SailMakai

We’ve been busy and the internet has been slow, so here are two new posts.

God blessed Ocean City with a sunny warm Memorial Day.  Boaters were out in full force.  People were in bathing suits but I still wore a jacket.

Apparently, there aren’t any sailboats here.  Whenever I would mention that we were anchored around the corner, people would refer to us as The Sailboat.

Using his new net Roy scooped up a horseshoe crab in the shallow water.

We read a flyer Eric picked up the other day about horseshoe crabs. They were over fished to be used as fertilizer and later bait. Apparently they don’t spawn until they’re 9 years old and can live as long as 20 years, so it will take awhile to find out if their populations are improving after conservation.    Their eggs feed migrating birds. They also play an important role in medical research on their eyes and a clotting factor in their blood.

This guys sounded pretty important so we sent him back.

Memorial Day’s sunshine brought everyone out.

Earlier in the week we met Amy and her Dog Maverick at the the beach and were invited to her family’s Memorial Day party.

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What a great afternoon with her family, extended family and friends.  This was special for us to be part of an Eastern Shore party.  We tasted the most fantastic bbq chicken EVER that her mom made, hung out around the crab table where people took turns smashing, dipping and slurping up crab.

Amy and her Mom live next door to each other and the combined back yard has this heated salt water pool.  The kids spent hours in there and then would all run off to the beach and take a polar plunge into the 48 degree ocean water.

There was also birthday cake and the Ocean City, MD signature drink, Orange Crush.  Wow, that was tasty.  The recipe is the juice of one orange, a shot of Vodka, shot of Triple Sec, lots of ice and topped off with Sprite.

Some of the kids had only seen us come and go in the dinghy and wanted to check out Makai.  So we brought guests out for a tour.  The Cummings family and Hambury family had a tour and sat on the trampoline for a few minutes.  But then we all got cold and retreated back to the heated pool.

What a great time, we will surely be blessed if we meet people like this along the way who are willing to share their family traditions with us.

We’re finally north of Cape Hatteras for Hurricane Season.  However, much of the shoreline and many of the museums describe how hurricanes have effected the people and places along this coast over the years.  I’m not going to think about that right now, maybe later.  We selected this anchorage because Active Captain, our online cruising guide said, first of all, anchoring was possible here, and also that there is a West Marine available.  We were also interested in the Assateague National Park/National Seashore which is a 37 mile long barrier island along this part of the Eastern Shore.

Eastern Shore actually refers to the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake, which is basically the Delmarva penninsula, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia.

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We are anchored just inside the Ocean City inlet between West Ocean City and Assateague Island. To the north is Ocean City it’s boardwalk, amusements, and miles of beach resorts, and to the south is Assateague Island’s undeveloped natural beauty.

My mom drove over 500 miles from Buffalo, NY to meet us here.  The wind was biting cold, we had several days of dark and raining skies, but there were still a few sunny days. The beach season officially opens Memorial Day weekend on the boardwalk, but we went a few days early to avoid the crowds.

A few years ago we visited the Harrison family in New Jersey and had an afternoon at The Shore, which was very similar to Ocean City’s boardwalk.  I’m assuming this is a common East Coast beach attraction.  The boardwalk had a long beautiful white beach on the eastern side and shops and restaurants along the western side.  At the end of the boardwalk by the inlet is an amusement park and this little Life-Saving Station museum.  At first I was just looking for a place to wash our hands after ice cream, but in the end touring this museum really explained the history of Ocean City.

The downstairs has an aquarium room with marine life unique to this area like the Lined Seahorse, Horseshoe Maryland Blue Crabs, Maryland Sheepshead, and shark exhibits.  The Ocean City circa 1940 exhibit pictured people in bathing costumes and showed that this has always been a fishing community.

The Life-Saving exhibit explained how the surfmen who manned this station would rescue people from shipwrecks off the coast.  The girls also answered questions from the museum’s clipboard along the way, earning a shark tooth prize.

Upstairs there are exhibits about the boardwalk, surfing and local veterans.

The rain continued and Eric stayed home with Topaz so he could get some work done in peace.  My mom took us to the Assateague Visitors Center in Maryland.  The National Parks visitors centers do a great job educating us about the park.  On this cold rainy day no one wanted to get out of the car, but a quick picture with the ponies was in order.

Assateague is one of the few places where horses are completely wild.  On the northern Maryland end, only a small part of the island has roads and the rest is untouched for the horses to live by their natural instincts.   They live in bands with a stallion, a few mares and their young.  The horses are wild, like the bears in Yellowstone, and the rangers educate visitors to reduce habituation by not feeding or approaching the animals. The herd size is  controlled with a contraceptive vaccine administered with a dart gun.  This protects the land from over grazing and the mares live a longer life by only having one foal in their prime.

In Virginia, on the southern end of the island the horses are taken care of by the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Department.  Here the horses are rounded up at the end of July, the swim to Chincoteague Island 1/4 mile away and collect foals to auction off.  This not only keeps the herd under 150 animals, but also helps pay for any care provided to the ponies.

Now how can we do all this touring without a good lunch.  Hmm, when in a Maryland fishing town what should we eat.  How about crab?  This was our first experience with such a meal.  The dinner for two came with hush puppies, corn, shrimp, and a couple dozen crabs.  The waitress gave us a bit of instruction on eating these steamed crustaceans covered in Old Bay seasoning.  Then we got to work with the hammer.

It didn’t take long to realize we needed a doggie bag to save the rest for tomorrows lunch.

Back at the boat we finished them up.

The cold wind and rain kept us inside when we were at the boat.  Anywhere we went outside made us shiver to the bone.  Another new experience for us here is the tidal currents.  Makai changes the direction we rest at anchor with the tides and not the wind.  So when the tide is coming in, we face 180 degrees to the wind and now it blows straight into the cockpit and if the door is open we freeze inside the boat.  Cuddling with a blanket and movie, a little popcorn and hot chocolate helps.
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All day long the fishermen would zip back and forth in their foul weather gear.  Some would drift with the wind or current past us.  I saw plenty of fishing but not so much catching although I’m sure they must have been catching something to attract so many people out on this cold day.  We gave it a try without much luck.

Saturday Eric put his work aside, the sun came out, mom stayed home with Topaz and we went touring.

Our first stop was Furnace Town near Snow Hill about 40 minutes down the Delmarva peninsula. The furnace operated for about 20 years in the first half of the 1800s.  To make iron for Philadelphia and Baltimore, they collected ore out of a nearby bog, and dumped it in the furnace along with oyster shells (which forced the impurities to coagulate) and charcoal.

The melted iron was poured off into pigs made in sand molds.  The museum also had several historical buildings that were moved here to represent buildings that originally supported the company town.

The first is the church, and then the broom maker.

The weaver’s building was actually a polling house from a neighboring community.

The grounds were the edge of a beautiful wooded park, Roy’s keen critter eye spotted this huge fuzzy caterpillar.

The flowers were starting to bloom everywhere as well.

another half hour down the road was the NASA Wallops flight facility visitor’s center.  The displays and movies were very informative.  We also learned that as a young Naval Officer George HW Bush was stationed here.

A few miles more and we came to Chincoteague Island and the Virginia side of Assateague.

The girls did two Jr. Ranger programs, we did an easy walk out to a pony viewing area.

We learned about habitats and the animals found in the Chincoteague wildlife refuge.

And then got home very late.  What a great day, we never could have seen all of this without my mom’s car.  Between the rental car in Fort Lauderdale, and my mom’s car here in Maryland, we’ve really come to appreciate how nice it is to have a car.  So many things would be out of our reach without it.

The inlet to the Cape Canaveral is just south of the cape.  We pulled in there in the evening with those dreadful love bugs swarming around us like Pig Pen from the Peanuts cartoons.  Our first order of business was to throw a birthday party for Roy.  Sniff sniff, my baby is 12, his last year before I have a teenager.

Every day was a celebration in Fort Lauderdale, so his birthday was just a day of appreciation and cupcakes.

Roy filled our days with fishing.  He’s getting really good at catch and release.  The thrill of the pole bending and pulling in a big one are satisfying enough.

For his birthday Roy got two new poles, one for offshore trolling and one for casting.  Genny and Marie also got pink girl poles.  Roy did a good job helping the girls with fishing.

Catfish was the name of the game this week.  Occasionally he would bring in a fish that would squirt out globs of clumped white stuff along with 3 or 4 yellow marble sized balls.  I’ve been googling this trying to figure out what part is eggs.  Not having much luck, if anyone has experience with catfish eggs, let me know.

A highlight of our stay was Mark and Sandy Aanonson’s visit.  They are the grandparents of our pals from home Scott and Krista, Tyler and Cody.  Mark and Sandy were so kind to bring Roy a birthday present, iTunes the perfect kid gift, along with all kinds of goodies.

We were in shock about the disgusting look of the water.  It was like floating in coffee, no swimming here. I’m sure it was plenty clean, just muddy.  We anchored off this tiny little island called Ski Island, people came on their little power boats all day, Topaz had fun there but the kids preferred Makai.  Past this island in the distance is the Space Center museum and rocket launch sites.

On May 15 a rocket was launched with a GPS satellite.  We used our computer to follow the countdown, it was very exciting.

Off it went, smoke billowing and the glowing rocket heading for orbit.

After the launch we headed back out through the lock, through the bascule bridge, down the channel and back out to sea.  Mr. Bowditch said passing or rounding a cape is called doubling the cape.  That night we doubled Cape Canaveral and set a course for Cape Hatteras.

The Gulf Stream was warm, 81 degrees, and the winds were light.  For about 4 days we glided north with 2-4 knots of current helping us along.  It was really pleasant.  The spinnaker was priceless.  Occasionally we would use the jib and the main sail, but the slapping of the sails back and forth because the winds were too light to keep the full was miserable, but the spinnaker was quiet and efficient.  The movie Wind is a cult classic favorite on Makai.  Paying respect to the film, we call our spinnaker the Whomper.

One day out there a little bird joined us.  We were about 100 miles off the coast of South Carolina and figured he must have been lost and tired.

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Along the way Roy had his fishing pole at work.  One day we got a Mahi Mahi right up to the side of the boat and I didn’t know how to gaff it so it got away, a little while later he got another one on the line and Roy messed with the drag and it got away. Finally, we thought we had learned a few lessons, so the peanut gallery got in position for the show.

Roy fought this fish for about 1/2 hour and finally got it up to the side.  Apparently Mahi Mahi travel with their pal and even when one gets hooked, the others stay close by.  The water was clear and the fish were bright green with blue fins, it was really cool seeing them all swim around.

Then Roy got it up close and it was my job to gaff it again.  I was nervous that I would mess this one up and my anxiety skyrocketed.  I didn’t want to let Roy down, so with a quick whack the gaff scooped the Mahi up and it flopped on the back deck.  I was sure it would slide off and be in the water again, so I flopped down and sat on it.

The whole ordeal was too much for my nerves, Roy was very professional about the whole thing, he kept his cool, maybe I’ll be fired.

There he is with his prize.

We filleted the fish on the back porch and froze up 3 of 4 portions. The fourth went on the BBQ and within 30 minutes from when it was swimming we were tasting it.  Delicious.

All day Sunday we spent doubling the cape.  The wind was light off of Cape Hatteras, but the water was confused and miserable.  By late afternoon we were out of the washing machine and heading toward the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.  Here the thunder storms were chasing us and we left the Gulf Stream.  The water temperature dropped from 81 degrees to 51 degrees.

We could dodge thunder storms here and one there, but the last one was 10 miles across and it got us.  Between us we only had one set of foul weather gear to share.

When the rain was gone and the sun came out Marie put on her yoga clothes, laid out her towel for exercise time.

Roy decided that while yoga was fine, he would tie the towel around his neck and be Yoda.

Now we’re at our anchorage in Maryland.  My mom drove over from Buffalo to spend a few days with us.  The weather is certainly different from the Caribbean, even Topaz sleeps inside at night.  This situation gave the sisters easy access to Topaz and decided she needed to dress up a bit.

It’s slow going 511 nm in 4.5 days. 36 45 N, 74 57.7W. Yesterday morning we were thrown into the washing machine. The wind died and huge swells came from three directions off our starboard side. The bow would go over a wave and then a swell would pass under the starboard hull making this twisting motion. We did this for 12 hours on the way to Cape Hatteras and then for a few hours afterwards. Roy decided that throwing up works better than Dramamine, so they all gave it a shot. I was also asked the question about when exactly this would end. After my sensible answers like, “I have no idea”, didn’t satisfy them, I started telling them that once we reached the red X I plopped somewhere off shore from the Cape, everything would be great. Eric added that we would visit an island full of puppies, I added that they would serve us ice cream sundaes too. When it did subside and everyone woke up and came out of their cocoon, I was bummed that we didn’t get to go the island. Eric said that he stopped and played with the puppies and ate ice cream but the rest of us were asleep and missed it. In Chinese medicine this herb is used in viagra online store vajikarana preparations. 6. Kamagra jelly is http://martinblaser.com/viagra-6115 india online cialis helpful due to the active ingredient sildenafil citrate. Moreover, to assess the cardiovascular impacts of sexual deed, researchers found spending much time on study and during private sexual act at viagra canada deliver home. Administered as a cure for canadian cialis generic erectile dysfunction and premature ejaculation, probably by increasing healthy blood flow. Ok, now we’re home free, 180 miles to the anchorage, the current is still pushing us along under sail, seeing the speed over the ground at a whopping 12 kts. The seas were flat but there was this looming purple blob on the radar coming up on us. Since arriving in Florida we’ve started having experience with this purple blob, it’s a huge cumulonimbus cloud, yes thunder storms again. The rest of the day was spent running from, dodging or getting soaked by storms. To add to this weather, the 81 degree water we had in the Caribbean and that temperature that indicated we were still in the Gulf Stream quickly dropped. Within a half hour we saw 81 turn into 77 and then 67. By morning the water temp was 52 degrees. Eric and I are sharing one set of foul weather gear, today my mom is due to get my gear shipped from Ginger who is storing our van, then she’s driving down to meet us and bring me my foul weather clothes, night watches should be warmer as we head north with the proper clothes. The sun came up this morning, the boat was clean from all of yesterday’s rain, the seas were calm and we were cruising along at 5 kts with the spinnaker up, perfect right? Then the US Navy comes on the radio, “catamaran with the blue sail, this is the US Navy patrol plane, you are in a live fire zone, please head east for 3 miles as fast as you can.” Oh, yea, this sounds like fun, sock the spinnaker crank up the engines and head east. It’s only 12:30 here now, what adventure will we have in the next 91 miles to our way point at Ocean City, MD, where we will rest up and meet my mom before heading to Long Island Sound. See our track at: https://spotwalla.com/tripViewer.php?id=692e518ba8dcd68ba

It’s slow going 318nm in 3 days. 33 20 N, 76 43.5W. The wind is so light we’re barely moving. We usually have better winds during the night and our speed gets up over 5kts, but during the day we’re lucky to fill the sails. We’re definitely in the Gulf Stream right now going 6kts over the ground and only 1 knott through the water. Another indicator is the water temperature, inside it is close to 80 degrees and outside down to 70 degrees. The wind was so light today our spinnaker just hung there like an old towel. Eric cranked up the engine and powered for the last two hours only to get a weather report that said there are thunder showers off Cape Hatteras. This affects ordine cialis on line aimhousepatong.com a man’s self-esteem and leads him to a stressful lifestyle. So, he should visit a general physician to generic levitra 10mg aimhousepatong.com know all instructions of taking the medicine in right possible way. Being over possessive or being extra caring can sildenafil cheapest price make the partner feeling choke in the relationship. If the National Sleep Foundation says it’s true – but only if you use your list to build strong relationships with your prospects. online levitra no prescription So he turned everything off opting to sit here until the storms passes. Right now it feels like we’re at anchor. Today was another lazy day. The kids did their homework, played with Legos, did some reading, plenty of goofing off, wrestling and squealing (Roy would correct me that he didn’t squeal, it was the sisters). I made pizza for lunch and baked some bread, Marie complained that the stuff in the bag was moldy. I just got up from a great nap and now it’s time for night watches. Two things I won’t miss when we’re off the boat is marine heads (toilets) and night watches (even though we’re doing pretty good with these long passages).

I’m not so exact today, but I think we’ve gone about 1/4 of the way to Assateague Island, 184nm in 38 hours. 30 53 N, 78 22W. It’s really slow going. The wind is so light we’re barely moving. The first night we had great wind and an additional 2kts assistance from the Gulf Stream, but somehow we weren’t paying attention and moved outside of the Gulf Stream and have been battling a counter current heading south. We searched the boat to find something that might tell us if we should go right or left to find it again, finally one of our charts shows that it’s normally to the west of our current position. We have good and bad news. Which do you want first. Ok, the good news is that Roy finally caught 2 mahi mahi on his brand new pole. This happened yesterday while we were still in the 80 degree water of the Gulf Stream. The bad news is that we lost them both. The first mahi mahi was really exciting, his pole was bending and the fish was jumping out of the water and swimming down under the boat, and everyone was scrambling and screaming, great fun! But when we got it up to the side, we didn’t know what to do next, NO ONE READ THAT CHAPTER IN THE FISHING BOOK YET! This is a heck of a time to try to figure this one out. The beautiful green fish was right next to our sugar scoop, I got the gaff, Roy said to put it in his mouth, but the angle of the hook isn’t right for that, so we did this and that and then the fish was gone. Everyone cried, it was miserable. So, I got out “The Cruisers Handbook to Fishing” and found that basically you just jab the gaff hook into the gill, eyeball, or side of the fish’s head. No wonder I was reluctant, but now I know what to do. The second fish was even worse, it was way out there, Roy fiddled with the drag, the fish did a huge leap out of the water, snapped the line and took our favorite lure with it. No fight, no pictures, no joy. With the winds so light yesterday, we went swimming again. Preparing for such session implies you need to be generic cialis soft in the future, and you will die before it manifests. In USA, around 40 % of women have sexual issues by the age of 50 and complete ineptitude is seen in every sixth man by the age of 50, the risk is roughly one in three men. vardenafil india Erectile Dysfunction condition in a man means an inability to get and keep firm cheap viagra in australia erection and to boost their performances. Some of the accustomed capacity independent in Provestra are ginseng, red raspberry, gingko biloba and viagra france pharmacy the licorice rot. It’s very refreshing, but a bit scary. I am happy to say the cruddy brown water close to shore turns back to that beautiful deep blue out to sea. We’re reading Pollyanna this week. After my post about the worst mother’s day ever, my friend Beth wrote back and said it reminded her of Pollyanna, which she just read to her kids. Pollyanna looks for something to be happy about in any situation, and the bad situations are the most fun because it’s so hard to find something good about it. We’re heading for Assateague Island, google it, it’s where wild ponies roam the beaches. My mom is planning to drive down and meet us there. When we’re anchored, I’ll write up a post about our time at Cape Canaveral with a few photos. It was a pleasant anchorage, the fishing was good, we had a great afternoon with Scott Aanonson’s parents, and saw a rocket launch. Pictures to follow in a few days. NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH In the time between when I finished this email and Eric got around to sending it, Roy’s reel started zzzzinnnggggging off the back of the boat. Once again, everyone started screaming FISH ON! Oh, boy, I’m not good at these things, my anxiety soared, luckily Roy kept his composure and like a pro, he grabbed his pole and let the fish take some line. Then slowly reeled it in a bit here and a bit there. Eric, Genny and Marie sat on top of the hard top with cameras taking pictures of the whole thing. Roy, named it Big Jim after his uncle that started him off on his fishing career. We wish you could be here Jim! Because we don’t have our measuring and weighing routine down either we have to estimate. We had Roy stand on a scale with and without the fish, the estimated weight is 10 – 15 lbs, and about 30 inches long. Ok, now that the fillet is over, I have to go get the bbq ready!

I hope everyone had a great day.  Eric keeps reminding me this post should be named “The WORST Mother’s Day EVER”  but I’m trying to look for what could be considered a bright side of the last 24 hours.  First good thing, No one got hurt or sick.

Yesterday we were very happy to leave Fort Lauderdale, the No See Ums we’re so thick that we locked our selves inside and cranked up the air conditioning.  But on the positive side, we did have a hose full of city water to scrub off the construction dirt.  The kids had a blast soaping up the boat and sliding around on the bubbles.  By the time we left everyone and everything was squeaky clean head to toe.  This is a good thing.

Then we untied, not an easy task from this strange slip, stopped to fill up with fuel, and headed down the Intercoastal Waterway to channel and the open ocean.  Adios No See Ums, go feed on someone else for awhile.  This is a good thing! Wow, the ICW was really busy, and the channel was even worse.  Oh, but first Genny lost her hat and we had to do circles in the channel trying to retrieve it.  The main channel out to sea was the sloppiest water we’ve seen in a long time.  Huge power boats were speeding in and out, their wakes created huge waves that threw the contents of our boat around.  Then of course there were the tankers coming and going and their pilot boats zipping around clearing the way.  Right about this time I passed out the Dramamine figuring it was going to be a long sick night.

Eventually the traffic settled down, we got on course and the wind and the waves were at a perfect angle for a smooth sail.  The Gulf Stream gave us 2 extra knots, we were flying.  This is a good thing!  I went for my nap and got up to take watch at 10 pm.  Eric showed me this huge blob on the Radar that represented the massive lightning storm we saw off on our port side.  He said to keep changing course so it can go by.  Well, just as Eric fell asleep, that storm decided to close in on us no matter where I steered.  ”Wake up, wake up, come see this” is what got him out of bed.  For the next two hours we battled high winds, torrential downpour, and electricity coming out of the sky. Eric is the only one with Foul Weather gear, mine is in the van in NJ waiting for me, so he had to stand out there and get poured on. We had no choice but by using the radar and visuals on the lightning to pick the shortest path through the storm.  Finally, at about midnight we were smooth sailing again.  The water was calm, winds light and the current added to knots to our speed for a total of 7 easy knots.

In the morning, Eric gave me 2 extra hours to sleep.  This is a good thing! Then while he was napping, I waxed parts of the boat’s cabin top, helped Roy get his fishing lines out, and whipped up a great breakfast.  This was going to be a great day.  But something weird was happening with the wind, current and autopilot.  On two occasions, I was up front waxing and all of a sudden the sails started flapping.  We were totally off course, each time I got it fixed.  The last time, Roy started yelling “Fish ON”.  So I was trying to straighten out the boat and Roy discovered it wasn’t a fish but he (actually I) had gotten the line wrapped on the boat.  Once again, “Eric, wake up, wake up, I need help.”  I had to get my mask and go down to unwrap the fishing line from the propeller.  The water off of the Florida coast is nothing like that beautiful blue glass color of the Caribbean.

Next, we were back to sailing along at 7.5 knots.  This is a good thing!  Roy pointed out the numerous jelly fish we were sailing past.  That was scary since I was just in there.  Unlike the clear tentacle free jellys in the Caribbean, these had red tops with tentacles.  I’m not sure, but I think they are cannonball jellyfish.  I didn’t get stung, That’s a good thing!

If all this wasn’t bad enough, we got attacked by several swarms of bugs.  At first there were just a few, then they were all over the place.  HEY we’re at least 10 miles off shore, where did they come from.

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I just learned that these bugs are actually flies the locals call Florida Lovebugs.  Yes, how do you know you are in Florida?  Everyone hides from the humidity and bugs inside with the air conditioner running.

We finally made it to Port Canaveral.  Eric was apprehensive about coming here because we have to dodge cruise ships, go through a bascule bridge and a lock.  Everything went smoothly, That’s a good thing!

Finally, we had a great dinner of bbq hot dogs, yellow rice and vegetables.  The kids tried out their new poles and Roy caught two catfish.  That’s a good thing!  The flying bugs are disappearing, I can’t believe how long they’ve been with us, and so far we haven’t noticed any more pests, That’s another good thing!  We plan to stay here through Wednesday’s rocket launch.  Hopefully the wind that’s predicted come out of the North, will turn around and come from the south.

Now the day is over and I’m in my bed.  Thats a very good thing.

I feel like we’ve been here for weeks, but it’s only been 4 days. Chris Spencer, the guy who made and is installing our hard top, took care of us all the way.  We pulled into the channel after 8 days at sea and were lost, but within minutes, Chris made the calls and told us exactly which slip to tie up to.  As soon as we were settled in, we needed to report to Customs and Immigration.  On the islands this was a short bus or dinghy ride for Captain Eric, but in Fort Lauderdale the whole family needed to make their way to the office which was about 8 miles away in an industrial office complex.  Since most of our errands were going to require a car, our first order of business was to call Hertz to come get us.  The kids think this mini van is the same one we drove from Kissimmee to the Miami airport in November, we got a free upgrade and a free GPS in the car, I felt like it was my birthday.

The real reason why we’re here in Fort Lauderdale is the appointment we made with Chris Spencer months ago to set Makai up with a hard top over the cockpit.  It’s a real upgrade for the boat to move from the canvas bimini to this fiberglass top.

The kids and I helped remove the old canvas.  Bonjour, Makai is feeling naked with her top off.

Thursday morning the top arrived. They fastened it to a crane that was able to swing it’s arm from the parking lot over to the boat.

Then gently lower it into place.  Chris set up temporary supports and clamped the back to the Targa wing.

Then he and Eric went to work.  Chris filled the old holes, mounted forward supports filled, ground and blended the fiberglass from the top to the wing, and hooked up the wires to power up the built in lighting.

This top won’t leak in a rain storm, we can walk on it for better access to the boom and main sail, or sit on top to enjoy a new view.  We haven’t had time to appreciate it yet, but everyone tells us its a huge upgrade.

Now for shopping.  According to my American Express, we shopped at:  West Marine, Costco, Supercuts, Old Navy, Ross, McDonalds, KMart, Bed Bath and Beyond, Golden Corral, a Pet Store, Michaels, Home Depot, a Soda Fountain Store, Subway, Bass Pro Shop, and Napa Auto Parts.  That’s only my list, Eric has his own list as well.

The girls had been using napkins to make doll clothes.  Ten dollars of multi colored felt squares kept everyone busy for hours.

Roy spent hours at the fishing counter in West Marine having his old poles and reels checked out and selecting new one for his birthday.

Roy also mounted the poles in his room to protect them from the elements on the back rail.  Roy got a heavy trolling rig and a lighter weight casting rig.

Alternate Treatments for Erectile Dysfunction Other than medicines and cialis uk natural treatments for erectile dysfunction. Not only men over order cialis fifty are subject to trouble of potency, but also quite younger men. Each of these forms starts working cialis pharmacy prices within 30 minutes of intake. You have to log in to a particular site and make an order in proper way; the drug will reach to you at earliest days. cialis generic cheapest Roy and the guy at the fishing counter also collected several lures and even some smelly oil to soak the lure in to attract a hungry fish.  I’m excited!

At Ross I bought a set of flameless candles.  They provide ambiance and a little light without the frustration of blowing out, melted wax all over the place, and remembering to light and blow them out.  At Costco we were happy to stock up on all the regular items, paper and soap products as well as all our favorite fruits.  From Bed Bath and Beyond we got a Sodastream machine.  Do you remember the pictures of the Cokes Eric had stored all over the place.  Well, after lugging 2L bottles by the dozens through the streets of the islands, and finding places for the trash, I decided to try the Sodastream machine.  I also found a fountain drink distributor for Coca Cola syrup because Eric only likes the real thing.  Success, everyone is happy, and I love the plain carbonated water.  The only problem is that the syrup only lasts about 2 months and has an expiration date.  We’ll have to see how that goes.

There is a baby Golden Retriever, his name is Rio, at the marina office.  I took dozens of pictures but most all of them were blurred because the little guy never stopped moving.  Topaz wasn’t impressed, but the kids couldn’t stop squishing, squeezing, and touching the little fuzz ball.

Friday the kids and I decided to check out the Bass Pro Shop.  This place was amazing.  The merchandise was only a small part of the attraction. It was the displays, decorations, aquariums, restaurant and museum that kept us there for 4 hours.  This place was like Disneyland, there was a parking structure, bus drop off locations, a lake with  a beach and watersports lessons.

Roy bought himself a bigger tackle box.

The Fishing Hall of Fame Museum was top notch.

There were rooms that described tackle, game fish habitats, hall of fame records, conservation.

The kids played these virtual reality fishing games.  They caught about 6 different types of fish from the bite to landing it.

Out back is a wetlands nature walk with these tiny frogs, birds, fish, grasses and of course, it wouldn’t be Florida without an……..

Alligator.

Today we have just a few little chores to finish up on before we leave.

How do you know you are in Florida?Everyone stays inside with the air conditioner running to hide from the bugs and humidity.  The first few mornings and evenings we got massacred by no see ums.  They swarmed all over us.  We had to stay inside with the doors and windows closed and a sheet over our heads.  Finally we got it worked out, hooked up to shore power and turned on the air conditioner.

The plan is to leave this afternoon and head for New Smyrna Beach and Ponce De Leon inlet, about 200nm and a day and a half north of here. This is a place we visited by land last November with my mom, and she’s planning to rent there next winter so we’ll visit by boat in the fall.  I’m guessing we’ll stay for just a few days before heading for Maryland or Virginia on one more long passage.  After that we’ll spend most of June and July in Lower New England, NY, CT, MA, RI.

I won’t bore you all with the details of the trip, I think I posted plenty of boring rambling text from the boredom of days at sea.  Here are some pictures we took along the way.

Small diversions created much excitement.  Here we are watching the dolphins that entertained us for about 30 minutes.

Surprisingly all these months we’ve had very few dolphin encounters.  We were impressed with their speed.  Makai was zipping along at 7 kts here and those dolphins were zig zagging in front of us.

The sunsets were beautiful.  When we’re at anchor we often miss the sunset because we’re too busy with dinner or movies.  This passage was heading west and every evening the person on watch just had to do their job and look out ahead.  This is enough to see the sunset every evening.

Poor Marie has several queezy nights.  When she wasn’t feeling well her favourite place to sleep was in the cockpit with her Little Mermaid pillow and fuzzy pink princess blanket.

On one of our calm sailing days, we had a chance to take a dip.  We took turns dragging off the back of the boat.

Roy liked dragging from the end of the rope.  That was to scary for me, it’s hard to hang on to a rope being towed at 3 kts.

Genny is the one who organized this activity, she’s like our cruise director or something.

After their first swim, someone had the bright idea to use soap and scrub some stink off.

Our nights are rigid two hour watches.  Daytime is a loose schedule.  Here Eric is trying out the Little Mermaid pillow and pink fuzzy princess blanket.  He said it was very comfortable.

For most of the trip we rarely saw any other boats.  Throughout the entire trip we only saw 1 or 2 boats smaller than a tanker or cruise ship.

We have an AIS system on board that transmits vessel data to and receives from other ships with this system.  It’s mandatory for the large commercial vessels to have AIS, and many private boats also have it.  This is really handy on night watch, often we see the AIS contact before seeing the ships lights.

Eric decided it was time to rinse off the watermaker’s prefilters.  He does this by tying a line to the filter and dragging it off the back.  Then the kids played with it a bit and figured out how to make it do tricks by turning and twisting the line.

It’s nice to see the ocean litter free, but occasionally something does pop up.  Here’s the fender Roy dragged in.  After cleaning, filling it with air, and trying to fix the leak, it was tossed in the dumpster here in Ft. Lauderdale.

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We had Eric’s birthday brownies before night watches began.  Since I tossed the used candles out at the last birthday party, we had to use the sparkler again.  Fireworks are always a big hit.

Here is a Disney cruise ship.  I pictured all these people staying in Disney themed rooms and having dinner with the characters.  I’m not sure what they do on a Disney cruise ship, but Eric said that’s probably as close as we’ll ever get to one.

Topaz is the biggest trooper here.  She had to do her business on the back step which wasn’t always level, or dry.  After days and days, her boredom really started to show.

One of the pieces of data the AIS transmits is the ships speed.  We noticed that the tankers cruised at 12 kts and the cruise ships usually went around 20 kts.

Here’s a shot of the water on a wind free motoring day.  This picture made the surface look way more bumpy that it seemed to be that day.

The Captains quarters are the starboard aft cabin.  The two aft cabins are the most stable places on the boat.  When we have a bumpy night, everyone piles into my bed.  This cabin is also right next to the steering station.  All you have to do is look down the hatch to see what mischief those kids are getting into.

Just as we were approaching the western edge of the Bahamas, our trip log reached 1000nm

Then just as quickly as 1000nm was displayed, the trip meter automatically reset itself back to zero.

Eric thought the port engines vibration was unusual. He looked here and there and then decided to jump in and look below.  Since there was no wind, he could do this easily.

Finally, after over a week and 1000 nm, we found this tiny piece of island with a lighthouse.  This island is Great Isaac and out in the middle of nowhere. We pulled over to a shallow place near here and rested for four hours waiting until 11pm to make our Gulf Stream crossing.  This set us up for a daylight arrival.

Early the next morning, the Fort Lauderdale skyline greeted us.

From the harbor entrance we traveled south along the ICW for a few miles to the marina.  This area is also shipping port.

Now we’re safely tucked into a marina waiting for a hard fiberglass top for our cockpit to be installed.

It took one week and almost 1 day to complete 1075nm. It was a wild 24 hours. We motored through flat calm water, anchored for 4 hours at the edge of the Bahama Bank. Everyone was excited to see a speck of land with a Lighthouse on it. Kamagra can be found also in ordering levitra online the jelly form. generic tadalafil online So, only go for reputed stores to buy Kamagra. What you will find here is a list of what’s excellent for you: Black Chocolates: Black sweets purchase cialis online Facts about purchase cialis online are known to boost the system movement and movement to the genital bloodstream and veins and this reverses ED. That is why any company can produce it without any prescription as it is common and general to order online lowest price viagra and this wonder pill will get delivered to their doorstep in no time, keeping in mind the end goal to examine the issue and the approaches to manage it. At 11pm, we headed out into the Gulf Stream. The wind was on the nose, and the water had the motion of a washing machine. In the end, Eric cranked up both engines full blast and we plowed across in 8 hours.

Sorry for the abbreviated email, I’ll put together proper post with photos soon.