He Said: It’s been a while so I hope all is going well
in your world. We have had lots of sun down here in the Keys, but also a fair amount
of wind and some cool weather to add to the picture.
On Tuesday
Feb. 17th our friends from Phoenix, Gary and Kathy, came down
to visit us here at Marathon Marina. Gary had
family in Naples
so they had an opportunity to catch up with them and spend about 6 days with us
on the boat. The weather was OK but not
terrific. We still had a blast doing
some fun happy hours, we spent a day in Key
West, played golf, and just caught up on stuff.
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| Pat Daley at Sloppy Joe's Key West |
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| It finally happened - Jack met Jimmy at Margaritaville in Key West |
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| Spectacular sunset at Mallory Square, Key West captured by Kathy |
Following
their departure we had about a 2 day break and more friends from Phoenix came to visit - I
go way back with both Cindy and Joe. We
kind of repeated our previous week and did some of the same fun stuff we had
done earlier. We also did some great HH
stuff, did Key West,
and just enjoyed each other’s company. They
stayed about 5 days and that took us thru the month of Feb. They left us March 2 to head back to Phoenix and we departed the same day to head towards Marco Island
and Naples.
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| Another great Key West sunset |
The month
of Feb. was too much fun. I think we had
company for about 25 days in Feb. and really enjoyed all of our friends from Phoenix along with my brothers visiting from Columbus. We also had a chance to hang with some people
we had met earlier in our boating world and enjoyed them also. Marathon Marina was a great place to spend the
months of Jan. and Feb but it was now time to head out.
On Monday the
2nd we headed toward the mainland. We traveled about 10 hours and threw the
anchor out near Everglades
City. It was a long day in the open water and a
peaceful nite sleeping. We arrived the
following day in Marco
Island and stayed at the
same marina as last year. We were happy
to visit with our boating friends John and Debbie and spent some fun time with
my brother Jim and his wife Claudia. The 6 of us had dinner at Snook’s that
nite and Claudia headed back to Columbus
the following day to visit family. Jim
and I spent several evenings hanging out drinking a few cold ones and watching
the Buckeyes get spanked by Wisconsin
in hoop. After about 6 days between
Marco and Naples
(14 miles apart) it was once again time to roll. We really enjoyed both places
and since we were there about a year ago we kind of know our way around.
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| Everglades National Park |
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| Sunset from the Sunset Grill, Marco Island |
We then
departed for Ft. Myers Beach
on Monday the 9th of March. We spent some fun time with John and
Trish, people we met about a year ago from Buffalo.
We had a blast catching up with them in both FMB along with Marathon. Our
friends John and Debbie were also in FMB so the 6 of us had a fun chance to
hang out a little. Our plans are to stay in FMB for about 3 or 4 days then head
to Punta Gorda. Pat’s sister from Vegas
will be there meeting good friends from Chicago. It will be a fun time I am certain.
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| Check out the fashion - Jack matches the bar in Ft. Myers Beach |
From there
we will spend several days heading up the Gulf side of Florida until we arrive in our final
destination of St. Pete. Sometimes this boat world feels like it started about
a week ago. It’s very hard to believe in
a few short months we will finish our 2nd year - amazing. That is
about it from down in Florida. Hope all is well in your world, and we will
keep you posted once we get to St. Pete.
Take Care,
Jack
She Said: It has been a crazy few weeks. We are having an absolutely fabulous time –
we are definitely going out in style!
Following the twins’ visit, our Phoenix friends, Gary
& Kathy, came for a visit. The day
they arrived the weather was great – we were hanging out at the pool enjoying
the sunny weather. That night we went to
happy hour at Cabana Breezes which is right on the ocean. You couldn’t ask for better weather. Then a front came in and we had absolutely awful
weather. I wore my “winter” coat almost
every day Gary & Kathy were here, and we had a record setting low temp of
49 degrees one night! In spite of the
bad weather we had a lot of fun. We took
a day trip to Key West where we saw Pat Daley at Sloppy Joes, went to No Name
Pub and saw the Key Deer (a first for Jack & me), golfed, and did our own
version of a Marathon Pub Crawl (6 bars/restaurants in one night). We ended their visit with a sunset toast at
Keys Fisheries, where we hooked up with some fresh caught Mahi. We brought the Mahi to Sunset Restaurant
where they prepared it a couple different ways with several sides. It doesn’t get any fresher than that. Before Gary & Kathy left we had brunch on
the water at the foot of the 7 Mile Bridge (where the Florida Bay &
Atlantic come together) – the weather was perfect!
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| Kathy, Jack & Gary at No Name Pub, No Name Key. The most dollar bills we've seen in one place. |
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| The endangered Key Deer |
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| It was COLD! |
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| The 7 Mile Bridge seen from MTB |
As our
final days in Marathon were coming to an end, Cindy & Joe from Phoenix came to help us
say farewell to the Keys. We made
another trip to Key West
where we saw entertainer Bil Kraus again (always fun), went to my favorite
watering hole, The Commodore, and saw our last KW sunset at Mallory Square. We got
a small group together and headed to Ramrod Key to see local TropRock star
Howard Livingston one last time. While
the bottom of MTB was being cleaning by a scuba diver (this improves our fuel
consumption and is just good for the boat), we headed off to the pig races. We spent our last night in the Keys at my
favorite Marathon restaurant, Florida Steak
& Lobster, for our farewell dinner.
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| One of our favorite Key West places - Irish Kevin's and one of our favorite performers, Bil Krauss |
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| It's a bit hard to make out, but that's a diver on the port bow (how about that nautical talk) |
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| Final pig race of the day. They were lightning fast! |
It was really hard leaving Marathon – especially all of our friends at the Marathon
Marina. After spending 3 months in the
Keys this year and 2 months last year, we made a lot of friends. When we left last year we knew we would be
back and likely reconnect with people.
Knowing we won’t be back, and that it is unlikely our wakes will cross
with our boater friends as our trip comes to an end, we really were saying our
final farewells.
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| Our final Marathon sunset |
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| Our wake as we are leaving Marathon |
The winds were blowing around 15 MPH
(the top range of our comfort level) so we weren’t sure if we were going to
leave as scheduled. After checking
numerous weather sites and talking with lots of people, we decided to leave as
scheduled. We were traveling with
friends, John & Debbie (experienced boaters), so that made us feel more
comfortable. It turned out to be a good
travel day – a bit choppy early, but the water settled down nicely. We followed John & Debbie so we didn’t
have to do any navigating – a unique experience for us. We actually traveled about 10 hours that day
and made it all the way to Everglades
City where we rafted with
John & Debbie. Rafting is when one
boat sets its anchor and another boat ties up to the anchored boat. While we
were waiting for John & Debbie to set their anchor we noticed they had a
couple crab trap floats floating alongside them. They hit a couple of the trap markers/floats
– ouch! We heard that while in Everglades National Park, you have to anchor more
than 400 yards from land – so we complied!
We had planned to set sail around
8:30am the next day for our short trip to Marco Island. When we met with John & Debbie in the
morning we found out that their generator wasn’t working – it didn’t impact
their ability to start the engines, but it was something that would need
attention when we got to Marco
Island. We also saw that one of our lines came untied
over night and we also lost one of our fenders/bumpers. It was quite a night! We untied the remaining lines and waiting
while John & Debbie pulled up their anchor. Or should I say “tried” to pull up their
anchor. Their windlass wasn’t working –
you might remember we had the same problem last year. They have a 60 pound anchor and about 100’ of
chain out – that’s a lot of weight to pull up and there was nothing we could do
to help them out. Once we got under way
it was an uneventful trip to Marco
Island.
In Marco we met Jack’s brother and
sister-in-law, Jim & Claudia, at Snook’s for dinner. John & Debbie joined us later after
arranging for a mechanic and having a diver go under their boat to cut the trap
lines from their propeller. We never
want to see another boater have a problem, but it lets us know that these kinds
of problems happen to all boaters – not just us.
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| Marco Island |
We left John & Debbie in Marco
working on their repairs and we headed for Naples.
We had a great time in Naples
last year and this time was no different.
We got a chance to spend time with Jim, my friend Debi from Chicago, and our Mexico friends Dale &
Clara. We visited all of our favorite
haunts and added a couple new ones.
After 4 days we were off to Ft.
Myers Beach.
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| Clara & Jack. Dale and I didn't get the memo |
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| Naples Pier - It's always great |
As we pulled into Ft. Myers Beach we saw a friend’s boat. They were having boat issues in Marathon so we were happy to see that things were
repaired and they were making their way home.
We grabbed a mooring ball and got a call from John & Debbie saying
that they were arriving in FMB the same night.
They too had their repairs done. The
six of us spent a couple days together until we had to say our final
good-byes. All three couples met on our
first night on the ICW in Coinjock,
NC a year and a half ago. John & Debbie have been our best boating
friends and saying good-bye to them was the hardest. They will be traveling “The Loop” for the
next year, but we hope to see them on land sometime in the future.
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| John, Debbie & Jack on Bonnie Blue. We had a great time with you guys! |
We are off to Punta Gorda to meet up
with my sister, Donna, and friends, Tom & Laura. We spent 2 nights in Punta Gorda last year
and really enjoyed it. Having family and
friends there will make it that much more fun.
That’s it for now. Will update
you again in a few weeks as we settle in to St. Pete.
