Bill and I have spent the last five winters enjoying
the warmth and the many interesting sights of southern Florida and the
Bahamas. We could continue to do this
for the rest of our boating life, but we promised ourselves that we would make
another trip to the Canadian waters again.
This area, particularly the Georgian Bay, made a lasting impression on
us. The scenery is largely rocks, water,
and windblown trees. There are not as
many boaters in the anchorages and marinas, and all the people we encountered
were super friendly and more than willing to share local knowledge with
us. We are looking forward to spending
more time in the Canadian waters over the next few years, starting next
summer. Unfortunately we will only be on
the water in the summers. Winters are
too cold for boating and the Great Lakes may freeze over in the winter. In the winter of 2013-2014 all of the Great
Lakes had large amounts of ice most of the winter. We haven’t decided if we can stand the winter
cold of Rhode Island yet, but we can always drive south if our blood has become
“too thin” for freezing temperatures.
This last winter in Marathon we retraced all of our
favorite spots to hold us over for our next few winters up north. Our bike riding and walking was great
exercise and the bike riding even gave me a big surprise. One of the last few bike rides we took, I almost
fell off my bike when I spotted a fifty dollar bill lying in the grass.
We left Marathon on Saturday, April 5th, the day there was a runners race
across the Seven Mile Bridge. We hadn’t
thought about it ahead of time, and just left as soon as we were ready. It was quite a sight to see the first of
several hundred people running across the bridge as we went under it. The news helicopter added to the excitement. This picture of the bridges is the west end
of the old one and the new one. The old
bridge was lower than the new, so they just knocked down one section of the old
bridge to allow boats to cross from one side to the other. The east side of the old bridge is a favorite
walking, running, and biking trail, two miles each way. The scenery is ever changing. Dolphin, eagle rays, tarpon, sharks, and many
fishing boats can be seen when the weather is right. At the end of the bridge section is the
historical railway workers camp, built when Flagler was constructing the railway
to Key West. Historically it is said
that the last rail connection was from this camp on Pigeon Key to Marathon, thus
preventing the workers to leave the work site and go back home before the railway
was completed.
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| The Seven Mile Bridge Race |
After leaving Marathon, we spent a few hours walking
the beach at Cape Sable before going on to our first night’s anchorage in
Little Shark River.
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| Lily Marie at anchor in Little Shark River |
We met cruising
friends there and traveled with them for several days. It was fun to have traveling buddies on the
next boat. Sharing favorite anchorages,
making ice cream stops, and exploring the nearby towns added to the fun. One of our next stops was by Marco
Island.
We had never stopped in the
downtown area before and enjoyed walking around the busy stores and luxurious
homes. It is amazing how many new sights
one sees when traveling slow and exploring the area on foot. There was a large farmers market near where
we anchored and a busy shopping center.
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| Will he fit? |
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| Harbour Reach at anchor in Smokehouse Bay at Marco Island |
Both boats traveled on to Ft Myers Beach, which is
one of our favorite stops on the west coast.
There is a very busy beach, great shopping market, and several buses to
take non-driving tourists to town, markets, local attractions, and more. We spent several days walking the beach,
enjoying watching different water sports, and partaking of the local
restaurants and ice cream shops.
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| An early visit to Ft Myers Beach |
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| A little later at the beach |
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| Boats anchored while people eat, swim, or enjoy the beach |
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Para sailors
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| Charter sailboat |
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| Kite sailors |
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| Boys and their toys |
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| Sunset at ft Myers Beach |
The following picture is of the full red lunar eclipse
on April 15, 2014.
We viewed it from Pelican Bay anchorage by Cayo Costa, Florida. There were no bright lights to hide the moon and
it really did appear red for most of the night.
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| Full red lunar eclipse on April 15, 2014. The red color lasted about 3.5 hours |
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| Blue Heron by bike path |
St Petersburg was next on our" must do places". We wanted to have a few more visits and game
nights with our friends, Bill and Polly Higgins. There were also a few places that our boat
painter from last year had to touch up.
It took about three weeks before moving on. While there we biked along the Sunshine
Bridge. There is a well maintained bike
path that leads along the bridge in a section divided off from bridge
traffic. Friends in a boat just arriving
to St Petersburg boated right under us.
We saw many colorful water birds along the shore.
We have often heard about drug boats, but have never
seen one until we pulled into the marina.
There was nobody we could question about the boat, but these pictures
seem to indicate that there was definitely a problem.
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| Not a friendly sign |
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| One was not enough |
The color of it was a southern version of
camouflage which would have made us question whose choice the color was.
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| Not our favorite colors |
Venice is a great place to visit. It has an interesting mural on one of the
first buildings you see when entering from the southern waterway. Each picture portrays part of the history of Venice.
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| Flagler's railroad along the west coast of Florida and once winter quarters of Ringling
Bros. and Barnum & Bailey
Circus. |
This is always a stopping off place for us
because many good friends live in or near Venice. This year the weather was perfect except for
possible late afternoon showers. We
decided that it wouldn’t rain and eight of us went on a picnic cruise to near
Boca Grande, one of the Gulf Islands.
It
was a perfect day, only about two minutes of showers when we were waiting for a
bridge opening on our way in, and a never ending supply of food.
While waiting for the bridge opening on the way out,
we saw another Pacific Trawler of the newer type. Only about twenty-three were built in the
1970’s when ours was and another twenty to thirty in the late nineties and
early two thousands. The owners of this
boat happened to be a couple we had met in the Bahamas about three years
ago. At that time they were on a
sailboat, but liked the living comforts of our boat so much that they came back
to the US and searched for a Pacific Trawler.
What a small world!
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| Our Pacific Trawler from the 1970's (lots of exterior wood) |
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| A Pacific Trawler from the 1990's (no exterior wood) |
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| Light orchids |
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| Waterlilies |
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| Waterlilies |
Lake Okeechobee Waterway is a collection of old
Florida memories interspersed with swampland wildlife. Each time we travel it there is always
something new. The next few pictures
will give you a taste of what we saw along the waterway.
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| An alligator waiting on the bank |
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| Grandma, what big eyes you have |
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| A bald eagle communicating through phone lines |
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| A recently burned boat with divers checking the damage |
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| Some people have boats, others have float planes at their dock |
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| One of many boats we saw that had gone aground |
Vero Beach is one of many cities on the east coast
of Florida that we enjoyed. There are
boats of all sizes there.
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| A charter boat at Vero Beach Marina |
The road from the marina was picturesque.
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| A street by the marina |
One of the driveways had a sight we had never seen
before.
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| The nose of a plane in a driveway ????? |
The trip
home is proving to be very enjoyable.
Knowing that we will not be making this trip north along the east coast
of the US again for many more years, we are stopping to enjoy many of the towns
and sites that friends have recommended.
Most days end with a breath taking sunset over the water. As usual we’ll end this blog with one of the
many sunsets we have enjoyed.
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| Sunset in Sarasota, FL |
