Ortona to Dry Tortugas

We left our dock on Tuesday morning for a 3-4 week cruise of the Florida Keys and maybe the Dry Tortugas. As we cruised toward Ft. Myers on the Caloosahachee River we continued downloading the weather reports. The weather conditions at Dry Tortugas look favorable for a week and the overnight passage looks do-able. So we decided to go straight for the Dry Tortugas, 200 miles from Ortona and 27 hours later, we dropped anchor right in front of the Ferry docks of Ft. Jefferson on Garden Key.

Sunrise on the Gulf of Mexico, approach to Loggerhead Key lighthouse

Ft. Jefferson

Dinghy landing and some Cuban Refuge Rafts built of steel, foam and plastic.

The water around Dry Tortugas was pristine clear, healthy beautiful coral reefs and a lot of fish. One 4' coral head had at least 6 lobster under it. We had a wonderful time snorkeling on the reefs and around the moat of Ft. Jefferson. The Fort was very interesting to visit and walk around and on top of. At the anchorage we also were entertained by thousands of birds (mostly Sooty tern and Frigate) on Bush Key day and night. I guess this is where they gather to mate.

Birds at sunset on Bush Key. Bush Key from the top of Fort Jeff.

We invited the couple on the next sailboat over for drinks one evening, and they turned out to be newlyweds from Colorado, on a chartered boat for their honeymoon after their beach wedding two days earlier in Key West.

Newlyweds Olivia and Ryan

Home and Travel Adventures

It's been a while since our last post. After arriving home last November, It took us a while to get the yard back in shape and Mark has been busy with various jobs on boats, both ours and his customers'. In between, we took time to spend Thanksgiving with family in Sebring, Florida and Christmas with Mark's family at Cincinnati, Ohio. In January we took a 15 day trip to Morocco, had a fantastic time absorbing it's culture and scenery.

Olives & pickled lemons, Weekly market

Snow on the Atlas, Camels at Sahara

Upon our return, some of our cruising friends stop by to visit on their boat as they're passing our area. So while we're at home, our cruising life continues.

Charlene & Tom "Forever 39", Lynn & Wayne " "Skinwalker"

Patty & Marshall "Sgt. Jiggs", Sue & Dick "Courage"

In April, I flew to California to have a reunion with my siblings and meet my 14 months old great-niece Emma, while Mark stayed home to work on boat jobs and get our boat ready to go cruising. While I was in California my sisters and I took a week driving trip through Oregon and Washington State; the scenery was gorgeous but the highlights were our visits to my friends Chris and Ron in Reedsport, Oregon, and my friends Chen and Carl on Whidbey Island, Washington.

Golden Gate Bridge; Clam digging on Whidbey Island

Tulip fields at Mt. Vernon, Emma with her parents

So after six months, we loaded Winnie the Pooh once again for cruising. It will only be for a few weeks due to lock closings on the Okeechobee Waterway. But at least we will get to taste the life on the hook again!

Palm City, FL to HOME!

After spending 3 days relaxing and partying in Palm City with our friends Gina and Eric, we left their dock at 8:30 AM on Tuesday. They made the trip with us on their own yacht "Southern Star", a Gulfstar 49 motor yacht. We arrived at the St. Lucie Lock just as it was locking through a west bound boat, so we had to wait for an hour to lock through. One side of the lock gate wasn't working, and as the locktender opened the other side of the lock gate to fill the lock, there was a lot of turbulence. After locking through over 70 locks this summer, this was by far the most unpleasant. Crossing Lake Okeechobee was uneventful; the Army Corp of Engineers doesn't recommend the Rim Canal route so we crossed the middle of the lake. We spent Tuesday night tied to the dolphins east of Moore Haven Lock, had a dinner party on Southern Star and watched the election results. As we departed for home on Wednesday morning, Southern Star continued to Clewiston and returned to Palm City by way of the Rim Canal, and they reported no problems with debris or depth. Good news, as the rim canal route is far more scenic than the mid-lake route.

Southern Star crossing Lake Okeechobee and tied to the Dolphin

It's great to be home. Now we have enough yard work and settling back into the house to keep us busy for weeks.

Okeechobee Waterway to home at Ortona, FL

We logged almost 5,000 miles and 8 months on this voyage. Mark would prefer to continue cruising but I'm looking forward to settle back into land life for awhile....Saturday we attended the Turkey Creek Yacht Club fall picnic, and Mark was tagged by a neighbor for his first boat electrical job since returning; it took only 3 days for them to find us home.

Fernandina Beach to Palm City, FL

This week the wind continued to be robust; it didn't affect our travels in this part of Florida ICW, but at the end of the day we took time to find a more protected anchorage. Our anchor was fouled on a chain/rope ball as we departed Fernandina Beach on Monday morning. It took us 30 minutes to get the chain off the anchor and cut the rope off. Not a fun way to start the day, but fortunately the rest of the day went smoothly. We dropped anchor at St. Augustine's Salt Run in the early afternoon and settled in for a windy night of NW 25-30.

White pelicans, St. Augustine lighthouse

St. Augustine waterfront, unique (haunted) house on the waterway

Tuesday brought us to Daytona Beach, another short and easy day on the waterway. The only exception was the Volusia County Sheriff was conducting potti patrol in the area and boarded every boat that passed by.
Mark's Mom and Dad came to see us at Daytona Beach on Wednesday with several care packages of goodies, homemade brownies, pecan tarts, and magazines, etc. We went out for lunch, walking on the beach and grocery shopping. A busy day that went by fast, and as always we felt so loved.

Joyce, Mark, Mom & Dad on Daytona Beach

We left Daytona Beach early Thursday with plans to get to Cocoa to meet our friends Evelyn and Mike for dinner. All went well and we had a nice evening together with great Mexican food and catching up.

Things that entertain us
Friday was another breezy day. We ended the day in the safe harbor of Faber Cove at Ft. Pierce. We traveled a short distance on Saturday and came to our friends Gina and Eric's dock at Palm City in the early afternoon. That night Gina prepared a delicious dinner to welcome us back. On Sunday they invited a group of friends over for a music party. The food, refreshments and music started at 2 PM, with guitars and banjo playing, people singing; the food changed from appetizers to dinner then desserts, 25 people, had a wonderful time until 10:30 PM.

Gina, Eric and grand-daughter Emma

Gina and Eric's dock, Sunday afternoon party

Eric, Neal, Jerry and Mark jamming

From here we are only 72 miles away from home. We decided to linger a couple days longer and will now arrive our home dock on next Wednesday.

Our homeward voyage continues, this week we traveled 292 miles.

Dewees Island, SC to Fernandina Beach, FL

Yeah! We are back in Florida waters and that means we are getting close to home.

This has been a week of paying close attention to weather, even cruising the ICW, the coast of South Carolina and Georgia many wide open sounds, so it can get nasty in a hurry if the wind is blowing. We departed Dewees Creek early Monday morning along with three sailboats. The weather was cool, sunny and calm, an easy day on the water. When we got to about 20 miles from Beaufort, one of cruising boats (Monk 36) that Mark knew was broken down on the waterway. They had called Sea Tow, but didn't know when they would arrive. So we anchored for Mark to give some help. As they're getting ready to come pick up Mark by dinghy, Sea Tow arrived. We decided to meet them in Beaufort the next day. We up anchor and traveled another 5 miles to anchor on the Bull River for the night.

Sunset at Bull River, the Georgia marsh

We arrived at Beaufort City Marina early Tuesday morning to buy dinghy gas and fill up water tanks. After anchoring Mark went on the Monk 36 and in two hours he got their engine running. We spent the rest of day just relaxing and went for a walk and grocery shopping. The weather service was forecasting a strong Nor'easter starting on Wednesday and lasting through Friday. So we left Beaufort early Wednesday morning and decided to go to Herb River at Thunderbolt, near Savannah, for the storm. We arrived at 1:30 PM, had our anchor well set, went for a dinghy ride, then the wind started to blow...and by Friday we had some gale force winds. So glad we're safely at anchor.

Gray looking day, beautiful sand bar with birds

We left Herb River at the crack of dawn on Saturday, the wind had calmed down but the sky was gray. The only good part was that the current was in our favor, where the waterway is thin we had high tide water. We dropped anchor at South River along with a sailboat "Charisma", Steve and Denny from England. They've called us along the way to warn us of some trouble spots and asked us if we're the boat that they've read about in a magazine. We invited them aboard for drinks and to see the boat. A nice change after being couped up for two days.

Charisma at anchor and sunset on South River

Today was a beautiful day, light wind and sunny. We followed Charisma out of South River this morning. While Mark navigated through some tricky spots, I enjoyed the changing scenes of the Georgia marshes, the seabirds and dolphins. A sailboat ahead of us ran aground, and we skirted around the shallow spot. He motored off just as we were passing, and followed us the rest of the day. We arrived at Fernandina Beach at 4 PM, went for a walk in town and Charisma invited us aboard for drinks and a tour of their boat. So happy we are getting close to home!

Brunswick bridge, seabirds and an old boat wreck on Jekyll Island

Our homeward voyage continues, this week we traveled 262 miles.