Apalachicola!

I loved this town!  I am fascinated by these shrimp boats.  Early every morning they would pass by our boat on their way out for the day.  At the end of the day, they would all come back in with flocks of seagulls and pelicans following them hoping for a small morsel of shrimp.  They weren’t the cleanest or fanciest boats but this is how these folks earn their livelihood!  Hard working folks for sure.  Added to my bucket list is to spend a day on one of these shrimp boats.  They just fascinate me.

We spent a day and a half wandering around Apalachicola and had dinner with our friends Jan and Rusty from CBAY.  They left yesterday to go to Carabelle and wait for a Navy man who has always wanted to make the crossing! 

One of the fun stores we went into was the Holly Holy Liquor store!  What a hoot!  We picked up a bottle of wine called “Crossings” to have when we hit Tarpon Springs.  No idea what it will taste like but the name sold us.  They gift wrap any alcohol purchase you make.  The store also has a bright red antique glider in the middle of the store for shoppers to rest their weary bones!!!!

We thoroughly enjoyed our stay in Apalachicola.  What a charming fishing village.  This place has more oyster bars then anyplace I have been to.  I am not an oyster fan.  When I was little, my father told me he would give me $0.50 if I would eat an oyster.  Scandanavians love oysters, I guess.   Anyway, I couldn’t get the slimy little thing down.  I got the $0.50 anyway.  I haven’t had one since.  If I were going to try them this would have been the spot as they were extremely fresh and everyone in the restaurants that ordered them raved about how good they were!  

We stayed at the Water Street Marina and Hotel.  It was all decorated for Christmas and so charming.  If you ever find yourself on the gulf coast of the panhandle, Apalachicola is a must stop!

Tomorrow we check the weather and if the stars are all aligned we cross the gulf! 

Stay tuned!  Pat

And the waiting begins!

We are leaving Port St. Joe Marina this morning.  It is cold, cloudy and sprinkling but still much better than the past couple of days.  We arrived here on Saturday thinking we would just spend one night and then the wind started.  It blew and blew and blew!  When the wind blows in this part of the USA, not only does it make the waves high but it also brings in higher tides.  The water actually blows into the bays.  Needless to say Ken had a 3 a.m. outing to readjust the fenders and the lines to accommodate for a much higher than expected tide.  The water was up to the dock and by mid morning I needed help climbing up and off the boat.  Mother Nature - she is one strong lady!!!  We enjoyed Port St. Joe.  It is a charming seaside town with several excellent restaurants, a grocery store two blocks away and a marina that brings the morning paper and on Sundays.......muffins.  Life is good!  By yesterday afternoon, we could tell the weather was improving.  God sent a rainbow to tell us it was OK to leave this morning.

We are back on the water!  There is a 5 mile canal that takes us back to the ICW.

Our destination for today is Apalachicola, FL.  Weather permitting we will move over to Carabelle, FL, the jumping off point for the gulf crossing.  And then we wait and wait and wait depending on how long it takes the seas to flatten out and the wind to calm down.  We have plotted the crossing a multitude of ways and yesterday when we realized that the Admiral (moi) was giving the Captain the miles to Tarpon Springs in Nautical Miles thinking it was Statute miles we were destined to run out of gas before we reached the other side.  I recognized my error thankfully so we once again began to rethink our crossing. 

20BUCK$ can get up and run 30 mph allowing us to make the crossing during the daylight which is our goal, but it leaves us too shy on fuel if we do Carabelle to Tarpon Springs in one leg.  We will make it in two hops - Carabelle to Steinhatchee, a tiny fishing village on the west coast of FL, and then Steinhatchee to Tarpon Springs.  The down side is that means we have to wait for two weather windows.  That’s OK as this is the part of our trip where we must be patient!!!!!!  The Captain, Admiral and 20BUCK$ will all be better off if we exercise caution, patience and choose our crossing day wisely!

So we will say a prayer for winds less than 10 mph and seas with wave heights less than 2 feet and until that time we will enjoy cruising to Apalachicola and on to Carabelle.  The pictures above are from the Port St. Joe area for you to enjoy! 

Loving every minute - Pat

Panama City!

Pat decided she’d open a new business. Shave and a haircut for $20 bucks!

Carl & Greg Vernon are the AGLCA Harbor Hosts for Panama City. They have a lovely house on Watson Bayou, and keep their boat docked in their back yard!. Yesterday, 30 Loopers descended on their home for Thanksgiving  dinner. We all brought a side dish to share, and the Vernons did a turkey and a ham, and even rounded up friends and neighbors to shuttle everyone from their boats to their home.  What a wonderful way to celebrate! It sure made it easier being away for the holiday.  Below are some photos of the day.

Many of the other Loopers we had already met along the way, and some we met for the first time. It’s always interesting comparing notes and boats. Everyone is always willing to help with questions and recommendations.

I was talking to one guy, who we had met briefly at Grand Harbor at the top of the Tenn Tom. I remembered the teak on his older trawler was pristine, and a much lighter color than normal. They were also in the same anchorage as we were a few nights ago. As we were talking, I kept thinking he looked familiar. And his hand gestures were familiar. Then it dawned on me! I looked at him and said: “South St Paul, 1968 - you’re Kermit Wold”!! He about fell over. We had graduated high school together, and not seen each other since!

As we continued to talk, I told him I had also run into Liz (Elm) Kemper at the AGLCA Rendezvous. He about fell over again! He said: “She was my first girlfriend!”  What a small world!

Here are Kerm & I talking over old times.

Today we walked into town, and did some window shopping. Then we found a funky little water front restaurant named Joe’s Bayou. It was a restaurant / marina, and you walked through the slips to get to the floating restaurant. As we sat down, and looked out over the water, I thought I was back in Red Wing. Anyone who has boated the Mississippi or St Croix in the last 20 years will recognize this boat.

The Beluga was anchored in Prescott Bay for years. There was a sign on the boat advertising knife sharpening and sales. The past few years it was in Red Wing. I always wondered where it went in the winter. No one I know of has ever seen it in a boat yard.

Looks like it heads south every winter!

Tomorrow we head East to Appilachacola & Carabelle to stage for the Gulf crossing. We are trying to avoid the slow overnight 16 - 18 hour run. My old friend Kerm recommended we run from Carabelle to Hudson during the day. It’s 130 miles, and at 25 MPH we can do it in 5 to 6 hours with fuel to spare - IF we can get some clean water. Hudson is just North of Tarpon Springs, and has an easy entrance verses the shallow, long entrance to Tarpon. It’s loaded into the plotter - and the long range forecast is good for later next week. We’ll move on to Carabelle, and get ready!

Thanks for the e-mails.

We always appreciate hearing from home.

Captn Ken 

  

Sandestin to Panama City!

We arrived at Baytowne Marina in Sandestin, FL planning on staying just overnight.  After seeing how beautiful the resort was we decided to stay an extra night and enjoy the sights.  What a beautiful complex!  And...............I got to walk on the beach!  Really beautiful white sugar sand!  The resort has 4 golf courses, 10 tennis courts, a marina, many restaurants, shops and even an ice skating rink.   We were greeted at the entrance to the marina by a MN loon singing right in front of the boat and then right after that, a dolphin!  Life is good!  But enough words, let me show you in pictures!

We left this morning to travel 50 miles to Panama City.   Our travels were across Choctawachee Bay, which is big water and included dolphin sightings then15 miles of a ditch called the “Grand Canyon”.  It was beautiful and reminded us very much of being back on the river.   We then entered West Bay which funnels into St. Andrew’s Bay where Panama City is located.  So many different waterways each one beautiful in its own way!  The pictures are from the “Grand Canyon”.

We will spend the next few days at Panama City marina.  Tomorrow we will spend Thanksgiving at the home of the harbor hosts in this area.  This is the fourth year they have hosted Loopers for Thanksgiving.  They expect to have around 30 loopers!  We will miss our family but it will be fun to spend the day with our new friends and meet some newer ones.   We will have fun stories to tell after our out of the ordinary Thanksgiving day.

The picture of the two boats shows the Ying and the Yang or the before and after or maybe the have everything and have only some.

We have told you one of the biggest challenges is storage!  One of the places we store stuff is behind our couch!  This is Ken putting the toaster oven back in its home!  I think he just about was swallowed by the couch!  Help, he’s fallen and he can’t get up!

We enjoyed another beautiful sunset tonight!

We wish everyone a very Happy Thanksgiving!  We certainly have a lot to be thankful for! 

Good night!  Pat

Pensacola Air Museum

The Naval Air Museum, the home of the Blue Angles, was HUGE! They had hundreds of restored aircraft inside, and many more sitting outside waiting to be restored. One item I saw was this quilt made by a Navy Pilots wife. I scratched my head for a while, and tried to remember the lyrics to the Elton John song. Turns out the song was about a fictional band that Elton John was supposed to be a fan of, and was a satire on the music industry of the late ’70’s. The quilt was another satire!

We had a guided tour of the entire interior, and also a narrated tram ride of the planes outside.

You really have to see it to believe it. I can’t begin to give you the specifics of the history of Naval Aviation, but will just put up some pics I thought were especially interesting.

The plane to the left is the same as the plane Amelia Earhart was flying on a circumnavigation of the globe in 1937. She and her plane disappeared somewhere over the Central Pacific Ocean. The picture below is a plane with wooden floats. 

The plane above is Snoopy's Sopwith Camel.

The plane in the first picture below is a staggered wing biplane.

And of course we had to get a souvenir from the place, so we picked up a spare prop for 20BUCK$!

The displays went on and on.  They had models of many air craft carriers, a flight deck of a carrier recreated, and planes, planes, planes. We could have spent three days there and not gotten through it all. If you are ever in the area, it’s a “must stop” place.

Above are four of the Blue Angles planes in their Diamond Formation. Bear in mind - these planes are hanging from the CEILING!!!

I was  going to continue with some pics of Sandestin, where we have been for the past two days. However, I think we’ll save that for another post, and tell you a little story instead.

I just got a call from our friend Rusty on CBAY - but a little history first. Rusty is a retired Georgia State Judge. You’d never guess it talking to him. He’s quite a character! He and Jan were with us at the museum, along with Beth and Dean from Kismet. We had taken a cab to the museum, and made a quick stop at a West Marine on the way home. The cabby was a nice guy, and knew right where West was. When we got back to the marina, another looper boat pulled in. It was mom, dad, and their two children. They were home schooling the kids on the boat during the Loop. Turns out they are from Miami, so are just finishing. A very nice family. We told them we had done the Air Museum, and they said they were doing it the next day. We all exchanged boat cards, went to bed, and all went our separate ways the next morning.

We headed to Sandestin, and Rusty & Jan headed to a small town about 1/2 way to Sandestin. They have friends there, and are spending Thanksgiving with them. Rusty discovered on the way his camera was missing. Must have left it at the museum. He got the boat card from the family we had just met, called them, and asked if they would check the lost and found  at the museum to see if the camera had been turned in. Rusty said if they turned the camera on, and went to the second picture, it would be of their recently deceased Chihuahua. They said they would, and discovered they were going to be at the same marina the next day.

Well, today they pulled into the marina right next to Rusty. Stepped off their boat, and handed him his camera.

“Someone turned it in at the museum??”

“No - we didn’t find it there.”

“Well - where on earth did I leave it then.”

“Well - we took a cab from the museum back to the boat. I asked the cabby if he’d mind stopping at West Marine on the way. He said - “No problem. Matter of fact, I had a group on the same run yesterday I did the same stop for.”  When the kids heard that, they started looking in the cab, and found the camera.”

Can you believe that one!!!

Next post - about Sandestin.

Captn' Ken

 

Pensacola, FL

Saturday we left the anchorage and headed to the ICW with a destination of Pensacola, FL.  The weather turned ugly shortly after entering the ICW.  It was drizzly, foggy and windy.  Not much problem on the ICW until we came into Perdido Bay and Pensacola Bay.  The wind was blowing like crazy which made the seas very choppy.  Just a nasty day on the water. 

Above is the first sugar sand beach we saw.  Still pretty even in the drizzle.

This  row of brightly colored town homes was so pretty against the white sand.

We arrived at Palafox Pier in Pensacola safe and sound.  This is a beautiful marina and town.  I will put a few pictures to show you the beautiful area we are in. 

Today we went with CBAY and Kismet to the National Naval Air Museum.  I will let Ken tell you about that.  Pretty spectacular. 

Tomorrow we will head for Sandestin, a resort community just east of Destin, FL.  We are leaving early so we have time to enjoy the resort’s amenities for the one night we are there.

The further south we get the bigger the boats get.  This is a 90’ power catamaran.  We had Jelly fish swimming around the dock.

The town was decorating the courthouse for Christmas here today and having a photo shoot for something.  Do you love the snow they created from soap suds?

Here is the crew from CBAY, Rusty and Jan and Kismet, Dean and Beth, that we have been traveling with for a few days.

Today we entered waypoints into the chart plotter!  Thank you Linnea for plotting the coarse across Choctawatchee Bay!  Made my work a lot easier.  I did check them just so I wasn’t making any wrong assumptions!  We ended the day with another beautiful sunset over Pensacola Bay! 

Signing off for tonight!  Pat