip, mostly with pictures. I have to say that the weather was not as good as expected for May and we didn't get to as many places as hoped and hardly anchored at all. We're still glad to have made the trip and hope to do it again sometime in the future.

Once the winds died down we were able to leave Green Turtle Cay and around the Whale pass into the Hub of the Abaco's. This was the area we were familiar with from previous trips and really looked forward to visiting. The first stop was Great Guana Cay. We'd hoped to anchor in Fishers Bay but we arrived on a Sunday which is the day of Nippers famous pig roast. The anchorage was pretty full so we opted for the marina.

Fishers Bay

We skipped the pig roast and hung out at Grabbers where this picture was taken. Much less crowded on a Sunday. Maybe it's all the time spent on a boat or just getting older but we seem to shy away from the touristy things....

Timmy really seemed to enjoy his return to the island and the laid back lifestyle.

We stayed an extra day and went to Nippers on a less crowded Tuesday. Still good food and drinks and a great beach to snorkel.

Our next stop was Man-of War cay. It's one of our favorite islands and many boaters pass it up. There are only 2 restaurants and a few shops. It is full of hard working people who build boats and such for a living. You can still hear the faint English accent in the locals talk and the island pretty much shuts down on Sundays.

The Albury's Sail Shop makes nice bags out of sail cloth and the Albury's boat works still hand make modern center console fishing boats.

Boat shop from Chasing 80

They still use a marine rail system to pull boats up for work and storage.

We were able to explore some by dinghy and went to a quite beach on the bay side that had waves crashing across the road on the ocean side.

Jill was able to get a picture of an elusive starfish using our new camera in underwater mode...they don't like to hold still for a picture and move faster than you'd imagine.

Anytime you visit the Bahamas and think things are expensive remember how things get delivered to the islands. Below is a shot of fuel being delivered to the marina. Drive a fuel truck onto a barge and then drive the barge to the island....can't be cheap!

 Our next stop was Hopetown on Elbow Cay. This island has the famous lighthouse you can climb that is still kerosene lit and hand wound every night.

We decided to take the dinghy to visit Cracker P's for lunch and hang out at Tahiti Beach for a bit. This was about one of the nicest weather days in the past week.

The next day we walked to the lighthouse for the big climb...you can see a long way from up there and I wanted a picture of our boat. Many years ago we had done the same climb and I remember thinking that some day it would be our boat I would be taking a picture of!

Next we traveled to Marsh Harbour which is on the island of Great Abaco. This is the "mainland" in relation to all of the other cays. We stayed at the Jib Room and Marina which is home to a weekly rib night and Limbo party.

We stayed a week here due to the forecast of rain and high winds...they were right. Also during this stay I began to see signs of the seasons first tropical system (Alberto) about 10 days out. It was way too soon to tell where it would go if it actually formed but we felt it would be best to head back to the US if it really did develop.

This meant we would miss a part of the trip I was really looking forward to, anchoring in Little Harbour and visiting Pete's Pub. It's a real treat to pull into the harbor on a boat and has some great history also, check out the link (if it works). Good thing is it is on the island so we rented a car and drove down one day.

One good thing about going by car is we saw a couple of Blue Holes which we wouldn't have seen otherwise.

We also drove over to Cherokee Sound for some beach combing and a shot of the "longest wooden dock" in the Bahamas. At 770' it was build to allow the weekly mailboat to unload. I imaging everything comes by road now.

By the end of the week at Marsh Harbour Alberto was beginning to look like it would form but the forecast direction varied between hitting the Bahamas or going into the Gulf. It looked like there would be a 2 day window to get back to Florida so we began moving back toward West End.

The weather held and we were able to cross back to West Palm on May 24th just a few days shy of 1 month in the Bahamas. The last day as we were headed to West End the water was so calm you could clearly see the sea fans and coral in about 12 feet of water as we traveled.

Soooo we are now safely back in the states and traveling up the east coast of Florida. Stay tuned for a future blog where we detail our, ever changing, plans for the summer.....

Bahamas Adventure, Week One.

 It is looking like a rainy day here in the Abacos and a good time to update the Blog. The following is a recap of the first week of the adventure.

 As I mentioned in the last post we crossed from West Palm to West End on April 27th in about as nice of conditions as one could hope for. Once we were just a few miles from Florida we began to feel the effects of the Gulf Stream trying to push us north as we headed east. We had to adjust course to the south to compensate and lost a bit of speed but not too bad overall. Once in the deep waters of the Atlantic the water turned a beautiful Indigo Blue.

 If you go to the "Locate Us" link the track is shown and you can see speed and course information on each dot. There is a wiggle later in the day and, no, we weren't drinking! As we got closer to West End we had to cross a major shipping lane and there were several large freighters crossing our path. I had to adjust course and speed to be sure we passed well clear of them. Kinda like playing Frogger in a boat.

 As I said in the last post we got into West End and cleared Customs and Immigration very easily. The first order of business after that was to take down the yellow Quarantine flag and hoist the Bahamas Courtesy flag we will be flying while here...and maybe hoist a beer.

 We were soon greeted by the local Conch Man and ordered our first Conch Salad which was made right next to the boat. We really are in the Bahamas!!

 The next morning we left West End and headed to Great Sail Cay. There is nothing on this island but it's a very protected anchorage and about half way to Green Turtle Cay which would be our first marina stop in the Abacos. The trip this day was not nearly as nice with 2-3 foot swells on our beam which caused us to rock n roll all day. The protected anchorage was very smooth and relaxing. As we approached we were greeted by 2 boats we had met while on the Great Loop. What a small world and great to see Crazy Love and Rowe Boat again!! This is shaping up to be a fun trip!!!

Our New Royal Marsh Harbour YC Burgee

  We left early the next morning for the 60 mile run to Green Turtle Cay. As we got into what is called the Sea of Abaco the water really began to take on that familiar Bahamas color you see in all the ads.

 We got in to the Leeward Yacht Club mid afternoon and took some time to enjoy the pool and congratulate each other on making it to the Abacos on our own boat! Jill and I have been to the Abacos several times but never to Green Turtle Cay. There is a shallow bar that crosses the Sea of Abaco just south of Green Turtle which causes you to go out to the Atlantic before re-entering the Sea. We were never allowed to use this pass in rental boats. It can build up a dangerous roll if waves are out of the east. In fact that was the forecast for the next several days so we settled in to the marina for a week.

 With the winds out of the east the leeward side of the island was calm and we were able to enjoy dinghy rides to visit other boaters and do some snorkeling. Our friend Gabi on Crazy Love joined us for a ride to snorkel in a quite bay. There are turtles that swim right up to you looking for a handout...they move along pretty quickly if you don't have food for them.

 Being "stuck" in Green Turtle Cay  for a week turned out to be a good thing. They were having their annual Island Roots Festival the following weekend. It was a nice event with food vendors and bands. We were treated to a performance by the Royal Bahamas Police Force Band which was fun. I took a nice video however found out later the microphone was turned off...it kinda looses something without the sound. Here's a still pic instead.

 We also got to catch up with our Looper friends as well as meet new boater friends.

 We really enjoyed our week in Green Turtle and will, most likely, stop again on our way home. The day before we left the winds switched from east to west which would make our passage around Whale Cay much more pleasant. Unfortunately the winds had us pinned to the face dock with boats close in front of and behind us. The dock-master quickly suggested the pontoon boat and, for the first time ever, we had a "tug" assist us off the dock! I will say it went rather smoothly considering. Once out it was an easy 2 hour day to Great Guana Cay. This is where we'll pick up in the next installment.

 If you ever have the chance to visit Green Turtle Cay (and I hope you do) be very careful if you rent a golf cart to get around. The "roads" are not what we're used to in the states!!