January 12, 2015 Little Shark River. 25◦19'.784N 081◦08'.067W

Today was a very uneventful day in very secluded waters. We made our way from Indian point to Little Shark river without ever touching bottom...Yippee! The area we are in is called the Everglades and there is little if any civilization out here. There are however, a million mosquitoes, several million no-see-ums and they all like my flesh.  This particular anchorage is listed in several references Jim and I use to navigate, so it did not come as a surprise when we entered the river and saw another boat anchored there. Henry and Diane are on a boat called "De De" which they built themselves. We have met them several times during this loop, in Grand Haven initially and then at Turner Marine and again in Dunedin.  They are a very nice couple and Diane is very much like me, in the sense that; when they say they built it, Diane was every bit the partner in the project of fiberglassing, Electrical and finishing touches. The boat is a 28 foot long bluejacket and they should be very proud of their handiwork. What is most impressive is that they had such confidence in their work, that when they finished the project they immediately set off on "the loop"

We had a lovely evening with a short visit to Henry and Diane's boat. We are also spending  a large part of our evening trying to identify the large fish or mammal that is swimming around the boat. We can hear is snorting every few minutes, we see it just breaking the surface of the water on several occasions, we know it is very large; say 12 to 14 feet long at least, but can never see enough of it to determine if it is a dolphin, a manatee or an alligator. We'll keep looking!  Good night all. 

Our back yard in Little shark river 

Jan 11, 2014 Dolphins swimming with the boat 25◦49'.881 N 081◦26'.456 W

Jan 11, 2014 Dolphins swimming with the boat 25◦49'.881 N  081◦26'.456 W

We have been in some pretty secluded areas over the last two days, so I have been unable to post to the blog. I am now posting the last 3 days all at once. Happy reading.

We had a very long day today, unintentionally. We started out the day with a plan to anchor at Marco Island. When we arrived to the predetermined spot, we once again got stuck on the bottom. Did I mention Florida waters are shallow!

The day was highlighted by dolphins wanting to play in our wake.  We saw 4 of them jumping out of the water racing to get to our boat. They like to swim right at the bow, just ahead of us. They are so close their tail fins almost hit the boat. I took a video for y'all but it's too long to upload, so here is a snap shot I got of one of them.

We left there and made our way to krice island. Here the exposure to the Gulf's wave action was too uncomfortable. We took the dinghy to the island and asked some locals if we could get into the small river coming off this island and they all said yes; as long as we approached from the south. So up comes the anchor and off we go. Part way to the river ...you guessed it, we hit bottom.

The weather was turning bad and we were concerned we would not make it to another anchorage before the storm hit.

 

Our next option was near the tip of cape Romano, but this left us too exposed so we made it all the way to Indian key just as the sun set. Talk about cutting it close! We were rewarded for our efforts with this beautiful seen which I snapped as soon as we got the anchor down.

 

Tomorrow we should make it to little shark river. Hopefully before the sun set this time. Good night all. 

Do not feed the Alligators 26◦27'.585 N 081◦57'.526 W

We set out quite late today. We spent our morning with Jeff and Susan at the Manatee River park and then going out for brunch. We had a really nice time, and saw hundreds of Manatees. 

I got to hug one 

and Jim decided to feed the alligator despite the sign telling him not to. 

We even got to see  couple of bunnies who were likely escaping the alligator!

When we got back to the boat we filled the water tank, then filled the fuel tanks and set out for a short run. We almost had an extra passenger with us, but fortunately  he was able to get back off the boat before we actually left.  

So here's the story:  After we fueled up, we were desperately trying to get off the fuel dock while the wind was desperately trying to push us back onto the dock. Jeff was helping us by pushing on the boat with our boat hook. He lost his balance and went to fall into the water, so he grabbed on to the railing of our boat. With his heart rate now at about 200 beats per minute and our boat hook in the water; he quickly ran up to the bow and jumped back off onto the dock...all without missing a beat. I then grabbed our other boat hook, which Jeff promptly grabbed from me, retrieved the original dropped boat hook, handed me the long hook, threw me the short hook and we were off. WOW, it does not look like much in print but it sure was entertaining to be there:) Really glad that Jeff was safe and unhurt through all of this...although I will call him in the am and see if anything actually got pulled!

We are now in Fort Myers Beach Florida, we are making our way down the west coast and will be going to Marathon to meet up with Sherrie and Randy, Jim and Sharon. This will take us about 3 days. In the meantime we will check out a few sites along the way. Hope you all have a great night. Sleep well. 

Our Anchorage in Fort Myers Beach 

The Shrimp boil High 24◦C

Jan 09, 2015 The Shrimp broil High 24◦C

This our second day in Fort Myers and we have had yet another wonderful day. Jim did an oil change on the engines as we were due in about 20hrs but we did not know when we would next be at a marina that allowed the dumping of oil, so he thought "why not now".
After the oil change we were invited to a Shrimp boil. Jeff and Susan have been here for about 2 weeks now and they have made a few new friends. Forunately for us the share and they invited us to join them.  A shrimp broil is an interesting thing. First you get a propane burner and a really large pot; the kind you could fry a turkey in. Then you set the water to boiling and add potatoes. After they have boiled for a while, you add some sausages...some mild, some hot. After this has boiled for about 20 min more, you add some corn on the cob and boil some more. Once all of this is ready, you dump it all on a table covered in news paper and then put the shrimp in the water and boil another 2 min. Any longer and the shrimp would be hard and woody. Once everything is cooked, you just eat and man did we eat. Except, our hosts do not like the practice of news paper dumping, so they opted for a more civilized dumping into trays...we appreciated that! It was absolutely lovely and we really enjoyed meeting Russ & Janice, Russ& Elaine, Joe & Connie and David.

After our yummy meal, Russ's wife presented the boys with new t-shirts. Apparently this group has traveled together for some time and each one of them have had issues with their shafts. This has earned them the title of "Shaft brother"

and now with the new T's it is official. :)

Later in the evening we took a walk down Main St for the Mystery Walk. There were several bands playing in the streets; acrobats, bull riding and men on stilts. A very nice way to end our day. 

Night all   

Oh I almost forgot; Simon and Alex, here is the next contender on our Rum tasting night. I am certain you will enjoy it. Once again, I promise not to open it until we are all together. 87 days to boat launch Simon! Alex I am assuming you'll be in before then? 

Jan 8, 2015 Hamilton AUYC Meting in Florida. 26◦38'.903 N 081◦52'.119 W

We made it through the gale force winds with no problem at all. Jim found us a wonderful anchorage protected from the North winds which are what blew us around all night. The strongest winds registered on our wind meter was 36 mph and although we dragged a bit, we certainly did not have a rough night. Our trip to Fort Myers was also uneventful, but at one point the wind was so strong that we were heeling like a sail boat!
The shopping in Tampa bay is pretty good, as you can see by the picture, you can get bait pretty much anywhere.

We arrived in Fort Myers just before noon and went to visit some old friends; Rick and Margie at the marina next door. The highlight of our day today was a meeting of the Hamilton AUYC at the Al Capon restaurant. The AUYC is the Gold yacht club (AU being the periodic table of elements short form for gold....in case you did not know) which we belong to in Hamilton. Many of it's members winter here in Florida. It was very nice to see all of them. Cathie and Gary, whom we had dinner with on the 5th belong as well, but the 2hr drive was a bit too much for 1 dinner. Anyway we had a great time and it was lovely to see them all.

Left to right: Fran, Steve, Morag, John, Jane, Jim,Mimi, Ross, Janice and Doug. 

Check out the Tommy Gun door handles

We will be spending another day here in Fort Myers before starting our trek down the west coast and ultimately to the Bahamas. Time for another oil change as we have now traveled 425hrs and Just over 3000 miles on our journey. We are hoping to find some butter melting temperatures real soon.
Night all.

The Sanibel Bridge 

St-James Island 26◦29'.420N 082◦04'.199N

We've had another wonderful day of traveling down the GICW. We did a very long day today, 10hrs of drive time, but it was so nice it hardly felt like a chore! 

Sunrise in the mooring field

Fortunately we did not hit bottom for a change. This was our first mooring ball experience and it was not too difficult at all. 

Our trip was the usual, weird boats, golf course on the water and beautiful waters,

                      

but tonight they are calling for gale force winds so we made sure to batten down the hatches and tie everything down. Today would have been my father's 85^th birthday. I like to think he's watching out for us from up above.

Sunset at anchorage 

Good night all.  

Synchronize your engines. 27◦19'.829 N 82◦32'.873 W

 We are now in Sarasota Fl, having had an uneventful day....mostly!

 This morning we set off from the marina at 7:30 and making our way down the inter costal waterway, we zigged when we should have zagged or a shoal appeared out of nowhere ....whatever. Bottom line is, we hit bottom.  When we did, all of  sudden we started feeling a vibration and we had no port rudder. Our props are too high to hit ground when our bottom hits, but we thought  maybe we bent the rudder. So our story for today is about synchronizing. With two engines running, the humming of two different frequencies can get a little tiring. To fix this problem we have a synchronizer on the engines. Once we are up to 10,000 rpm or so, we click on the synchronizer and magically, the engines start working in unison and the vibrations and humming are reduced. Once the engines are synchronized, the  accelerator for the port engine is no longer needed, and we manage the speed with only the starbord engine's throttle. This is all lovely until you hit something! Florida is very shallow; did I mention that already?

The sunshine bridge 

 About 30min after we hit; Jim still trying to trouble shoot the problem said "#@$, I wonder if the synchronizer popped out". He backed off the engine, re-engaged the synchronizer and voila, problem fixed; thereby avoiding the lengthy search of our insurance policy to see if we were covered for bent rudders!

We arrived in Sarasota by noon, so after lunch we went into town for a little touristy walk. The down town core is lovely.

Tomorrow, we aim for Charlotte Harbor, assuming we don't hit bottom again! I think we should upgrade our insurance to the Gold policy!

One last note, for those of you who are not familiar with what a cleat should look like, I got you some before and after pictures. I have a nephew who is a welder. Pierre is this cleat something you can fix? Brass cleats are awfully hard to find these days.

Night all.