First Post

Doug

Our plan for this blog is for it to be a spot where our friends, family and teachers can follow our progress through the Bahamas during our up coming trip. We will put the name of the writer at the top of each post.

My friend Kyle Reed came down from Denver March 12th to help me bring the boat down to my parent's dock in Fort Myers. This cuts significant distance off of the trip that Jen and the boys can skip, and gives us a good place to start from.

The Gulf Intercoastal Waterway offers a sheltered water route from Fort Myers all the way to Texas. It's easy traveling where you don't have to worry as much about weather. This is also called "the inside route." It is the way we mainly travel even though it is generally slower than going "outside" in the open gulf.

There is only one portion of the entire GICW that is not sheltered, unfortunatly, that is the leg from Carrabelle (where we normally keep the boat) to Tarpon Springs. This leg is about 140 nautical miles, or in our slow boat, about 18 to 20 hours.

Kyle and I planned to leave Saturday morning, 3/14, stop somewhere near Crystal River Saturday night and go on to Tarpon Springs on Sunday. But when we got down to the boat Friday afternoon the weather was so nice that we decided to leave that night and head straight across the Gulf to Tarpon, running all night.

This is despite the fact that many old mariners consider it bad luck to start a voyage on a Friday. Plus it was Friday the 13th.

Nonetheless, we threw caution to the wind and headed out. It turned out to be my best ever open water crossing The gulf was slick calm with only a small, barely rolling ground swell. As it got dark the clear night sky was choked with billions of stars and it was so calm and clear we could see them reflected in the surface of the gulf even though we were 40 miles off shore.

About 2 am a huge, nearly full moon rose out of the east, making it almost daylight in the open gulf. We steered right into the moon until it rose mid sky. We were surrounded by spinner dolphin playing in the wake and the eriee calls of loons much of the night.

The only issue was that the port engine was reading hot, about 200 degrees (140 is normal) so we nursed it along and worried a bit.

We got into Tarpon Springs about noon and took a slip at Tarpon Springs Municipal Marina, not the best docks but a great location and a steal at $36 a night. I taught Kyle how to lasso pilings with the dock lines. You would think somebody from Denver would be a natural at cowboy stuff. Kyle and I watched the FSU UNC basketball game in a little bar that afternoon. Tarpon Springs is a cool little town, mostly Greek, with lots of tourists and little shops on the waterfront. They all sell sponges. Every one of them.

On Sunday we diagnosed the hot running engine (it was just a sender for the gauge, the engine wasn't actually running hot) and headed out for Bradenton Beach. It was still so calm that we went outside at Clearwater Pass and ran the open gulf south, coming in to Tampa Bay through the Eggmont Key channel.

Eggmont has special meaning for my family since my Grandmother was the only person ever born on the island. Her father was an engineer who lived out there and was helping to build the fort that guarded the entrance to Tampa Bay. Eggmont Key is now a state park.

On the way down we listened to the AM radio broadcast of the FSU vs. Duke ACC tournament championship game. I had to lean the radio antenna against the mast to get a decent signal, but it worked. The 'noles lost, but we are proud of them anyway.

We anchored that night behind Bradenton Beach just south of the Cortez bridge and took the dinghy into Bradenton Beach to look around. On the way back to the boat the dinghy motor died and I had to row us the rest of the way. Our inflatable dinghy does not row well, (this should be read as it rows in circles, the boys love to watch me try to row it) so I was happy we were only a few hundred yards from the big boat. Messed with the dinghy motor but couldn't get it running. Grilled steaks on the boat for dinner.

The next day we continued south 8 hours down the GICW and took a slip at Boca Grande Marina. Nice place, but man, everything we saved on the Tarpon Springs slip we spent at Boca Grande Marina. Saw a really big tarpon laid up in their entrance channel. We walked around downtown Boca Grande that night and had appetizers at The Temptation, the oldest restraunt on the island. On the way back to the marina I took a wrong turn and got us lost, not an easy thing to do on a small island surrounded 360 degrees by water. Inevitably though we hit water and turned right, following the shoreline back to the marina.

On monday 3/16 we had a short trip (4 hours) down the waterway to my parent's home on a canal off of the Caloosahatchee River. My dad came out in his boat and met us about halfway, in a particularily narrow section of the waterway called miserable mile. Since I grew up on the water in Fort Myers, this part of the trip is always special to me. I have a lot of memories of fishing and camping on islands in that area. Only downside is the tons of boat traffic here and the bleach jug cruisers that throw huge wakes as they tear past us in the narrow channels.

Got to my parents home about mid afternoon, their neighbors are nice enough to let us tie up to their dock. Spent the rest of the day cleaning the boat.

Woke up the next morning and replaced the water temp sender on the port engine (boy, it's a lot easier when the coolant that spills out of the sender hole in the block all over your hand isn't 140 degrees). Tore apart the dinghy motor and found it had a clogged carb jet, probably from using the old gas that was left in the tank from last fall. Cleaned the carb, replaced the gas and the motor is now running great. It's nice when things are easy to fix.

Kyle rented a car and drove to Boynton Beach to see some family there and I rented a car and drove home.

Jen, the boys and I will head down on 3/3 to start the trip. We plan to provision on 4/4 then head out on 4/5 going through the Okeechobee Waterway to West Palm Beach.

We plan to post photos as we go along. I'm not much of a photographer, so I didn't take any on this part of the trip.