Time to get caught up on our travels – I’ll continue with our overnight at the Pink Shell Resort and Marina last Wednesday.

We had to leave our slip by 11 Thursday morning because another boat had arrived for their reservation for the slip we were in. We’ve discovered this is a very popular time of year for boating down here!

We knew that we wanted to be in Naples Thursday and Friday so I started calling marinas there early Wednesday morning. After spending 45 minutes on the phone and not finding a slip in any of the marinas I called, I decided to try the Naples Yacht Club. Fortunately they have reciprocity with Saugatuck Yacht Club, where we are members, and they were able to give us a side tie by their fuel dock.

The dockmaster brought some steps over to make it easier for me to get off the boat and gave us good recommendations for nearby restaurants – very friendly and helpful. We were ready for a late lunch when we got there, but before we could go into the clubhouse and get some food, we needed to change – no denim allowed (I was in jean shorts) and Rich needed to put on a collared shirt. In spite of the dress code everyone was very friendly and accepting.

We walked into Old Naples downtown Friday for lunch at Campiella’s, an Italian restaurant recommended by the dockmaster. We both had pasta dishes – the pasta is made fresh there every day and you could tell. We were so stuffed after lunch that we didn’t eat dinner that night. That’s one way to cut down on food costs 😊

We didn’t have an exact distance from Naples to Marathon, but we knew it was around 100 miles. We had decided to leave Saturday morning at 7:30 so if we ran into rough waters and needed to slow down, we could still get to the marina before sunset. We got up at 6, got dressed, and then looked out to find dense fog. What the…? We hadn’t seen fog in a long time, so why now when we only had this last day of travel to get to our winter destination??? Luckily, it had burned off enough by 8:30 that we could safely leave. By the time we got down the channel and into the Gulf, there was no more fog and waves were less than one foot. The water remained calm, with it almost like glass for at least a third of the time. The biggest problem we had was dodging crab pots – it was like a mine field of them!

Ever since we got to waters where dolphins live, I’ve been on the lookout for them. Rich sees them all the time, but it seems that every time he says “dolphin”, by the time I see where he’s pointing the dolphin has disappeared. There were two or three dolphins off the side of our boat as we were headed to Marathon which I finally got to see close up. They jumped several times, but this is all I could get a photo of.

We got to Faro Blanco Resort and Marina mid afternoon Saturday, got fuel, tied up, and lunch.

More about the marina tomorrow –

Because of tide times, we were able to sleep in this morning, have a leisurely breakfast, and hang out at the resort until after 1 this afternoon.

We motored down the ICW, passing Sanibel Island, and on to Estero Island, where we had a slip at the Pink Shell Beach Resort and Marina. We had to be very careful as we left the marina on Captiva because the tides have been incredibly low for the past few days. We were going out between low and high tides so we kept a constant eye on the depth finder – as long as we had 3-4 feet of water showing we felt comfortable. Anything below that and you start sweating. Fortunately the lowest it got was about 3.5 feet and we made it to deeper water on the ICW. The hardest part of today’s trip was getting into our slip. The wind was blowing 15-20 mph and the tide was rising so you got a lot of water movement – not an easy situation. But three guys were on the dock to grab lines and help us in and we didn’t damage anything in the process!

We left our dock just after 10 this morning and continued our travels south to ‘Tween Water Inn and Marina on Captiva Island. The Gulf was very calm again today so we were able to do about 2/3 of the trip outside on the gulf. There were many small boats on the last portion on the ICW, all going faster than us and leaving wakes for us to deal with – ugh. We were doing at least 15 mph, so we weren’t traveling that slowly.

We got docked by 2, so we had plenty of time to wander around the resort. It started as a series of cottages facing the Gulf in 1931, and those cottages are still here. If you cross the road in front of the resort you are on the beach on the Gulf side. And if you walk to the other side of the resort you are at the marina on a chapel off the ICW.

We wandered over to the pool area to get some food at the poolside bar. We were finally wearing shorts, tshirts, and sandals!

The rest of the day has been spent chillin’ and enjoying the warmer weather. This will be the first night in more than a month when we won’t need to have the heat on.

By the time most of you will be reading this, Christmas will be over – I hope everyone had a great holiday!

Yesterday we thought we would go to Anna Maria Island, just south of Tampa Bay today. But when we got up this morning we discovered that the Gulf waters were quite calm, so we headed out about 10 and traveled south on Gulf waters instead of going down the ICW. We quickly found we could go a lot farther than originally planned. I called the marina that we had planned to go to tomorrow and they had space for us today, so we headed to Venice FL and arrived there about 3.

We spent last Friday doing very exciting things since we had a car – laundry, mailing packages, buying charts for this side of Florida, and grocery shopping. The weather was very interesting while we were out and about. The sun would be out, then it would pour rain for 5 minutes, the sun would come out again for a little while, and the cycle would start all over again. Fortunately it always rained while we were inside!

We had a dinner reservation at the yacht club Friday night and were quickly invited to join a group of members who were also having dinner there. It was a lively group and fun to socialize with people from all over – I don’t think any of them were originally from Florida.

We returned the car Saturday and asked for a ride back to the yacht club. The driver was picking up someone else and wouldn’t be back for at least 20 minutes, so the agent said she would have an Uber driver take us back. She called for one and less than 5 minutes later he showed up. It was our first experience with Uber, but probably not our last. It’s actually one of the first places we’ve been where there has been Uber readily available.

We spent the afternoon doing boat things and trying to figure out an itinerary for the next few days. We discovered that the marinas we were interested in were going to be closed on Christmas Eve and Day – time for plan B. I was eventually able to come up with marinas for both days, but we’ll be tying up on our own both days (no one to grab lines for us at the dock) and will be tied to a fuel dock on Christmas Day.

Our friends picked us up Saturday night and took us to their home for dinner. Steaks on the grill, sautéed scallops, good salad, and plenty of wine, along with good conversation made for a very enjoyable evening.

We were awakened by a large thunk this morning – it seems there was an unusually low tide because of a full moon, and our lines got so tight they were trying to pull out the pilings they were tied to!

We only went 22 miles today to Clearwater Beach Marina. When I looked at the map of the marina, I realized we were just a 5 minute walk from the beach, so after we got settled in we took a stroll over to the beach. As we headed down the dock there was a pelican standing on the dock. It just looked at us as we walked by and seemed totally unconcerned when I took a picture of it.

It was cool enough on the beach for a jacket, but that doesn’t keep people from enjoying a beautiful sunset.

Tomorrow we head across Tampa Bay to a marina on Anna Maria Island and still warmer weather – tomorrow is supposed to be mid to upper 60s – it’s almost warm enough for shorts and sandals 😄

Just as Pigpen always had a cloud of dust around him, we seem to always have a cloud of rain around us. In the last 24 hrs we have had over 2”of rain. And it’s supposed to rain all day tomorrow. Is there a drought somewhere where we should go and bring them rain?

We drove down to Clearwater Beach but it was raining the whole time so no pictures – is this really the Sunshine State???

The forecast calls for rain and gale force winds on the Gulf from Thursday morning through Friday night, with high waves continuing through Saturday . The next part of our trip will be on the ICW, but all that separates that from the Gulf are long skinny “islands” – not much protection from the winds. So I started calling around this morning to see if I could find a slip for us that had power and water hookups where we could stay put until Sunday. Fortunately Tarpon Springs Yacht Club had one slip available and it was less than 10 minutes from the wall we had been tied to. Because of falling tides we needed to get there immediately so we quickly untied and moved to that slip. The people at the yacht club are super friendly and the club is very nice – it should be a nice place to stay for the next few days. They invited us to join them tomorrow night for bingo and we’re welcome to eat in the restaurant, too!

One of our classmates from high school lives in Tarpon Springs, so we got in touch with her yesterday. She and her husband picked us up mid afternoon today and showed us around Tarpon Springs. This is known as the sponge capital of the world so we checked out a couple of sponge shops, bought a few sponges, had a glass of wine at a local wine bar, and finally ended up at a very nice Greek restaurant. Of course it started raining as soon as they picked us up so we didn’t spend much time outside.

Tomorrow morning we will get a rental car and explore the area on land for the next couple of days.

We got out of the slip at 7:10 this morning and 45 minutes later we were in the Gulf of Mexico. 150 miles and 7 1/2 hours later we were in sight of land and the river that would take us into Tarpon Springs. Because we made the crossing sooner than we had originally planned, we didn’t have a chance to call any marinas for reservations. That turned out to be a problem, but fortunately the harbormaster at the second marina we called gave us the name and number for a woman who has a restaurant right on the river with a sea wall where we could tie up. We have no electric or water connections on the wall, but we have a full water tank and a generator to power our lights, fridge, etc., and a great Greek restaurant right there, so life is good. Tomorrow morning I will call a couple of other marinas to see if we can get a slip nearby with power and water. This looks like a cool area – and of course the weather is going to turn bad on Thursday, so we need a place to stay for a couple of nights.

We left Lighthouse Marina in Panama City Beach this morning intending to go to Apalachicola and then to Carrabelle tomorrow, the jumping off point for the Gulf crossing. But we’ve been following forecasts from a guy who lets Loopers know when the weather will be good for making the Gulf crossing and he said tomorrow should be as good as it will ever get. And then we got an email from a friend who’s done the crossing 14 times and he said the same thing. So we revved up the engine and made it all the way to Carrabelle. Go fast boats can be very nice when you really need to get somewhere!

We met up with a couple today who also want to do the crossing tomorrow, so we plan to untie at 7:15 tomorrow morning and hope the sea gods will look kindly upon us as we traverse open Gulf waters for 150-160 miles to Tarpon Springs. Interestingly, the couple we will be traveling with is from Spencer IN and started their trip from Racine WI about a week after us.

Some photos from today’s travels –

Today the weather decided to provide us with a good travel day, so we made it to Lighthouse Marina in Panama City Beach. About a third of the trip was down a narrow channel, with interesting banks on both sides.

It’s early to bed tonight because we have a slow day ahead of us tomorrow. A long stretch of the ICW tomorrow will be a narrow channel, which means speeds of 8-10 mph, not very fast.