June 20 - We landed in Key West for the worst weather on our trip so far. But before we get to the wind and rain, lets get you here from Little Torch. It was a great sail and we only used the engine for an hour.

Before we left I decided that I really didn't want to crawl up my mast. I've already climbed one mast so I decided I would take my really cool, but breaking, camera and do some telephoto pictures at the extreme zoom and do a good inspection. I blew these up big time on my computer and saw nothing that would indicate a problem. So we were good to sail to Key West.

I even had an accidental jibe so I know everything is just fine.

This zoom is even closer and is looking just fine.

As I said, we had a great sail to Key West. We set our sails just as soon as we got out of Mike and Kim's canal and didn't start our engine until we started into the Key West Pass.

Below you can see us starting to arrive in Key West. You can always tell you are arriving because you will see a cruise ship at the docks. Below right you can see a picture of the shore that includes the southern most house.

Just as you reach the western area of Key West you find Fort Zachary Taylor. This is the beach for Fort Zac and it is probably the best beach on Key West because you can snorkel a reef near the shore.

As we were approaching the beach we saw this boat on the rocks.

As we came around the corner of Fort Zac and headed north into the pass we got a closer look at the Carnival Cruise ship that was in before it headed down into the Caribbean.

When we arrived we anchored in a new spot but it has turned out to be a good one. After we stood anchor watch for an hour and put the dinghy engine on we headed in to Dante's just to see if one of our favorite bar tender ladies was on site. As it turned out, Jo was there and when she got off of her shift, she joined us as you can see to the lower left.

We hatched up a plan for a sunset cruise tonight. Little did we know there would be storms and rain coming in waves. Well, it was a good plan anyway.

To the lower right you can see John who was our "crew" on the wreckers race about 3 years ago. We met up with a number of other people we've known too and it was lots of fun.

Of course the rain came in. And came in. And came in. We've not had bad weather on this trip so I guess this is the payback.

Two cruise ships were in yesterday and they came in the rain. The cruise ships provide these plastic trash bags, no wait - ponchos, that are designed so the cruisers can get out and spend money while they are in port. Good for the cruise ships.

Today we were out and about. We picked a time between the rains and walked up to Caroline's then a bit on Duvall Street.

As we saw more rain could's coming in we started back to our tender for our yacht. Let's see. That means a 10 foot dinghy that has a leak to go back to our boat. I think the first sentence sounds better so I'll just say we were heading back to our yacht.

As we walked back to the dinghy dock, no wait - the yacht tender dock, we could tell the winds were up and weather was bad because all of the cattle boats, no wait - the snorkeling tour boats, were at the dock.

We headed back by Schooner's Wharf where we were talking to some more people we kind of know. These people were friends of our friends in Ft. Myers and while we were there yesterday we hooked them up by telephone. Good move since it got us a nice discount on our food and drink.

Sometimes it is who you know verses what you know.

Michael McCloud is a very good performer although you will probably hear the same music you heard 5 years ago in the same order this year. Regardless, he is a very good artist and puts it out every day. He delivers the music very well each time and on top of that he entertains the cruisers with songs that have titles that I really can't say on a PG website. His best songs however are covers of other artists.

This evening we watched as this Carnival cruise ship left the dock. They use their bow thrusters, stern thrusters, and engines to turn 180 degrees and head back to sea. Bottom line is there will be some passengers that aren't feeling too good on the next few days of this cruise. Weather is going to be less than good.

The storm was heading in and rain was a coming. We saw 25+ knots of wind - read that 30 mph or greater. Rain was coming down just when we were to pick up the people for our "sunset cruise." Good thing we canceled. Now a couple of hours later it is almost sunset and it is raining and blowing again. Like I said, a good decision.

Tomorrow we will hang out again. Probably head in to Caroline's and go to lunch then off to Dante's to see Jo. We have to get up the Keys on Friday and wait out a nice big storm coming our way. It is supposed to be 35-40 mph winds on Sat and Sun so we figure that it's best to just go to Marathon on Friday and wait it out. There will be a better angle on the wind by Monday or Tuesday then we can head on up the Everglades and then the west coast of FL.

I'll try to keep you informed as we move on back up the Keys.

 June 21 - Deb and I weathered some pretty good (read that thunderstorms and wind) yesterday and our anchor did as it always does. Held just fine. We are still in Key West and are leaving tomorrow morning for Marathon to pick up a mooring ball. This morning, there was a possibility of a Tropical Storm forming in another day or two in the Gulf. We have looked at all the weather services we use and they were forecasting 10 foot seas at Sanibel on Monday and Tuesday yesterday. Today, they say 9 footers on Tuesday. Sounds like it may be getting better. Bottom line is we are whimp's! Honestly, that's what we are. Why beat ourselves up and our boat up???? We'll take the easy road and I think we will hole up in Marathon for 4-5 days learning about taxes for a small business. I do have to file my first tax return in July so why not use this time productively. Besides, we are whimp's.

We leave tomorrow morning at 6:30 am and should be arriving in Marathon tomorrow afternoon. We'll update more then since we will have plenty of time! I did decide to throw up one picture just so you could see the big red and purple blob coming north into the Gulf which just got named as Invest 96 that just wants to be a bigger purple blob - otherwise known as a storm.

If you are bored and want to join us, give me a call - storms can be fun if you have the right mind set. Wait, I forgot - we are whimp's.

 June 23 - We are hanging out in Marathon after a rocky trip up yesterday. Prior to leaving we caught a couple of pictures of the "cattle boats." Actually they are tourist boats that go out for a sunset cruise.You will find it pretty interesting about their sails.

On the evening I took these pictures the winds were about 20 knots. Nothing to require what would be a 2nd or 3rd reef as you would see on the main to the left and below.

What happened a couple of years ago was this several of these types of boats lost their mast. As it turned out, they decided the rig was undersized. Since these guys motor sail all the time anyway, I'm pretty sure that the corporate policy has changed and they had new main's sewn or just cut down their old ones so the insurance companies would still give them insurance.

As you can see in the picture to the right, they don't even have their jib up. It's more a pictorial thing than a real sailing boat now.

We arrived yesterday afternoon after heading east for 8 hours. The seas were directly on our beam and were 3-5 feet all morning before starting to fall to 2-4's. On the beam, means the waves were hitting us on our side which meant the boat was rocking from our right to left about every 3-4 seconds. Let's just call it uncomfortable. Nothing the boat had problems with but it's just a bit hard on the people in the boat. I didn't put a board down because the last time I had these conditions I broke a centerboard bolt 50 miles offshore. Yes, I have new bolts and they probably wouldn't have broke but why put the boat under such stress.

We arrived at Marathon and their radio wasn't working. Something about the volume being turned down until I came by dinghy to check in. We picked up all our bathroom cards and dinghy pass. Then back to the boat. We made an early dinner out of it over at Docksides and headed home.

It looks like we made a good decision about stopping just because we don't like getting beat up more than we have. We could have made it home but if anything went wrong then we would have a pretty bad experience as a result.

 Let me bring you up-to-date about the forecast. We are actually out of the equation really since we are here at Boot Key Harbor in Marathon. I also need to let you know that we could have picked a different anchorage down in Key West if we wanted to because we've been through winds like this before and with our ground tackle, I wouldn't be too concerned about it. That said, it just made more sense to come over here so we could get off the boat and simply reduce the possible concern of dragging.

So what does it look like today? The chart below is from windfinder.com and I'm looking at Sombrero for the forecast. Sombrero is at the reef off of Marathon. It gives you a realistic view of what the ocean is doing. I made this picture bigger so you could follow along if you want to. You can probably figure this one out on your own. Let's just look at Tuesday, Jun 26. You can see the winds will be at 32-35 mph and gusting to 38-40. That is what we will see here in the harbor but the waves will be practically nothing. Out at the reef however, I've circled in red what the waves will be doing. 10.5-11.2 feet. That should be an interesting day on the reef! Then as you look at the next few days you will see the winds will start falling on Wednesday then become low on Thursday. Just as important, the seas height will fall to practically nothing. This is part of the story but we are heading north so I next went and picked up the winds at Sanibel which is right at the pass we go in at Ft. Myers.

 On Tuesday, you can see the winds are forecast for up to 37 mph and gusting as high as 48 mph. Seas will be up to 14.8 feet. Not something I really want to go under a bridge with these on my port quarter. Of course we aren't going to do that and that's why we are down here.

All of this is still days away so who knows what it is really going to do. They don't even have a good idea of which way the storm is going to go. Models take it from Texas to NE Florida so who really knows. We'll get more info and we'll leave when we leave. Thursday or Friday. Then we have a minimum of 3 day trip if we don't go overnight. I guess we will know when we know and one of the biggest advantages for us - we don't have to get home!

More later.

 June 26 - And the song says "There's a storm coming in..... Coming back from somewhere that I never should have been. And the storm rolls on. And the storm rolls on."

Debby is about to end her 30 years of "whatever" which built up just for our anniversary. Pretty cool isn't it, having a storm named after Deb just for our anniversary.

We really tried to take lemons and make lemonade out of it yesterday. Marathon isn't a bad place, actually it's a pretty good place. We made a plan and worked our plan. Lunch at Docksides and they even gave us a free round. Then off fishing where Deb swears she had a good bite. Then on to dinner at Castaway's and there they even gave us a free Key Lime Pie. It was good too. Ending at Docksides because I forgot my credit card and just had to pick it up again, plus another drink to celebrate.

So, what's it like to be married 30 years? Well, I'm a pretty honest guy - it has it's ups and downs but honestly it has many more ups than downs. We lived 24/7 with each other for the last 7 years and without give and take we could have had some problems. That said, we didn't. Instead, our relationship has continued to grow and we've had a great time with each other. Sometimes, our relationship is such that we would just as soon be with each other. Of course me being me, I'm always bringing other people into the fold when they can add intellectual stimulus. Deb enjoys it too and conversation is a great thing especially when you can solve problems that haven't even been created yet.

Let's just say, we've had a great two months on our boat and a wonderful trip to celebrate our anniversary.

Let me go a bit further. This trip was my 30th anniversary trip and it was wonderful with wonderful people who accompanied us. Our next trip is a cruise coming up at the end of October and it is Deb's trip. I think there is a cabana boy in the mix to get her Bahama Mama's or more likely, chardoney

We had a wonderful dinner with champagne and spent the day reminiscing about friends in St Louis, Cuba MO, Kentucky Lake, Omaha, Tulsa, Florida, the East Coast and everywhere else we've been over the last 30 years. As the song goes, life is good today, life is good today.

So what happens next? Well today we did some boat projects fixing some caulk and making the galley look new again. We also went to lunch and continued having a good time. Then we tracked Debby and found that it does look like we will be heading towards home on Friday with a three day trip. Hopefully we will meet up with Larry and Joyce in Naples if we get there soon enough on Saturday. Then a long day home on Sunday to dock behind our house.

Life has been very good to us and we have appreciated everyone's friendship and love. Thank you very much for everything you have given us!

  June 28 - Nope, no pictures. We've just reprovisioned with the minimal amount we needed, got rid of trash, picked up water, and got familiar with Marathon again. After a week, we are ready to go. Tomorrow looks like a "whimp" day on the water which suits us both just fine. Winds are light and variable with the seas at 1 foot or less. Like I said, a "whimp" day on the water. We will try to get north of Little Shark river to an anchorage we haven't been before. With the light winds we could probably just anchor offshore and leave the mosquitoes to themselves. Saturday, we are going to hook back up with Larry and Joyce again for dinner and conversation. It will be a great time. Then, Sunday we will make a long day back to the house. So, this is getting redundant with our past post. I'll get some pictures in the morning and along the way past the everglades to make it more interesting.

Almost back home. It's been a great cruise and I just fixed the air conditioning so we are sitting on a mooring ball running the A/C on the Honda generator living large as my old friend John used to say.

 July 2 - I left this on this time frame just because it is the conclusion of our two month trip. I'll be updating less now that we are finished with this cruse so it is good to keep this all together. Now, back to the story.

The winds died as predicted, also as predicted the waves died the next day as you can see in the pictures. I dropped the mooring ball at 6:15 in the morning and we were off on our trip up to the everglades. In the picture to the right you can see the 7 mile bridge behind us. We are leaving the Keys behind and really don't know when we will be back here again. Honestly, we found this part of the trip a bit disappointing. We've done it so many times that we simply didn't find the excitement that we found it the past. That said, it was great seeing Jo again down in Key West. Otherwise it seemed like same thing different day.

Again, back to the trip home. In the picture below you can see the keys in the background then below left you can see that we really did pick a "whimp's" day to cross.

 We lost site of land for about 4 hours but we didn't loose sight of the clouds. First, I'm not really a dog lover because I am allergic to them. That said, I really like dogs because they seem to give you a complete love - about like Jimmy Buffet does for me. So here is what I saw - In the cloud to the left I saw a poodle that was laying down with one paw up. Don't you see the nose and eye then the fluffy coat? Sure you do. It was really pretty cool then it was gone. Just happy to get the picture.

We had planned on staying one place but the sea breezes came up with 2 foot seas and it was low tide. We went another hour then hid behind the island you see on the left. It was a great anchorage and good depths too.

Below right, you can see all of the sea grass I took out of our sea water strainer after we anchored following a 75 mile day.

The next morning we left before the sun rose and you can see to the left the sun rising above one of the 10,000 islands of the everglades. Deb was up at 6 am, yep she was definitely up and helped me pull the anchor. Then she was back to bed. Her happy place in the morning. It was a no brainier trip except I had to make a decision of going outside of Romano Shoals or inside through Goodland. Since we left so early the tide came into play big time. I found out that we would have a push up on the inside so that is what I decided to do.

Below you can see Marco and Goodland ahead of us.

Below right you can see the pass we went through at almost high tide. Based on the time we went through we had an extra knot of speed since we were being pushed up between the islands. 7 knots is pretty cool when you are running at 2550 rpm's. Real Cool Running!

This is a picture of one of the resorts at Goodland - actually it is probably the only big resort.

We went right up and out of Marco Pass because the tide was shifting and if we would have stayed on the inside we would have had the tide against us. So outside we went back into the calm seas. We popped into the Naples Pass only to find some cool marks. For any of my students who have followed us, they will see the Red over Green as a preferred channel mark. We took the red side which would mean we were heading to Naples.

Naples is where we met back up with Larry and Joyce. Larry, as you remember, had joined us in the Bahamas and it was good seeing both him along with his lovely wife. You can see Larry, Joyce, and Deb below.

It was hot, Deb wasn't feeling well, so I went to a reasonably priced marina in Naples. Naples City Dock who gives you a discount if you have Boat U.S. or Sea Tow insurance. It was good to have A/C for the evening. I awoke before 6 a.m. and with no wind I told Deb she didn't have to get up. I turned off the power, took up the cord, pulled off the lines and got out of the slip like I knew what I was doing. Then we were off and heading towards home. Little did I know that we would see some history in the making.

Below you can see a ship being towed out of Ft. Myers. I told Deb, it looks like they are towing that boat out to become a reef. As it turns out, that is exactly what they were doing. Please see below the USS Mohawk which served in WWII. Cool, Cool, Cool.

I called the tow boat on Channel 13 just about the time I took the picture you see below. We worked out a 2 whistle pass and I figured everything was just fine. Little did I know the Coast Guard Auxiliary guys would run over and tell me that I was too close. Honestly, I wasn't but why argue. I did have them go to Ch 13 which is the channel for bridge to bridge communications and I told them I worked out my pass with the tow operator and I was over 200 yards away. Regardless, POWER or perceived power, always wins and I just turned to port and they went away.

We passed through the Sanibel bridge and turned towards the Miserable Mile. This is the pass where every boat must go if you are moving between Ft Myers and the sea. As you can see, there are lots of boats.

Below left, there are even more boats.

Then we arrived in Ft. Myers. It was like being home again. Oh wait, we are home.

As we passed through the first bridge, we saw where the construction crews were digging away to create a new sea feature for downtown Ft. Myers. Progress in downtown Ft. Myers.

We then turned up the river again and were only a little over an hour away from our dock. After 2 months at sea, we were ready to get home.

Arriving at our dock it was both good and bad. We loved being at sea but it was good to be back at our house again. I got off the boat with the keys and went to the Van which started - wow - I didn't figure it would. However, Houston, there is a problem. The brakes went to the floor. I saw brake fluid on the driveway and I had a problem. Turned off the van and unlocked the door. Spent the next hour unloading the boat of essentials then went back to find I had a broken brake line. Rusty, the new name of our van, has lots of rust underneath. As it turns out the two months allowed the brake lines to rust even more and when I put my foot on the brake one of the lines broke. So what did I do today? I worked on brake lines. They don't have these pre-made. You have to buy the right lines, in the right lengths, with the right fittings, and put them in once you get the old ones out.

The old ones came out - well that is an understatement - I ended up using everything from penetrating oil to multiple vice grips to get the lines loose. Then I had to go buy lines, tools for making double flare's, flair nut wrenches along with the brake fluid. I would like to say that after 3 trips to the parts store on the scooter along with tons of sweat the thing is fixed. Problem is I now have another problem. The lines are fixed but the bleeding screws are stuck in the brake cylinders and I can't get them out. More penetrating oil and tomorrow I'll be back at vice grips and probably ez-outs. I'm pretty desperate to get this fixed but will keep up the work.

Of course I missed a Jury Summons and I had to make some phone calls along with send emails to justify why I did not appear. They say I will either have to pay $1,000 or spend up to 3 days in jail. You already know I won't be paying the thousand bucks so hopefully my explanation will suffice that I was not in the country while the mail was being delivered. So it goes with the delima of being back on land.

Thanks to everyone who has followed us along with the new people who joined our site in the last few months. I'll try to update what we are up to every week as we move forward.

July 3 - Yesterday was a hot day but not near as hot as up north. Imagine everyone thinking that Florida would have better weather in the summer than the mid-west. It really is cooler and I'm not sure about the humidity. That said, I left you with the fact that my brake line had rusted on Rusty so much it was leaking, let me say spewing, brake fluid. Just think, we could have been driving that beast when things broke. I ended up bending the brake lines appropriately, getting all of the fittings loose, and this morning bleeding the brake lines. We are back in business. Deb, decided that she would actually wear her seatbelt cinched down as you should. So off we went to the store and lunch. Everything worked just fine. I've put together a bit of a kit of tools but right now it looks like it is superfluous to the project. I declare it finished.

The heat has kicked my butt and I took the afternoon off after an all day project yesterday along with more this morning. It was good to just hang out and gel. Hopefully, everyone up in the midwest will be able to gel themselves soon. You have it just too hot up there.

Tomorrow we'll have some ribs on the grill and I'm going to get started on some projects at the house that I need to do for my company along with an upcoming meeting I have in Amelia Island. I guess it is back to work again after a half day off.

 July 17 - Another lapse on the updates..... We arrived back home and we've been very BUSY. Regardless, we saw the guy to the right and he decided to do a bit of posing.

You can see below he is just a bit cute. I took about twenty pictures very zoomed in and on macro and the little guy just sat there. I really liked the picture to the lower right.

 We really have been busy with getting the house up again and getting ready for a meeting with the company I work for teaching Captain's classes. Regardless there was one item I really needed to take care of. The safe my cousin gave us stopped working just before we left on our cruise. Deb decided she could help out and took the control off to replace the batteries, that didn't help. Everything was left hanging until we got back. I called Sentry Safe and after ton's of time on hold finally got someone. I had my voltmeter ready!

Didn't need it.

Instead I took all the connections off and that didn't help reset the system. They heard the "wrong" beeps and said they couldn't get it open. Next came the big secret. They said I would have to call a locksmith and they would tell him/her where to drill. BUT, they would send me a new safe. Really, that's what they said. They were going to send me a new safe. My thought was - this isn't the first one to break!

I'll catch you up with the pictures in the next text block.

 So all I had to do is call a locksmith, pay him/her to open the safe and they were going to replace it. I figured fair deal. I called the locksmith and he said "You don't have to bring it in. Use a crow bar and you can typically get them open. There may be a bit more to it."

I took that as directions and out to the Garage with implements of destruction. I ended up using two crowbars to expose the fire retardant material. After clearing a bunch of that out, then I produced the sawsall which really made a dent in opening the safe. It took about 15 minutes but I was in. All I wanted was all the important stuff out. But remember, they are sending me a free safe!

Yesterday we got our free safe and it is cool. Different design and I'm sure it will continue to work just fine. I guess this was just a write-off instead of a class action suit against the company. Good decision on Sentry Safe's part - I'm sure this was cheaper than paying lots of lawyers.

 So let's go to a completely different subject. I was heading up to a meeting with TrueCourse and got a phone call. "Jim, would you be able to look at a Gemini for me?" I asked where and it just happened to be in Georgia an hour from where I was meeting. I said, you're in luck. So, one evening I took off to look at a Gemini 105M that happened to be very close in hull numbers to our boat. I did this through my company and I'm actually pretty reasonable offering a pre-offer inspection of a boat. Let me say that this was a nice boat but I did find some items that the owner didn't know about. The cracks you see in the picture to the left actually has a hole in the center. Well, that's a minor problem. It needs a good fiberglass person to fix it and put new gel coat on. Then I found the centerboard bolts were rusted. In the picture to the lower left it is really deteriorated. The picture below shows rust. Again, the owner didn't know about it. He really lucked out that this person asked me to go and look at his boat. My recommendation to both the owner and my "employer" was don't go offshore until these are replaced along with the hole in the side of the boat fixed not to mention what caused it.

These are just a few of the items I found and remember this is a good boat. If you ever wondered about paying someone who really knows a subject, this should tell you it is worth it. I can tell you I do know about Gemini's.

 Since then I've been writing again. We are reworking the OUPV "6-Pack" and Masters manuals. They are going to improve by a big step up. It is very exciting to be this involved in improving the company. There's some more stuff going on but I will discuss it later when we have some definite details.

It also looks like I'll be teaching up in Alabama in about 2 1/2 weeks. I'm looking forward to the trip because I really like the people in the Muscle Shoals Sailing Club. It will be great to see them again and a joy to teach in their facility. They are in for a treat too because I've really increased the visuals in my presentation.

More later.