The last travel day for a while

Wednesday June 19 we awoke at 0430 (that's zero-dark-thirty for you USMC-types) to buzzing and flashing lights.  We were having severe power surges from the dock shore power connection!  As we ran around the boat turning off electrical equipment, I thought "That's all we need is to fry our two air conditioning units, with 95 degree Florida summer days!"  As I was turning off the main circuit breaker to shore power, I saw our voltmeter jumping between 100 VAC and 200+ VAC.  Sue smelled the unmistaken acrid odor of something electrical burning.  We scurried around the boat with our flashlights trying to find the source of the odor, and finally located it around the TV/DVD player cabinet. There was no fire, but the odor lingered.  I disconnected shore power, started the on-board generator & turned circuit breakers back on, one by one.  Fortunately, the only thing that got fried was a surge protector, protecting the TV/DVD.  For once, things worked as advertised!

Since everyone was now wide awake, we got ready to leave.  As we left Manatee Pocket, we saw this boat anchored in the entrance, selling live bait to the fishermen heading offshore that morning.  Lots of lazy pelicans surrounding the bait boat were looking for breakfast.  "We're not in Kansas any more, Toto".  (You can click on the picture to see a larger view).

We exited the St Lucie River at the junction of the Okeechobee Waterway and the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, right at the St Lucie Inlet to the Atlantic Ocean.  This intersection can have strong tidal currents & rough water, but this morning it was pleasantly calm.  We turned north and started counting down the miles on the AICW.  (Mile Mark 0.0 is at Norfolk VA).

The wide, calm AICW

The AICW was wide and calm, but the dredged channel for us was pretty narrow.  Had to continually watch the red & green markers, except that one time when we went "bump" on the bottom!  Austin was driving at the time, so we blamed it all on him!  After all, he had been aboard the boat for 1/2 a day & should have known everything by then!

We had to watch the tides & currents as we passed the ocean inlets between the barrier islands, because the direction and speed of the currents changed frequently.  It could either add or subtract 1.0 mph to our progress.  At one point going under a bridge, the current was about 2.5 mph from behind. 

We finally made Telemar Bay Marina at Satellite Beach FL, just south of Cape Canaveral.  Austin was ready to hit the beach, having had enough of being a sailor (his dad is career Air Force).  His parents picked us all up & we went to their house for dinner and air conditioning.  We'll keep the boat at this marina for a month, while we retrieve our car from Clearwater FL, then drive north to Ohio to care for an uncle, and then to TN to care for Sue's mother.  We also need to plan where we're gonna cruise to next.  TO BE CONTINUED...............

Finally, the East Coast!!



He brought our morning coffee & newspaper!

We got underway early on June 18 in order to get thru the Moore Haven Lock before the big boat left at 0730.  As we were "Making all necessary preparations for getting underway" (as the bosun's mate on the Navy ships say), we saw several alligators swim very close to the boat.  They were our alarm clock. 

Lake Okeechobee collects run-off from central Florida & the water is used for many purposes.  Lake levels fluctuate between 11-14' above sea level.  There are locks on both sides of the lake, controlling the water flow into the Atlantic and into the Gulf of Mexico.  All the locks on the OWW have small lifts/drops - from 1-1/2' to 13'.  All of them change their water level by slightly opening the upstream lock doors to let the water pour in.  This is much simpler than the locks on the Tennessee River, but the process creates quite a bit of turbulence inside the lock.  We got caught exiting one lock when tried to depart before all the turbulence settled.  The Admiral started getting quite excited!

Locking thru with the "big boat".  He had "cheaters" -
bow & stern thrusters.

As we traveled the canal leading to the Lake, we saw typical swamp creatures - lots of alligators, herons, egrets, ospreys, etc.  Kinda like living back in our house in the swamp outside New Orleans.  Lake O. itself was wide and shallow (8-12' deep).  We were careful about the weather (we had read so much about how the Lake would get rough quickly because of the shallow depth), and enjoyed a SE breeze at 10 mph.  By the time we got to the last lock, the 101' Hargrave had caught up to us, so we locked thru with them.

The "big boat" passing by

The "little boat" getting passed "on the two whistle"

Entering the St Lucie River, we saw depths of only 6' (our boat draws 4.5'), since we were at low tide.  The big boat ahead of us was skimming the bottom as they went thru.  By the time we came to the bay around Stuart FL, the afternoon on-shore winds had kicked up to 15-20 mph, so we started taking salt spray all over the boat again (welcome back to the salt water).  We found Manatee Pocket on the east side of Stuart & followed the well-marked channel to Stuart Yacht Sales, a sponsor of America's Great Loop Cruiser's Association who was offering a FREE DOCK to Loopers passing through.

FINALLY!  We made it to the east coast! We secured the boat for the night & tried to cool down.  After traveling 80 miles, locking through 3 locks, in 95F temperatures, we were hot & tired.  Later that night, we had visitors in the form of Sue's nephew & family, who lived about 60 miles north of Stuart.  They brought their son to spend the night aboard & travel with us the next day back to the area they lived in.  He is an avid fisherman, and stayed up half the night fishing from the boat.

June 17

After spending 3 nites in Ft Myers, we needed to move on.  We're starting to develop this darn thing called a "schedule".  During the past 2 weeks, Sue's uncle in Ohio had some changes in his medical condition, to the point where Sue was on the phone several times a day while we were anchored in a cove.  Later this week when we dock the boat for a month, we'll drive north to Ohio to assist him.

Banyan tree given to Edison by Firestone around 1910.
Banyan trees produce latex rubber & grow their
"roots" from the branches down to the ground. 
This one has grown to over an acre big!

Our highlights in Ft Myers, besides wanting to come back to spend more time, were finding a new Goodwill "Boutique" downtown where Sue found a couple "priced-right" articles ,and touring the winter estates of Henry Ford & Thomas Edison.  What struck me about the estates, was the museum showing the genius of Edison, and then the personal & business relationships that Edison had with Ford & Harvey Firestone.  The three of them created a business in the late 1910's to find a source of rubber (which the US had to import during WWI).Their labs imported & tested over 17,000 plants & trees, and many of the exotic plants surround their estates.  The other interesting item was that Edison was a mentor to Ford in encouraging Ford to produce the horseless carriage, even though at the time Edison was developing a battery-powered car.  Yes, Edison was a bit ahead of his time!

We departed Ft Myers early Monday into sunny, hot, humid weather.  Are we in Florida in the summer?!?  The Okeechobee Waterway consists of the Caloosahatchee River eastbound into Lake Okeechobee.  The river had some nice waterfront homes, surrounded by citrus groves, cattle farms, sugar cane fields & Spanish moss.  Kinda like the house we used to have in LA. 

Rather boring Okeechobee Waterway.  Hours of
complete boredom interspersed with moments
of sheer terror!

After a while, we saw something swimming like crazy at the surface of the water.  As we got closer, we saw it was a 8' alligator trying to avoid the on-coming boat.  For some reason, it didn't dive deep, but instead was swimming at the surface.  Crazy alligator!  We went through two locks today, one with a 3' lift, and the other was 8'.  Not quite like the Tennessee River, where the lift is as much as 84' in one lock

We stopped as planned at Moore Haven city dock for the night.  Right after we docked, a 101' Hargrave showed up & docked next to us.  All at once, we were the smallest boat at the dock!  As we walked along the water looking at the lock close-by, we met the part-time mayor of the city sitting under the bridge on his pick-up truck & shared a beer with him.  Nothing like small southern towns! 

We're the little boat tonight!

June 12-14

We just spent the most amazing 3 days anchored next to Cayo Costa Island, one of the many barrier islands between Ft Myers and Tarpon Springs.  We had anticipated and planned for this week for most of a year, as the highlight of our trip down West Florida.  We were not disappointed.

We woke late Wednesday morning June 12 & enjoyed our coffee on the back deck while waiting for the tide to come up, so we could exit the anchorage.  We had a short run of only 20 miles to our next anchorage.  We were able to raise the anchor surprisingly easy, even though it had dug in during the rain squall the nite previous.  The wind stiffened as we got underway, but the seas were dead calm as we crossed Charlotte Harbor.  We had to make our own wind by moving at a death-defying 10 mph!

We found Pelican Pass, our anchorage for the next 2 nites, and threaded our way into the bay.  We had to strictly follow the entry instructions from the AGLCA (Looper) website, enter at mid-tide or better, and closely watch our depth sounder.  Did I mention that the waters around here are kinda skinny??  We dropped the hook in the deepest part of the bay (9 feet) amid 4 sailboats and 4 other power boats.



"Fruition" relaxing by Cayo Costa

Since it was early afternoon, we decided to launch our dinghy & mount the motor to see if everything worked.  We had put the dinghy in the water only once before, and had never really tried out the motor on it.   While it was slow going, we were able to putt around the boat to take some picture of it at anchor.



ANOTHER  perfect sunset at Cayo Costa


It was getting to be 5:00 somewhere, and we were thinking about some adult beverages, when the thunder started rolling again in the distance.  We watched the T-storms and ANOTHER rain squall heading our way!  We let out some more anchor rode, and brought the dinghy up close, just as the squall hit us with 40 + mph winds.  Two squalls within two days!  Does our boat have a target painted on top of it?!?  We stayed at the helm ready to start engines if our anchor started dragging, but thankfully, we had a big enough anchor with lots of heavy chain rode and enough scope, that we stayed put.

We then broke out the margaritas and lots of ice, fired up the grill, and threw on the 1-1/2" steak that had been marinated all day.  After dinner, I threw the scraps of steak into the water, and they were immediately "attacked" by a small school of fish that we thought were Angel Sharks.  Really interesting!  After the rain, the cool evening created another picture-perfect sunset.  Could cruising get any better?

THURSDAY morning we took the dinghy to shore to visit Cayo Costa State Park, which is accessible only by boat.  We went over to the Gulf side beach of the island to act like a tourist.  The beach did not have fine powder sand like other beaches we've seen, but had shell bits all over, which made it easy to find whatever kind of shell you wanted.  As we're lying on the beach, we watch the big sand crabs sneak out of their holes & wander around.  When two crabs meet, only the largest one sticks around.  Next, as Sue was wading in the water looking for shells, she finds a sea urchin which had empty shells stuck to its spines.  So she picks it up by the shells & brings it ashore to show me.  First time I've ever seen one.  And then, as we're getting back into the dinghy to return to the "mother ship", right next to the dinghy surface two manatees!  We couldn't see them real clearly, but they lumbered around for about 15 minutes, and then went back up the small stream into the state park.  The first time both Sue and I had seen these creatures in the wild.

We go back to "Fruition" to change clothes and turn off the inverter (which keeps our refrigerator running, but sucks the juice out of our batteries).  Then back into the dinghy for a 3 mile ride a couple islands away to Cabbage Key - another island accessible only by boat. (I guess that's what an island is!)  I was a bit anxious about going this far in the dinghy with an unproven motor.  I kept thinking, "what would I do if the motor quit now?".  But we had a GPS with us, and a VHF radio, plus signal flares, so I guess we wouldn't be stranded for too long.



All this could almost pay for our engine repairs!

Cabbage Key is a private island that has a super restaurant open to anyone who can get there.  They also have cottages to rent.  Supposedly, Jimmy Buffet wrote "Hamburgers in Paradise" when he stayed here, so the restaurant specialized in hamburgers.  The unique feature of the restaurant is the tradition for diners to tape a dollar bill to the walls/ceiling.  The story goes that many moons ago, sailors passing by on the ICW would stop for a cold drink and some food, but then wanted to guarantee that a cold beer would await them on their return trip.  So, they posted some money on the bar or wall ahead of time.  The tradition continues to the point that there is an estimated $70,000 hanging there.  As it falls down, the restaurant donates it to charities.

"Paradise" looking out the window at Cabbage Key

We wanted to walk around the island more, but we saw the "duty" afternoon thunderstorm brewing to the north, so we hustled to the dinghy for the trip back to our floating ya-chut.  I guess we'll just have to return here to finish seeing everything.  We used the davit to haul the motor and dinghy back aboard & stowed them for the trip tomorrow.  It was after 5:00, so we found some liquid refreshment and watched another glorious sunset.
 
FRIDAY we finished stowing gear before heading out for the 45-mile trip to Ft Myers.  We pass the well-known barrier islands named Captiva & Sanibel, and gawk at the mansions lining the waterways.  As we enjoy the bright sunny day with a moderate breeze on the beautiful turquoise water, I remember that I first heard of Sanibel Island back in the 1960's, when my uncle bought a ferry boat to run on Lake Erie called the "Yankee Clipper".  I worked as a deckhand and general gopher on that ferry boat several summers.  The ferry boat had run between Ft Myers Beach and Sanibel until a new bridge was built.  And now, we're cruising under that same bridge.

A home-built partial square-rigged wooden pirate ship
near Ft Myers

We take a small detour south of Ft Myers Beach to buy diesel fuel.  The Looper website and Active Captain website clued me in to this place which sells fuel for 60 cents less than anyone else in the area.  We then head back north to find the end of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway at Mile Mark 0.0 at the entrance to the Caloosahatchee River, which is also the western point of the Okeechobee Waterway Mile Mark 147.0.  We'll be on the Caloosahatchee for the next leg of our travels.

We head upriver about 10 miles to find Legacy Harbour Marina, where we can enjoy lots of hot water, a fresh water washdown, and a night without the noise of a generator.  This top-notch marina is a common stopping point for the Loopers heading east across Florida on the OWW.  We secure the boat, and then use lots of hot water (which we don't have at anchor) taking showers.  We find that Joe's Crab Shack next door serves a mean crab dinner to celebrate a most memorable week of cruising.

Tuesday June 11

This is how a calm, flat Gulf of Mexico looks!
(We had never seen it before.  We've always
had 15-20 mph winds)

We wake to that un-Godly thing called an alarm clock, so we can get underway around 0700 (that's 7 AM for you USMC-types).  We exit Tampa Bay back into the Gulf of Mexico because we want to make good time on the "outside" down to Venice, rather than the slow, narrow GICW.  The wind was initially 10-15 mph, but quickly died down to 5 mph  The beautiful clear turquoise water was so flat, we didn't know that the Gulf could be so calm.

We use the autopilot at the helm, and really enjoy the 4-hour trip south to Venice.  The inlet at Venice is very easy - don't have to worry about swift outgoing tides and opposing onshore winds.  We join up immediately to the GICW and continue heading south.

A point that I found interesting, is my finding old navigation charts left on the boat when we bought it from previous owners.  I found several charts for this area with marinas & routes marked on the charts by previous owners.  It means that our boat has been in these waters before!  We were told by the immediate past owners that one of the first owners took this boat around America's Great Loop!  It's been in places that we haven't.......maybe we'll just hit the autopilot & let the boat go by itself!

Did I mention that the ICW is narrow & shallow??
When the birds are standing in the water.....
DON'T GO THERE!

As we travel the ICW, we pass under quite a few bridges (of course we go UNDER them, not OVER them), and refer to the charts or guidebooks to determine our clearance.  The problem we've found is that the charted height is not always what we actually have.  So, Sue drives slowly towards the bridge while I climb out to the dinghy deck, sight along the highest part of our boat, and give Sue the OK.  One bridge had such little clearance that I could have touched the bottom of the bridge!



What did we learn about squall lines in our USPS
Weather Class, kids?

A special note for our Lynchburg TN Boating Buddies........as the ICW passes south of Venice, it becomes a narrow man-made canal.  We're running just under 10 mph (with a tail current).  On the bicycle path right next to the canal, two cyclists are passing us!!!  We really qualified today to be called a "crawler"!

We anchor early by Englewood Beach for the night.  We're both hot from the heat, so we turn on the genset and air conditioning right away (ain't cruising tough?).  We begin to hear thunder in the distance & soon see the squall line coming our way.  We let out some more scope on the anchor & then get hit with 30G40 mph winds.  All the bad stuff went to our west, but it sure made our evening interesting!!

Hoping for great weather the rest of the week, since tomorrow we take a short ride to Cayo Costa, one of the best anchorages anywhere.


Underway from St Pete

An Anhinga trying to act like an eagle

The weather window has arrived (at least as good as we're gonna get), so we depart Maximo Marina in St Pete on Monday June 10.  Upon checking out, the marina charges us for only one week, rather than two, since we were kept there by the tropical storm.  Even though the marina is in deteriorating condition, the manager compensates nicely.

Instead of following the GICW southbound to parallel the Sunshine Skyway bridge, we decide to go outside in the Gulf via Pass-a-grille inlet.  We will come back in several miles later into Tampa Bay, past Egmont Key.  The weather is beautiful, the seas are only 1', the breeze is enough to keep us cool, and the clear turquoise water is just beautiful.  We make our "three hour tour" across Tampa Bay to the Manatee River next to Bradenton FL.  We drop the hook for the evening among half a dozen other boats, and then go swimming from the boat.  We tie a swim raft to the boat's swim platform & enjoy the water.

Hey Chattanooga Boating Buddies....what two
"things" are missing from this picture??

Just before another glorious sunset, we're sitting on the bow with our drinks, watching the dolphins surface a mere 100 feet away.  Tell me.......would you rather be doing this, or still be stuck at the office at this hour because of some stupid staff meeting all afternoon???  (This is an I.Q. test!!)

Maybe we gonna re-name our boat.....

....to "Target" or "Bulls-eye" or somethin' like that.  Seems like all the storms find us no matter where we hide!  Our first tropical storm of this hurricane season came this past week just a few miles west of St Pete & treated us to 50 mph winds, about 9" of rain, and storm surges of 2' above high tide.  The water was over the docks & we kept adjusting our lines all day.  The good part was that the storm passed over in just a couple hours, and a few hours after that, the winds/rain started ending.  Not like our CAT 1 hurricane in New Orleans last fall, where we dealt with the darn thing for 6-7 days straight.

So now our boat has seen one good tropical storm, 2 hurricanes, 2 tornadoes less than 1/4 mile away, and one marina fire at the end of the dock.  And we've only owned the boat for 5 years!  Is the best yet to come?

We're planning to go cruising this Monday for the next 10 days, ending on Florida's east coast near Cape Canaveral.  We'll take 5 days going slowly down to Ft Myers, spending 2 nites anchored off Cayo Costa Island.  According to the Loopers, that is supposed to be the best anchorage & prettiest island in the entire US.  We've waited for a weather window, so it should be quite nice for this trip.  We'll go swimming several times, and put the dinghy in the water to motor up to shore.  Maybe we'll dinghy over to Cabbage Key & get a "hamburger in paradise" (this is where Buffet wrote his song).  We'll watch every blazing sunset from our sundeck, while listening to Jimmy Buffet songs, and drinking our wine or margaritas.  This is what cruising is all about!

I remember when I was working on my J-O-B, a couple years from retirement, and my young  boss was giving me a "performance review".  He had just been promoted to manager & was trying desperately to act the part.  He asked, "Where do you want to be 5 years from now?"  I answered, "Sitting on my boat, drinking a glass of wine, watching every damn sunset!"  He laughed & said, "No, really, where do you want to be in 5 years?"  I looked him dead in the eyes & said, "Brad, you're not listening.  I want to be sitting on my boat, drinking a glass of wine, watching every damn sunset!"

This week, I'm a-gonna do it!!

Acting like a Tourist in St Pete

It was a looooooong trip to & from Panama City to retrieve our car, but we've enjoyed having our car this past week or two.  The weather our entire first week here was strong east winds.  This week, a low pressure system is in the Gulf, making its way towards Florida.  So we're enjoying Maximo Marina much more than we wanted to.

We've enjoyed visiting our relatives in Seminole (two families), along with our nephew & family from Florida's east coast.  We've been able to get together several times, including a cookout at their house.  We've shared a lot of memories around this marina & the nearby neighborhood where Sue used to live.



Sue in front of Salvador Dali museum in St Pete.

We've driven around St Pete several times to find the junior college that Sue attended in 1969, as well as finding the house where she lived in 1966 & her high school.  We drove to Fort Desoto beach, one of the best beaches in Florida, where we used to go way back in 1967 when we were dating each other.  And, of course, several times we drove past her old house nearby to reminisce.




Outside the Dali museum, Sue sits next to the
"melting clock"





We drove to downtown St Pete to visit the museum we've been waiting for -- the Salvador Dali museum.  We've both been fans of Dali & his surrealist art for many years (and we've been jealous of our daughter since she visited the largest Dali museum & his home/studio outside Barcelona Spain).  This is supposed to be the 2nd largest collection of Dali works in the world.  Most of this was originally a private collection of a friend of Dali.  



At the Ringling estate & museum

We also drove south across the new Sunshine Skyway bridge & Tampa Bay to visit the John Ringling museum & estate in Sarasota.  It was amazing to see the history of all the circuses in America & Europe, & how the Ringling Brothers started in the business.  John Ringling ran his circus, and after joining with Barnum & Bailey, became the "Greatest Show on Earth".  And he made millions of dollars doing so.  His estate was modeled after castles in Venice Italy, where he visited often while searching Europe for circus acts.  In America in the early 1900's, when "the circus came to town", it was a major event, since it took about 100 train cars to transport the 1000-1500 circus employees & their gear & their animals.  The logistical effort to move & feed such a large army was noted by the US Army prior to WWI, when the Army asked Ringling for advice.  The Ringling family sold the circus around 1967, so although the name persists, the Ringling family is no longer involved.

Ringling's winter home on Sarasota Bay

We need to get back to cruising, 'cause we're starting to look too much like tourists!!