We have been in paradise full time for about 6 months now and I’m really enjoying it. I’ll be establishing Florida residency in a few weeks, even have a mailing address, but more on that after it happens.

Manatees frequently swam right behind the boat at Port Canaveral.  The Captain caught this guy playing.

This is the park that was right behind the boat.  From sun up to sun down there were almost always people fishing.

This place had character

Sharon likes pictures of herself about as much as I do but it didn't seem right not to include one.
This was on the Viking Cruise gambling boat.  A little windy and cool but still beautiful on the water.  

We talked earlier about some of the visitors we had while people were escaping the mid-west winter.  We had one more visitor while at Cape Canaveral.  Anna’s granddaughter, Piper, who is eight, spent her spring break with us. Anna and Piper made the drive together in two days.  Anna was giving thanks for modern technology to keep a 2^nd grader entertained for 24 hours of car travel.  They also had quite a list of state license plates, even some of the age old “car games” can still be entertaining. 

The girls did the Kennedy Space Center on what they described as a perfect day, small crowds so they could experience all of the “hands on” displays just made for kids Piper’s age. We all went to the Brevard County Zoo, a local attraction with lots of options.  Piper enjoyed the “Shoots and Ladders” obstacle course and zip line.  She also loved feeding the giraffes.    

Piper at home on the Pig

At the Brevard County Zoo

Our friend Amy lives in Daytona and ran down for a day when her aunt Cherie was visiting.  We had hoped to take the boat out but the weather didn't cooperate.  We all enjoyed the day just the same and hope we'll see more of both Amy and Cherie.  

Missed a boat ride but drinks on the bow hit the spot.

Our time at Port Canaveral has ended. May 31^st we fueled up and moved south to Loggerhead Marina Vero Beach, FL. I wish I could say the two weeks prior to the move were without incident, but that wasn’t the case. The last weeks at Port Canaveral were expensive. Yes, things still break even when you’re not using the boat daily like we had.

It all started one morning after getting up, as normal I needed to take a wiz. As I flushed the head, the shaft to the ball that holds the water in the bowl sheared leaving the head in the master bedroom inoperative. Fortunately we have two others in the V-berth area.

I try to fix most everything on the boat but there are many items located in the floor or in the engine room in such tight spots either I can’t see or I can’t get into a position long enough to fix them. I called the service company we have come to trust.  All 6’6” of Kyle was right down. We referred to Kyle as the “Pretzel Man”.  This guy can fold himself up and get into some of the smallest places. I find him amazing.

The head took about five days since we needed to wait for parts over the weekend. You would think some marina would stock parts but we find it not so much here. The head was back in operation on Monday.

Two days later the main raw water pump for the salon A/C unit quit. I spent a couple of hot days in the bilge racking my brain for a fix; I cleaned all the sea strainers, removed the hose’s hoping to find some blockage; I checked power to the pumps. Both were running and drawing the correct amps however, I still didn’t have any water flow or A/C. I had had it. I broke down and called Kyle again, mostly for his troubleshooting experience. Kyle was at a loss too. He pulled the pump and took it to his shop. Come to find out some form of little sea urchin had made his home in the raw water pump. With the constant flow of fresh water bypassing his gills he got fatter each day which eventually stopped the impeller from turning. With a new pump installed water flow was reestablished and the A/C came back to life…..hooray!

Anna and I spent another day in paradise in the bilge. Again she was great help as my runner. I spent the day on my belly servicing our 12 - “D” batteries, all 72 caps needed to be removed and checked for water, all the cable connections were removed and cleaned. Each cable was done cautiously one at a time so I didn’t get the positive and negative posts confused, a time consuming and uncomfortable job.

 A few days before our scheduled departure we woke to a super day with no breeze and blue sky without a cloud to be seen for miles. With all of our fixes behind us we decided to top off the fuel tank, melting our Master Charge just one more time in preparation for our trip south on Saturday. Then we planned to take the “Pig” down the channel to the open water of the Atlantic for a shakedown cruise.

While going through my start up check list. Yes, I do have a startup list: I look like a jet pilot checking gauges, flipping switches making sure everything works before we drop that last line from the dock. I turned on the bow thrusters  and hit the switch, nothing happened. Damn, I thought, I turned off the charger to the thruster batteries. I do this when we sit for an extended time thinking there is no reason cook the batteries needlessly.

I went down to the panel to flip the breaker but it was on. Oh crap this isn’t good, I thought! With this system there are only two things that can go wrong with the bow thrusters, both pricy. First, there are the two marine 1,050 cranking amps batteries or secondly, their charger. In our case, true to form, it was both batteries and the charger.

One of the batteries had shorted out taking the charger with it to electrical heaven. The other battery was borderline, so we shot it to put it out of its misery. No way would we get a charger in time for our departure so I called our buddy Kyle one last time. I explained we would be off the boat for several hours but asked if he would bring me two batteries and leave them at the steps, so we could install them later that evening when we returned. When we got back there were no batteries at the steps. I went to the V-berth and Kyle had removed the old and installed the new, with a note reminding me that this was a 24 volt system so I wouldn’t burn up my charger. I’m gonna miss that guy.  Now with new charged batteries we had all the bow thrusters we’ll need for the trip south. 

Saturday finally arrived, the sky was sunny at the port but a little dark in the southeast. Daytona Amy arrived ahead of schedule. We get her stuff aboard, fueled up and at 9:30 we pulled away from the dock saying our goodbyes to Clayton and his crew, only to wait 30 minutes for the lock to open.

When the gates opened the lock master cautioned us to be extra careful that there was a manatee trapped in the lock and that this would be the last locking until it was removed by divers who were on the way. We all wondered how a diver herds manatee out of a lock, could be something to ponder. After we arrived at Vero Beach we heard on the VHF that the lock was still closed (about 6 hours), guess you really can’t herd manatee. We got lucky with the locking, not that we couldn’t have gone outside, we just wanted to go down the ICW.

Our trip to Vero Beach was a nice trip. The thunder boomers were around us all day but with the radar I just slowed or sped up as required to miss the rain. The overcast skies were actually pretty nice as it helped keep the fly bridge cool. We finally arrived at Loggerhead Marina Vero Beach a little after 5:00 PM.  Amy was certain I had driven way too fast.  She really enjoyed the trip! Steve, the harbormaster, stayed over to help us land and get all tied up so he was glad we weren’t too late.

Anna, Daytona Amy, and I all enjoyed the taco dinner Anna had prepared the night before. We had ferried my truck down to Vero a couple of days ago so early Sunday morning we drove back up to the Port to take Amy back to her car and said good bye.  We are hoping for more visits together during our stay in Vero Beach.  She is always good company!

The marina is really dead now compared to the time we visited in April when all the snowbirds were still in the marina.  That’s just fine for us though, fewer names for us to remember. Anna and I have resolved to be a little more extroverted since we’re making this our home for the next year.  We have met the neighbors who also have a Viking, a foot shorter than ours and 10 years newer. We also have started going to the pool around 4:00 PM each day for cocktails and a dip. This seems to be the place where everyone congregates and the water’s warm.

The Vero Beach view from the bow.

And the view from the stern

Sunrise

Last week I decided the ugly blue love seats and rattan table and chairs needed to go. This has been on the list since day one but kept being pushed back by more pressing needs, no more.  I have had my fill of old boat furniture. We went furniture shopping and we found and purchased a love seat that’s 6’ long. That’s a bit longer than most love seats but not quite a sofa.  We also bought a cocktail table, and one end table for the salon, and a new dining table and chairs. The loveseat, and new dining room chairs are white leather. All the tables are glass and chrome.  It’ll be a new look and we’re ready for it! We needed to personalize the main living space and Anna says this is definitely me.  

The furniture will be delivered July 8^th so we’ll have a chance to get rid of the old stuff and get the carpets cleaned.  We feel lucky to have found a great place to donate the furniture.  The Visiting Nurses Association here runs a thrift store and will come to the boat to pick up the furniture. Can’t get any better than that. We’ll get the pick up planned for a day or two before the new things arrive and get the main living area thoroughly cleaned.  Stay tuned for new pictures with the next post. 

We also got the dingy in the water.  It’s a 13’ Boston Whaler that can really zip around.  We got some gas and took a little ride out in the ICW.  Anna seems to like driving this little boat and it may become a good source of entertainment while we’re here.  Getting the dingy back on the boat was a lot harder than getting it down and we finally had to call on a neighbor for help.  I think I have that figured out now though and the next time should go a little easier.  

We are currently preparing for our departure this weekend (6/14-15) for KC we should arrive there by Sunday evening (6/15/14 and stay until 6/27 or 28). Between doctor appointments and Honey Do’s I should have a full couple of week of work. Especially since I normally only work about 5 hours a day at my new slower pace. I’m also particularly looking forward to some Bryant’s and Gates BBQ….oh and a HIBOY double cheese w/ rings in on this return.

See ya on the water

Keeping warm in Port Canaveral, FL

Keeping warm in Port Canaveral, FL

Ahhhhhhh winter in Florida. Mid 70’s sometime the low 80’s (mostly), warm tropical breezes, palm trees, flowers, how could it get any better? We have enjoyed the warm weather here in Florida this winter. Even when the temps dip into the 40’s and 50’s over night we know we are a lot warmer than KC.

We have also enjoyed having some visitors! We mentioned in our last post that my grade school friends, Mark and Sherrie, came from Kissimmee to spend a few days before they departed on a Disney Cruise. Mark had hurt his back the morning they were to come over and was down hard all the time they were here. He essentially stayed between the couch and the bedroom. Our weather was far from ideal that weekend as well so we mostly stayed on the boat, exchanged old stories, watched some football and played cards.  Along with Mark’s back issues, Sherrie started getting a nasty cough that got progressively worse. In spite of it all Sherrie insisted that that she would not miss her ride on the mouse boat.

The dockage for the cruise ships is only a 5 minute drive for us so Monday we dropped Mark and Sherrie off for their Mickey Mouse Cruise. The following Friday when we picked them up we learned Mark had gotten slightly better with the back pain but Sherrie had pretty much been down for the count with some form of bronchial infection. Their Disney Cruise wasn’t quite what they had expected.

We quickly found ourselves getting ready for our next visitors, Anna’s sister Judy and her partner Paul. Prior to their arrival the weather was just plain crappy. Each day was filled with a blustering breeze and temperatures in the mid 50’s. Not cold by mid-western terms, but none the less cold here. A 20 MPH wind over the water converts the 50’s into the 30’s wind chill. Only the hardy of us are still wearing shorts and tee shirts.

The weather wasn’t all that great while they were here but the sun gods did bless us with one lovely day.  And we took full advantage of it to finally get back out on the water.   Our Pig hadn’t been out her slip since our arrival in Cape Canaveral and she was ready to run, even if it was only a 16 mile trip. The trek was short by her normal 75 plus mile daily runs but it was a good feeling to captain her again. The sun was out, and the wind was warm blowing out of the south at about 8-10 MPH.

We started in the calm protected waters of the port channel with our destination being the #2 red sea buoy, a distance of 8 miles out. Once we hit the ocean at green marker #9 King Neptune was still showing his sense of humor. While not as rough as previous days ours seas that day were 2’-3’ spaced on 6 seconds which converted to a bouncy ride. There was even a little spray over the bow heading into the wind. Yeeehaaa! Arriving at the red 2 we turned back toward the port channel, the wind was now on our stern which made the ride a bit smoother.

 

On our way back our guests caught a glimpse of why we enjoy boating. We were all treated to the antics of the diving frigate birds. These little white birds fold their wings and become a spearhead, plunging into the water from heights of around 50-60’, and usually come up with a fish. We witnessed one bird make his dive and come up with a fish, just to be attacked by another frigate that actually was successful in stealing the newly caught fish but quickly dropped it. The original bird swooped in and caught the fish in mid air then flew off to eat his dinner unbothered.

"Way too much sunscreen"       

As we approached the calmer water of the inlet we saw a small pod of dolphins playing their dolphin games, but none wanted to swim with the boat that day, as they often do. Later the same day we enjoyed a sunset dinner at a local restaurant as we watched the huge red/orange ball set over the glass calm bay, without a cloud in the sky. It was a good thing we had such a lovely day because winter was back the following morning with more rain and cold temps. 

Judy and Paul left the following morning and Anna’s friend Sharon arrived that afternoon. A cruise ship staff couldn’t have moved much faster than we did washing sheets and freshening the guest quarters.  Sharon stayed for about 5 days but she wasn’t able to bring us any warm weather for her stay either. As a result, there was no beach time for Sharon either. We are now running 0 for 3 on taking our guest to the beach.

Sharon is old, like us and had never been to Walt Disney World. While I don’t personally see that as a catastrophe it was on her bucket list so the girls met Sherrie at Epcot and had a marvelous day even though it was cold enough for heavy jackets.  The girls also took a road trip one day someplace up north. Both times I stayed home to make sure no one stole the TV. You can never be too careful.

We were able to show Sharon the gem of the area, “the flea market” down in Melbourne, FL. Like any flea market it has everything imaginable from produce, to car tires, tools, cell phone cases (lots of cell phone cases), pets, house plants…..and those one of a kind items you only see advertised on TV.  We drove around the area some and she got to get out of the car long enough to see the beach, even though it was still cold and windy.

Sunday the three of us went out on the Victory Cruise, a gaming boat that goes out past the three mile line of demarcation so people can lose money legally. The buffet was less than expected, the crowds acted like they hadn’t eaten in weeks, and honestly the food wasn’t that good either. Maybe I was expecting better, something like the gambling boats in KC. Since we’re not gamblers we only lost the two complimentary $5 chips they gave us at boarding. One thing for sure this will be our last Victory Cruise, cruise. We had a nice time sitting in the sun just hanging outside on the deck, though we had to keep swapping sides to avoid the wind and stay in the sun as the boat made its turns.

The day Sharon departed, our weather finally improved. The sunny warm days returned. That afternoon Anna and I rode our bikes down to Jetty Park, a Florida state park about 3 miles from our marina, and walked the beach. Like all state parks in Florida the entry into the park is always free; however parking is another thing, 10 bucks for all day. That’s why the bikes are great assets.

Another Project

The day before Sharon departed the float in the shower sump pump started acting up. I wasn’t surprised as I had expected it needed cleaning.  I had earlier decided though if it was working why fuss with it. It seemed the time had come.

Cleaning the pump is not especially complicated; the real issue is you have to pull up half the carpet in our bedroom to gain access to the sump hole and then lay on your stomach to work. As with all my projects the first thing out of my tool bag is my trusted partner Anna, she’s always there to help no matter how nasty the project.

 

Access to the shower sump

 Cleaning a sump pump doesn’t compare with
working on the heads but soapy shower water that has been sitting for awhile has its own unique fragrance. After I removed the slime covered filter I took it outside and blasted it with the water hose. Then we cleaned the soapy, slimy water out of the sump, and ran several cycles of hot water through the pump. Everything worked properly so we re-installed the filter, re-laid the carpet. A job well done! All this took about 2 hours, a great way to bond with your mate in the morning, although I can think of some better ways to bond.

That afternoon Anna took a shower and came up stairs with news the pump wouldn’t shut off. We operated one day by turning the pump off and on as needed at the breaker panel, not ideal but it worked while we chased prices. It was off to West Marine, our checking prices all done.

I knew it was the float but a new float is $40 and would still leave us with an old pump that could stop at anytime too. I opted for the new sump box complete with new float and pump. For a cost of only $130 it was easier to wire up too, only two wires. (How was that for using every imaginable way to spell “2”?) Anna held the light, ran the go-fer duties, and photo recorded the whole moment then re-laid the carpet by herself.

With the sump fixed we were again project free but not for too long. Anna told me Sharon had commented on a funky smell in the v-berth sleeping area before she left.  When we went in that area, we could smell it too.  This couldn’t be good. A funky smell can only mean one thing; the front sump pump is having an issue too. I guess with all the company the pump got a work out when it wasn’t used to working at all since we never shower down there. But I’ll have to wait for WM to get another sump box in stock.

Always something to do on a boat, I just wish you didn’t have to become a pretzel to work on things. It’s hell getting old; either you can’t see it, or you can’t reach it, or you can’t get in that position for more than a few seconds before your legs, your back or both start cramping. Then the next few days after you’re so sore you wish you had written a check.

The Ugly Side of Boating

I want to go on the record I never liked any of the salon furniture, but I figured I could live with it for awhile, well the “awhile” has arrived. We have the option of buying real house furniture since we have the space and the sliding door for entry. I have been getting the bug to change things out, a project which doesn’t require bending, or flexing only writing a check. So we have been furniture shopping.

Orlando and Melbourne, FL seem to be the furniture market Mecca. However even the cheap stuff is pricy by fixed income standards and going to set me back a few thousand for the items I wanted. Then, like in everyday life, just as you have a way to fulfill your want list the kids need braces or the summer camp dues are due. Well it now appears our child needs braces and camp dues. The salon A/C has died.

 

 RIP the old unit is out and setting on dock

The A/C man has just departed leaving the ugly news behind as he escaped out the side door. The air handler condenser is leaking and is un-repairable so we’re in need of a new unit. There is not much to think about. The old unit has had a long life by A/C standards and we nursed it as long as possible. With all the glass in the salon we could never survive a Florida winter, little alone a Florida summer without a working A/C unit, so Friday morning is installation day for the A/C and good bye furniture.

 

The new unit is installed, can you see the similarity to a loveseat it has!

We did decide to remove the bar in the dining area and called our new best friend Jim Starr, Jim removed the stair railing, and door frames on the washing machine installation project. His craftsmanship is impeccable, so calling Jim for the bar removal was a no brainer. Just the supplies he brings is worth his cost. If I had to go out and purchase it I would spend $100+ in materials and then have to find a spot to store all the extra.

We are hoping removing the bar will give us the additional space in the dining area without buying a smaller table. I really think a smaller table is in order but I’ll give it a try. Removing the bar was a tough decision, I wanted to eliminate the dining table, enlarge the bar to twice its size, then get two new bar stools. Anna wanted a table to eat at. I guess you see where this is heading, and who won this argument. So we have compromised, the table stays, and the bar goes. It’s so hard to argue with someone who is always right. That’s why I have her to bounce my silly ideas off of. As she says, “I always have ideas, and some of them are even good”.

"Sorry for the sloppy picture layout this is normally Anna's job but her computer is on the fritz's and until her new one arrives this what you get! Frank "

See ya on the water

 

The last few weeks have flown by!  My trip home was great in spite of some frigid temperatures and I had a good “kid fix”.  It was nice to return to the land of palm trees flowers, shorts and flip flops.  Just to be fair it’s been a little colder here the last few days too, as it has in much of the country, but highs in the 50s feel pretty good when I check the temps at home. 

The Captain at the helm.  Last day coming in to Port Canaveral

 

The Captain used his time on the boat well.  He got the last vestiges of the Pig’s former name (Fiasco) off the boat.  We are hoping the karma went with it.  The Captain has issued an executive order banning that word from being used in any fashion while on the vessel. 

He also found a place to fix the heat exchanger for a fraction of what a new one would cost.  The guys at 3 Star Radiator in Fort Lauderdale did a great job.  It’s all freshly painted and looking pretty fancy.  The Captain and I got it on the boat and was it ever heavy! We got it down to the engine room and hooked up without breaking anything or hurting ourselves, and the engine is purring again with no leaks. 

Today major work is going on even as I type this.  The new washer and dryer we purchased a couple of weeks ago are being installed.  Shopping for just the right size took us to all the major appliance stores and finally to Camping World.  RVs are close relatives to boats, especially with regard to space.  We finally found appliances with dimensions that would fit in the hole. They’re not anywhere close to house size but they will be better than dropping quarters all over the coast. 

With the purchase accomplished Captain Frank continued his research on how to take the boat apart to get the washer and dryer down to the laundry area.  Frank spent his career figuring out how to get stuff installed and he’s pretty knowledgeable and creative.  He had the fancy hand rail figured out but was brought to his knees by the pocket door that had to come out in order to create enough room to get the appliances in.  He talked to the Viking people to see if they knew what it took.  They have been pretty helpful on other things but they didn’t seem to have any idea how to accomplish this task on their 25 year old boat. 

The Captain was still convinced we could do the demolition and installation ourselves so yesterday he started in on the job of removing the old appliances.  After several hours of work that included a lot of time on the floor in some pretty interesting positions he had the front panels off both the washer and the dryer and the wall holding them in removed. There was even a surprise of concrete ballast in the washer. That was it.  He was still stymied about how to get them out of the room, and finally agreed to call in reinforcements. Luckily Clayton, the harbormaster here has a guy for almost everything.  Frank explained what we needed and Clayton told us about Geriach Engineering.  Kyle was down to the boat in the afternoon.  He could do the removal and installation and he called in an expert “wood man” named Jim Starr to take care of the door and the stair rail, all removed and reinstalled like it was never been touched.

It's hard to capture just how tight the space is.  There was no way anything was going in or out that opening until the door was removed.

 

Ready for the work to begin.  Notice the handrail. 

So today, it’s all coming together.  I’m sitting on the fly bridge typing this to stay out of the way…and running downstairs occasionally to snap a picture or two.  When you see the ones of the three guys lifting the washer over the side of the boat you might relate to why I’m relieved that Frank and I aren’t trying to do this ourselves.  It’s all pretty exciting.  I’m looking forward to doing laundry tomorrow after the last few months of laundromats and quarters.



One washer, coming aboard.

 

 

Lots to do yet but aren't they pretty?!

This past week saw another mile marker when we entertained our first guests on the new Pig.  Sherry and Mark drove over from Orlando and spent a few days with us.  The guest quarters seemed to be comfortable and we understand the shower works pretty well so it’s all good.  We learned a new card game and enjoyed the company.

Another new experience occurred last night when we got to see a rocket launch.  It was a beautiful clear night and pretty neat to watch the rocket light up the ski.

   

We have more visitors planned for February and fewer expensive projects so we are happily anticipating the rest of our winter hiatus.

  

See ya on the water

Our trip south from Morehead, NC was full of excitement, white knuckle stress, confusion, and exasperation along with some relaxation and fun in the new boat. All of these emotions continued right up to our arrival at the Ocean Club Marina in Port Canaveral, more on that later. Anna’s gone home now and I’m spending some quality time with the boat still learning the countless systems. There are always things to piddle with on a boat.

We’re having trouble recreating our boating experiences over these last few weeks so I’m going to give a quick summation hitting some of the highlights ( or low lights, as the case may be).  We mentioned in an earlier post that we were getting hit pretty hard with old boat syndrome, just one of those things to be expected in a 24 year old boat.  In addition the new Pig has seen more running hours in the 2 ½ months we have owned her than in the last several years as a weekender with her previous owner.  

 We got held up one morning due to dense fog.  Just hard to boat in pea soup.

The valiant effort of the sun

One major thing we have learned is that fuel filters are a diesel engine’s best friend.  It’s been a long lesson but I think we got it.  It started out with an ugly cloud that was following the boat as we cruised on the outside for the first time.  We got in to dock for that night with oily black soot all over the transom.   I talked to Ryan, our broker a couple of times.  He’s a pretty knowledgeable about diesel engines and I wanted to pick his brain.  We talked about options but there weren’t too many available considering our position. There had been fuel filters left on the boat but only enough to change one engine.  We changed out the port engine because that was the one that seemed to be producing the smoke. 

This is the third day of smoking.  A big improvement from the first day of soot.

Changing the primary filters helped some and the amount of soot decreased but we were still smoking and washing the boat every night.  Luckily the engines seemed to be running fine, just smoking.  We got in to Savannah a couple of days later and I made arrangements for a diesel mechanic to come in and take a look at the engines to see what the deal was.  Mike, with W.W. Williams met us at the dock.  It was a Friday evening so we were glad he hung around to check in with us.  Mike spent some time with me in the engine room and explained about primary and secondary filters.  He also told us that we were using the wrong size for the primary filters.  The difference was huge.  The filters the former owner had been using were 2 microns.  That’s what I had used for the replacements.  Mike said we needed 30 micron filters.  It’s almost impossible to explain how big the difference is between those two sizes.  The new filters in both engines made a big difference in the smoke. 

Mike also diagnosed another issue that had come to my attention.  The heat exchanger on the port engine had a leak.  This isn’t an immediate show stopper but will need to be addressed soon. A replacement unit will be very expensive so I’m exploring repair options at the moment. 

We got hung up in Savannah because of weather so we had Mike come back and look at the generator which had stopped one day and we hadn’t been able to get it restarted.  We were out of town a couple of days shuttling the truck from Myrtle Beach to Port Canaveral and Mike took care of the generator.  It was the fresh water pump, the bearings were shot. I authorized the repair assuming the pump was an inexpensive fix. Boy, were we ever surprised; to the tune of $2,200.00.  When I mentioned this to Mike he admitted he too was surprised at the price of the replacement pump.  Next time, I’ll ask a few more questions about costs.

We caught the Thunderball Christmas boat festival.  The community held a hot dog and chili dinner.

So we left Savannah with the generator working, new filters all the way around and the knowledge we had one more major repair to deal with down the road.  I had planned to run outside from Savannah to St. Simmons to avoid some treacherously low water in the ICW just south of Savannah.  The spot is called appropriately “Hell’s Gate”.  Even with the tide being just right the most water you’ll see here is 7’ not good when you draw 5’.

We left Thunderbolt Marina in Savannah around 8:00 AM on a falling tide and rode the 4 MPH Wilmington River current the 12 miles out to the sea buoy Green #3 into the ocean and pointed the boat south towards St Simons. Once in the ocean the day was a bit rougher than forecasted we started out with 2 to 3 foot seas and they changed early afternoon to 3 to 4 footers for rest of the day with an occasional five footer thrown in just for fun. The wind was out of the south at 20 knots.  The boat handled great and the salt spray coming over the bow was kind of fun.  Definitely a day for making sure you had at least one hand on the boat at all times. 

We had this reminder that we need to prepare a little better for high seas.  

We got this from an ATM machine and felt like it was worth a pic.  Seems like a good message. 

Cute, huh?

Christmas on the ICW

We ran on the ICW the last two days and finally made Port Canaveral on Tuesday afternoon. Not a lot of time to spare with Anna’s plane leaving Wednesday morning.  It took us a couple of hours longer than we thought. Anna says, “It always takes longer that you think” and normally she’s correct. There was a section of about 30 miles that took more time than I had planned, it was one no wake and manatee slow zone after another.  To top it all off our last 6 miles has two bridges and a lock. The bridges turned out to be non issues but not by my planning. We just got lucky, really lucky, that we didn’t require an opening on either bridge. You see our arrival time also matched the time the bridges were going on a rush hour shut down and wouldn’t open for three hours.  We cleared the first one and asked the lock master to lock us through.  He wanted to be sure we could clear the last bridge or he would have wanted us to stop for the night at the marina on the north side of the lock.  That would have meant we would have been stopped for the night less than half a mile from our winter home.  With Anna’s flight scheduled for the next morning the title of this blog might have been “Mutiny on the Pig”.

Anna’s now at home in KC. I took her to the Orlando airport on Wednesday after spending that last evening packing and doing the laundry. She’s on her annual Christmas jaunt and will return in early January. Hopefully after spending 22 days in the Midwest winter she’ll be glad to return to the land of sand and flip flops. We both are hoping for some company to come down and share some time with us as we relax in the sun and start planning for next summer’s travels.  When Anna returns she’ll have another birthday under her belt but I’ll still welcome her with open arms. You see, I love that old gal.

Happy New Year to you all!

See ya on the water

Welcome to Florida!  Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia are history and we’re just a couple of boating days short of our selected winter home for the Pig.  The last ten days have been exasperating and tiring.  Once we get to Port Canaveral and get some rest we’ll try to provide a little more detail about our recent adventures.  

See ya on the water.