Awaiting our test results so that we can hit the Bahamas this year. The weather is pretty today and lo and behold one of my drying towels ( hand towel) flew off the boat and i did not see it. I walked out onto the deck of the boat to retrieve my towels and only had one there the other had escaped obviously! So i looked around at the bottom of the basin and saw this bright yellow spot in the water and i thought i bet i can retrieve that. Steve said hey take the dinghy and get it. SOOOO i took one of the poles off the side of the boat top out of the faithful brackets that have held up through the rough weather and got into the dinghy put the key into the boat and clumsily attached the key safety to the console. Unhooked it from the boat and puttered out to the yellow square on the bottom of the basin and attempted to hook it several times and finally at 7 foot i hooked it whew hoo! Saved that microfiber towel from a certain watery grave and put it back where it belonged. Andrea has a great hammock chair that she hangs off the spinnaker pole enjoying the sunshine and quiet. I have two but have not put them out yet i will when it gets pretty and calm. So we are off to the restaurant to get some seafood. The restaurant was not very good a lot of locals staring at us as we ate. Wont eat there again. so back to the wall and the dinghy, and man is it getting hard to bend those knees and jump in the dinghy! But every time i load up it is a little mini adventure lol. Good night all and fair winds.

Beautiful day started out with a beautiful sunrise but we are expecting a storm today so we will stay on the boat and enjoy the beauty around us. Watching the water around us go from beautiful clear see to the bottom to dark and unable to see through is a wonder of nature. When the waves started to get short and choppy and the wind started to pick up we made sure the boat was storm ready even when you are on anchor. So i made sure nothing would fall off the counters and watched as the storm moved in. The sky started to get dusky and the wind started to pick up really fast. Sitting on the boat as it heeled over sitting still is a really weird feeling. The winds were supposed to be 50 knots but thankfully it didn’t last long and we were so glad. So we stayed on the boat and enjoyed the peace and quiet of the mangrove and enjoyed our sunset in Key Largo. Fair winds my friends. Until next time.

KEY LARGO 25.0865’N 80.4473’W

CHATTANOOGA – KEY LARGO

The adventure continues,

Spent time today on the boat cleaning up and organizing to be more efficient, plus its fun to do on a boat in the water in paradise! Left after cleaning to shore to pick up the sunglasses Steve had left at the Divers Direct. More walking for exercise down the strip to the divers direct then to Publix to restock the food for the boat. Found a place to eat like a locals bar restaurant with so so food. Got to check them all out though. Make sure we are not missing any good food! Conch Fritters are so good we are still getting them everywhere that serves them and grading them accordingly…so far the one i have liked the best were at the conch house here in Key Largo. The traffic is so congested like an interstate and just as dangerous, we were like track stars waiting on point to take off between cars. We did make it back to the dinghy to head to the boat where we slept soundly to the rocking of the bay.

Arrived in Key Largo today out on the blue water coastline into the channels at Key Largo. Well the channel is very shallow into the bridge so we had to use the Big Moose to do a little redneck recon and pull our buddies boat off of a shallow sandy area near the channel.Channels are not marked too well out her in the keys sometimes! Got to be on your toes out here. So after we made it under the bridge we had to maintain a NO WAKE speed all the way to the bay due to all the houses and shallow waters on the trail. There are so many beautiful and cool houses in the narrow waterways. You will see what i mean just check the pics. The course is so narrow if you veer off you will be grounded. I actually heard someone on the radio who saw us say “if they get stuck we will just charge them to pull them off”. So we showed em we never ran aground! Silly motorboaters. The bay was so nice we passed the crawling mangroves reaching out into the water and into the bay where we dropped anchor into clear 7-12 foot of water where you can see the bottom clearly. I love the clear water, getting closer to the beautiful turquoise waters of the bahamas. Checked out the area and went to eat at the Conch House and walked to the Divers Direct store to find a tank. BUT ended up buying a cool underwater case for our iphones to take pics with! Steve realized at the counter that he has left credit card at the conch house restaurant, so we called and they had it and would hold it. We had walked a good 2 miles in all and i said taxi time. HAHAHA so we rode back to the Hampton Inn where we were allowed to tie up our dinghy at the wall there. DONT even get me started on NO DINGHY DOCKS allowed per mayor orders. I cant believe as much money as sailors and cruisers spend that we are not allowed to tie up at city docks!!! Unlike when we did it 10 years ago when people were still friendly and unafraid(and not damn rude yankees). South florida is becoming a sucky place for boaters and tourists. NUFF SAID. Its is still warm and beautiful and love the snorkeling and diving here. Enjoy the pics.

We pulled anchor around 7 and headed off to Long Key anchorage near Fiesta Key, actually right next door to Fiesta Key. The weather was a little bumpy but nothing really uncomfortable. The morning sky was beautiful with storm clouds in the distance. We ran from the storm but it moved around and in front of us but we never got in any rain. It was a good sailing day and we anchored out next to the highway on Long Key and dropped anchor and lowered our dinghys into some fiesty water to go eat at a cool little tiki hut restaurant that belonged to an RV Park it was good food. We hopped in our little dinghys after eating and rode the wild waves back to the boat put the dinghy back on its davits fighting the rocking of the boat as we worked frantically to lock the chains in place. Finally got it hooked up very well and secure and went to bed with the rock and roll of the Big Moose. Fair winds fellow sailors and followers

Happy Birthday today to my sister Paula Allen!!! Today we pulled the anchor and set off to shark island anchorage for the night and will head to Long Key in the keys tomorrow. The sail was good with both sails out and the wind helping us along at 10-15 knots. It was a nice and uneventful trip coming into the anchorage. NO swimming here as it is a gator area with many many little red eyes that light up at night when you shine your light on them. I sat and watched a pelican diving into the water repeatedly trying to catch a fish. He must have been after a tricky fish. The serenity was so nice with the calm water and the many different colors of the sunset going down behind the boat. Barry and Andrea anchored out close to us, it is a lot of fun having them with us on this trip. Not too much happening here so I will sign off and watch the rest of the sunset.

Good morning peoples! Hope everyone is having a great day today. Today we will explore the cayo costa state park and head to the beach for shell hunting and sunset! I am posting pictures for todays post.

Headed down to the Cayo Costa Park to anchor out and enjoy the beautiful beaches covered in shells and gorgeous sunsets. Travelling down the ICW we saw some gorgeous homes and islands. Seeing several kestrels and a lot of birds. It was a great day boating and we just enjoyed the serenity of the trip. NOT a racetrac today very calm traffic and very few boats! We sailed into parrot key into a very nice anchorage very safe and sheltered. We got out into the dinghy and headed to the little beach area which as we found was the place to hang out at for the locals and tourists. There were a lot of boats in that area and it was an absolutely gorgeous sunny day. We walked along the little beaches and found some cool shells and very nice scenery. I had to find a little wildlife path through the sharp grass and bushes from beach to beach. Andrea being the good sport she is followed me without complaint as I can take off through questionable trails when exploring new places. It was a cool place and we stayed for a while until we took off to the boats again because we couldn’t go to the restaurant due to the waves being a little grouchy today. BUT we shall try again tomorrow to go to the restaurant. My son sent me pictures of him and my grandson snow sledding down a hill. Enjoy the pics and I am out….

Today we shall explore the Venice beach and look for shark teeth!The winds are still very strong and the waves are high. So Steve Barry and I took off to the beach. Andrea was not feeling 100 percent and stayed behind. I was looking for the dolphin statue that used to stand in the middle of the parking lot but it wasnt there, I was sad. Anyway walking through the sand to the beach through a cute place in the trees with a bench and a neat pathway to the beach. We had a ball looking for the sharks teeth I found one and was so excited. We kept looking and looking buy never found another one. The ocean was rough and it was hard to keep digging through the sand and waves. After several hours on the beach we decided to dinghy back and get Andrea to see the sunset. It was a beautiful sunset and we found 4 chairs already on the beach so we sat and watched the gorgeous sunset. Leaving there we found some really cool shell pictures created by someone who loved to create obviously! We had a great night and are going to get ready for more adventures tomorrow. Enjoy the pics. Signing off for tonight!

Today we started it with a great breakfast at the end of that beautiful waterway near us. After that we pulled anchor and started on our adventure down the racetrack known as the Sarasota/Tampa ICW. As usual we had to take it very slow and watch out for pshychotic boaters, hahahaha. Well we enjoyed the beautiful scenery that includes the cool houses on the banks of the ICW. The temperature was good today also so I sat our on the front of the boat and enjoyed it. Coming into Venice it was like a traffic jam on the freeway and finally made it safely into a side waterway and into the venice anchorage areas.

Quickly we realized that the anchorages were the same ones we anchored at in 2012 that left us on the hard ground and where we came to a sudden stop when leaving when our keel slammed into something very hard. SO we found a place that would stay deep enough where our boat would still be floating when the tide went out. Very hard to find a place to take dinghy until we ran into the yacht club member that let us know that the very end of the boat pier close to the road was empty and to dock there. He even gave us the code to the bathrooms and the shower(even though we didnt use them). SO we took off into the town of Venice toward a cool restaurant on the water. It only took a few minutes to get there walking down the sidewalk. There are a lot of condos in this town that are so cool. We went into the restaurant and it had some great food as well as some neat benches and decorations. IT also had the showers and washer/dryers in the bottom area close to the parking garage. They were actually the nicest showers and we had access to them because the marina was closed to boats due to the storm coming in couldnt take us so they gave us access to the amenities! We walked back to the dinghy then back to the boats to get a good nights sleep. More adventures tomorrow! Good night everyone.