First Boarding

We got to St Andrews bay (Panama City, FL) just before dark on Tuesday. The next morning we were having breakfast (bacon, eggs, and hash browns MMMMMMMM) when Sharon saw a boat approaching. It turned out to be a customs boat. They came along side and asked how many were on board. I told them just two. He then asked if we had any firearms aboard. I said yes, one. He told me they were going to board us, and for both of us to stand in the cockpit. After smacking our boat with theirs, two of them boarded us, while one stayed with their boat. He asked where the firearm was, we told him, he went down and looked at it, unloaded it, then asked to see our documentation. I gave him my drivers license, gun license, and boat registration, Sharon gave him her license. They wrote everything down, said have a good day, and got on their boat and took off. We saw them ten minutes later, with another boat stopped. I knew I was legal to carry in Florida, but I was still nervous. I told one of them that this was the first time we had ever been boarded. He told me it will happen more and more the further south we go. Yeha.
We are at Smugglers Cove Marina. It is a decent place, and very affordable. I think we will stay here for awhile, and do some work on the boat. Before we left Kentucky lake I bought paint to paint the topside, but it got to cold for me to do it. It is plenty warm here. We have been in shorts and tee shirts for awhile now. I had to break out a fan the other day. It is perfect weather to me, not too hot, not too cold.


OK, I give up. I just tried for 45 minutes to upload pics for this post. Blogspot software is so screwed up it has to be ran by the government. That is the only explanation for how a business can have such bad service, and survive (like the post office).

WOW! WHAT A DAY!

It's warm where I am.

Destin harbour.

Destin harbourwalk

Cool pic in the gulf today.

We left Destin this morning, and headed on the outside over to Panama City. It was our fist time in unprotected waters. When we came over from New Orleans, we were in the Mississippi Sound, which is the gulf with barrier islands. No islands this time, so the motion was different. We had a really good sail. We sailed 55 miles in 11 hours. It was fantastic. We made it into St. Andrews bay just before dark. The tide was going out as we were coming in, so it slowed us down to about 2.5 miles per hour. We are anchored a little ways in right now.
Destin was a lot of fun, but expensive. It is beautiful, but set up more for tourists. We couldn't find anyplace to shower, and had to walk a long ways to get groceries. But on the beautiful scale, it was about a 10.
The water once we got out into the gulf was just gorgeous, a kind of turquoise. We only saw a couple of dolphins today. We are going to check out a marina tomorrow that is supposed to be nice AND affordable, we shall see. They say they have showers, laundry, new docks, and a grocery across the street. Sounds to good to be true.

My first sunburn of the year

                                 Traveling along the ICW between Mobile Bay and Pensacol

                          An old sailboat washed up near Pensacola                         

                                              Morgan at anchor near Pensacola.

                                          Me investigating washed up sailboat.

Rosie beached as we took a walk.

I put sun screen on my face this morning, but not my neck. So now I am a redneck. Sharon says I have been for a long time. Tomorrow I will remember to put it all over. We had a very good day today. Motorsailed some, and sailed some. Beautiful day. We should make Destin tomorrow. We anchored about 4pm, and are just kicking back and getting ready to grill some hot dogs. Sharon is being cantankerous right now (don't know if I spelled that right). Anybody know how to keep a woman in line? Any help would be appreciated, as I have been trying now for almost 29 years with no luck. She thinks I am being a back seat driver while she is cooking supper. I'm just trying to be helpful. Sort of.

Oh well , you'll get that on a small boat.
Mike

We made it to Florida!

We are anchored just outside Pensacola Bay. Last night we anchored in Mobile Bay. It was a good trip through the ICW today. Once we anchored, we took Rosie over to the outer peninsula, and went for a walk on the beach. What a joy it is to be here. The weather is great, sunny and warm. We may spend a few days here, as it is really nice. Then we will work our way over to Destin. The new solar panel seems to be working out quite well. We also bought a third battery while in Ocean Springs, so we have a bit more electric available now. I will write more later, right now it's time to grill.

                          You probably can't read the sign, but it says Welcome to Florida

Sailing in the gulf

Mike

Leaving tomorrow

We got the boat mostly ready today. We will have a little to do in the morning, but that's okay. We need to wait for the tide to rise a little anyway. Low tide is at 6:15, and although we should be okay, it would be close getting out. I am amazed how shallow it is around here. I tuned the rigging today. That is a big relief. It has bothered me since we bought Morgan, as I had no idea of the correct way to do it. I met a guy here named Ken Jackson. He is from New Zealand, and a very nice guy indeed. He taught me how to do it. Not that hard if you know how. Although I am certainly not an expert yet, I do feel comfortable doing it now (probably know just enough to be dangerous). He looked over it and gave it his approval. We got the shopping, laundry, gas fill up, and everything else done this evening. We can't wait to get going. We may not have good enough Internet to blog for a couple of days, but should by the weekend.

Destin, here we come.

Mike

Lots happening

                             Sharon, right after I asked her if she still loved me.

                                             Destin

                                          The bay in Destin we plan to anchor in.

                                             Sailing today. Oh yeah.

The great Catalina rescue.

It has been busy lately. We went to Pensacola on Friday and picked up our sails. The guy did a good job. While we were over there, we drove on to Destin to check it out. It is beautiful. We found a nice place to anchor once we get Morgan there. On the way back we stopped at "Pirates Cove" in Alabama to look around. We had several people tell us it was a nice place. It doesn't look like a place we would care too much for, seems mostly for partiers. I am too old and tired to party. I just want to sit, relax, and enjoy the company of a couple people at a time.

I had to rescue a guy on a Catalina sailboat yesterday. He decided he was going to sail out of his slip here in the marina and out into the bay. Unfortunately the wind was blowing straight into the marina, so he backed out of his slip, and was blown straight across the marina and into other boats. Everyone was coming out of their boats and pushing him away from their boat and onto the next one. I jumped into Rosie and went over and grabbed a line and pulled him out of the marina. He never has come back. I don't know what happened to him.

WE WENT SAILING TODAY!!!!!! It was 69 and sunny, and as close to heaven as you can get here on earth. Made me feel like winter was officially over. The marina we are at does not have pump out facilities, so we had to go to another one to get the holding tank pumped out. On the way back we were accompanied by dolphins. I don't think it will ever get old seeing these wonderful creatures swimming by the boat.

We are planning on leaving for Destin on Tuesday. It should take a few days to get there. We can't wait to get into the clear water of Florida. Not looking forward to the government hassles though. Oh well you have to take the good with the bad.

Mike

What a day!

Had a really good day today. I installed the fire hose rub rails on Rosie today. They turned out pretty good. Now I don't have to worry too much about her rubbing up against Morgan while at anchor. It took 20 feet of 1 1/2 inch fire hose, 20 feet of 1/2 inch aluminum flat bar, and 120 stainless steel screws. It felt good to get it done and her back in the water. I took her out for a spin when I got done. It was a nice day, so it was fun to do a little exploring. Had a nice relaxing evening, grilled steak, had a friend over. Good food, good conversation, a very pleasant evening. Another couple came into the marina today from Galveston on their way to the Bahamas. We had a nice chat with them as well. Why didn't I discover cruising five years ago? We should pick up our sails from the sail maker on Friday. So we should be leaving weather permitting Tuesday or Wednesday. Time will tell.

Work, work, work. (the fun kind)

Sharon getting on Morgan at low tide (no, she doesn't know I'm posting these).

New solar panel.

We had a nice sunny day yesterday and part of today. Highs in the upper 50s. It felt really good. I watched the Superbowl yesterday, good game. I would have liked to see the steelers win though. I always root for the underdog (and they were for most of the game). I installed the solar panel today that we bought over Christmas. It turned out pretty good. In full sun we were charging 4.51 amps.when it was cloudy it went down to about .5. I would like to have one more, but at $200, it will have to wait awhile. The tides have been really low lately. Makes getting on and off the boat a little more of an adventure for Sharon. I hope she doesn't ever fall in. For several reasons, 1 I would get in trouble for rolling on the ground laughing while she was getting out, 2 she would be hard to convince to carry on cruising, 3 we would have to go to the laundry mat again. There is a state park about 4 miles from here. We drove there and took a shower today. I can't believe I didn't think of that before now.

Great Day aboard

We had a great day today. We got the boat clean, and most of the stuff stowed. Since we have the car here this time, we were able to go to Lowes, china-mart (wal-mart) and my favorite fast food restaurant in the world, Whataburger. I got the sails down today to get the main ready to take to the sail maker tomorrow, to get two more reef points put in. It seems really weird to have a car here. Almost like anti-cruising, but it has its advantages. I got lots of things to do to Morgan, but am going to wait until the weekend. They are predicting 6o's for Monday and Tuesday. Oh yeah! that's what I'm talkin bout. It was good to go back to Indiana to build up the cruising kitty, but it is good to be home. We sold about half of our furniture while we were there. I think we will sell the rest in May, and make a complete break. Time will tell.

I talked to a guy in Destin FL. today. He told me of a cheap marina close to Destin. We are going to check it out tomorrow when we take the main over to Pensacola. We may stay in the area until April. Time will tell. I think that is my favorite phrase now "time will tell". I have lived my whole life running, running, running. What a joy it is to cruise. I am so glad Sharon is on board with me. Even though she doesn't fully embrace the dream yet, she fully supports me and my dream. I am proud of, and appreciate her emensly.

Having steak and fried potatoes tonight. MMMMMMMMMMMM

Later,

Mike

BACK ON MORGAN

In the immortal words of Jackie Gleason HOW SWEET IT IS! We got back to Morgan at about 1 am this morning. It was a hard drive with the high winds.We went about an hour out of our way (further west) to avoid the worst of the rain.
Morgan seemed to fair well while we were gone. A friend here Ken Jackson kept an eye on her while we were gone. He is a liveaboard here from New Zealand. Everything inside was covered with a thin layer of salt film. Other than that all was well. I did almost nothing today, other than rest. We had six weeks of running at full speed. It felt good to do nothing for a change.Tomorrow we will clean and unpack everything. I have to take down the sails, so I can take them on Friday to be repaired The sail loft we are going to on Friday is in Pensacola, so while we are there, we are going to check out the area by car. That way when we get there by boat, we well have a better idea of where we want to be.

I can't wait to get going again.