Cape Coral/Fort Myers, Naples and Marco Island - Loop Trip Days 64 - 72

Captiva island was a really nice stop except for this "winter tide" stuff. I don't mean to dwell on tides, but I must admit TVA makes this a lot easier on the river. We have summer pool and winter pool not a daily or hourly pool!  And it changes everyday, sometimes four times a day - arrgggg!  Anyway, departure was delayed a while to get more water leaving the bay. That part was better, but I still dredged up all kinds of sand getting out of the slip. Oh well, we got out and didn't hurt anything. Maybe I'll get better at this with more practice in tight locations that have shallow water. 

Old Captiva House

From Captiva, we traveled to Tarpon Point Marina in Cape Coral. The trip over was interesting in that this day had more boaters out than any previous day. Basically everyone here seems to have one speed when running and that is wide open!  All that wasn't any big deal until we got to within 2 miles of the turn out of the channel into in secondary channel leading to the marina. Locals have named the section " The Miserable Mile" and it was. All of the waterways north and south of this mile merge together and speed limit reduces to be an "idle speed, no wake zone" and I can assure you that no one even thought about slowing down until they were at the sign. After leaving that craziness behind, the short trip into the Marina was pleasant. This is a very nice location right next to a Weston Hotel that has brand new concrete floating docks, two restaurants, shops and three condo towers. There has been live music every afternoon and we have finally reached warm weather!  Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/943537

The Miserable Mile

Tarpon Point Marina - East side

Tarpon Point Marina - West side

We are spending a couple of days here. To start our first day, I have to do my chores which includes washing the salt off the boat from our last run. Another difference from the fresh water of the river. You never see that stuff until you stop and touch the hull or rails and there's this crust on everything. After the morning, we went for pedicures and then Ubered to downtown Fort Myers. Our friends had recommended Capone's Coal Fired Pizza which was great!  The inside decor was all based on the gangster and the glass floor area was quite unusual (see photos). We sat outside and enjoyed the sunshine and then went searching for the 86 Room. It is a kick back to a '20's speakeasy so there is no sign outside. Inside is one big room with exposed brick walls, some beautiful custom woodwork, jazz music playing and old silent movies projected onto one wall. It was very much fun!  On day two, Susan is taking us to the Ace Hardware and Publix. These are becoming typical stops for our larger city locations. Even though the weather forecasts say this is a cloudy day, it has been raining off and on. This continued through the afternoon and then came fog!  Not something you normally see at 4 PM!  By about 8:30, the fog had vanished so we're hoping that's the way it will be in the morning. 

Pedicure time!!

Downtown Fort Myers

Capone's vault located under the restaurant floor

History of the vault

86 Room speakeasy

Susan and Regina enjoying the view

Afternoon fog!!

Today we move on south to Naples with a three day stop at the Naples Boat Club.  The first thing we do is go back down the Miserable Mile to reach the ICW and thankfully today was much more sane than the trip in.  It was a fairly short run out of Cape Coral until we were in the Gulf. Wind this morning was straight out of the east which created some small waves that were hitting us right in the port side. This didn't cause us to have a rough ride, but it did make holding course a bit of an effort. We had about two hours of this combined with watching for crab pots until reaching the entrance to Naples Harbor. The entry was interesting with a little rough water and boat traffic coming out, but we got in without any trouble.  Naples Harbor is long and not too wide, but has basically no speed limit!  Quite a few boats came roaring past on their way toward the Gulf as we continued in looking for the Naples Boat Club.  Our destination was almost at the end of the harbor where the first order of business was to get fuel and pump out the holding tank before moving into the slip. Arrival day means washing the salt off the boat and today we also took advantage of the free laundry facilities at NBC.  After getting these things done, we Ubered into town for dinner at Old Naples Pub.  They had live entertainment, good food and was also a quaint location with lots of local history documented in photos and news articles. Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/944604

Naples Harbor from the stern of the boat

Naples Boat Club

Naples Harbor toward the south

The first full day at NBC started with getting a repair taken care of. I had located a service called Cruise Cool that will send technicians to your boat. They arrived about 9:30 and in a little more than half an hour had not only located, but also, repaired a leaking water line connection in the forward bilge!  We celebrated that by going to breakfast at EJ’s Cafe and visiting Tin City. When we returned, I broke out my Ace Hardware parts and fixed the leaking water line at the aft toilet. Our friend Andy from Marietta lives here now and met us for drinks and dinner and to deliver a bunch of packages that I had shipped to him. We had much fun catching up!  We visited Old Naples a couple of times to walk through shops, see the town and try some restaurants.  Many places have live entertainment and outside dining.  The weather has been really nice so we took advantage of this every chance we got.

EJ's  Cafe is here in this waterfront development

It's lobster time!!

Our friend Andy at the boat

On Monday we finally got a weather window to leave Naples so we jumped on it and headed for Marco Island. This was a short trip that took less than two hours, but got us a bit further south. This will provide a good place to make the next leg toward Marathon. Just like almost every other week since we got to Florida, we will have to wait here until the next front passes which should give us a good travel day on Thursday. Since we have a few days, we will explore the island and we started with Snook Inn for an early dinner. This place is right on the water, has live music, food was very good and was a short walk the marina. At arrival today, we have traveled 1,390 SM which is 1,223 NM or roughly 1/5 of the total Great Loop. Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/948255

Snook Inn overlooking Big Marco Pass

So we’ll be here a few days. Hopefully when I do the next update, it will (finally) be from the Florida Keys!!

Gulfport, Sarasota and Captiva - Loop Trip Days 58 - 63

Probably the biggest change from boating on the river to moving to open water is tide. Some marinas have floating docks so you don't immediately see the change in water levels, but it is necessary to pay attention. Today we had to wait until 9:30 to leave Turtle Cove as tides changed from below normal low toward high. This time put us at about mid-range which was enough, but not any "extra" water. So we slowly eased out and followed the directions from our Harbor Host as to where the most depth in inner Chanel would be. The entire Tarpon harbor is an idle, no wake, zone so it takes a good 30 minutes just to transit the distance to the Anclote River.  The morning was chilly, but bright sunshine and no wind which made it slow ride nicer. Once reaching the channel to the river which lead to Clearwater Harbor, I was able to run faster and gain some time as there were many more slow zones ahead.  It was fun to see the places that we had driven to back when lived down here from a whole new perspective. The bays in Clearwater and St Pete varied from wide expanses to narrow channels, but none of it was especially deep so staying in the markers was key. The boats, beautiful waterfront homes, parks and high rises made the trip to Gulfport interesting. At one point, l looked down and saw a dolphin swimming along side us!  It stayed right there until I had to adjust speed to go under a bridge. A bit further along, one of the dolphin experience tour boats started following us and we realized that several more were swimming in our wake on the port side. Those folks sure got their money's worth on that tour - maybe I should apply for my commission!  After arriving at the Municipal Marina, we walked into town for dinner at O'Maddy's.  If you're ever here, this is a good place to go!  Track and photos -  www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/937913

Giving the Dolphin Experience Tour an experience

One of the dolphin that was following

Dinner location

Some of downtown Gulfport

The second day here happened to be a Tuesday which turns out to be a market day in town. The little Main Street was lined on both sides with vendor tents displaying all manner of goods. Since the day was again sunny and warm, lots of people were out to examine the wares. A few musicians were playing to add to the atmosphere and aromas from the many restaurants filled the air. One interesting feature of the town is that this street was once just lined with small homes. Now most of these have been converted to businesses. There were shops, art galleries, offices and, of course, restaurants. One person told us that many of these were the packaged homes that Sears & Roebuck once had in their catalog. Might be true, but who knows for sure. We took it all in, visited the beach, soaked in the sun and ultimately found an Italian restaurant called Pia's Trattoria for late lunch/dinner. Oh so good!  If we were here longer, this could be a do over. 

Interesting street art

The beach - it's right downtown!

Great Italian restaurant

The next leg of the trip is to Sarasota and on Wednesday morning we left Gulfport to cruise the 35 miles south. Again we see the impact of tide as the water was a bit too low to leave until 10 AM, but the other side of that is that it was also still low enough that we could slide under the fixed bridge at the south end of St Pete. After crossing over the wide entrance to Tampa Bay, it was on down the ICW first past Anna Maria Island. The waterway in this area is very wide pretty much all the way to Sarasota. Wide doesn't mean deep though so you have to pay attention to the markers. The day was sunny and beautiful blue skies, winds were calm to start, but forecast to get bad so the plan was to get docked before that started. This meant running a little faster and the dolphins came out to play!  Even the dolphin experience tour boat followed us so their folks would have a great view. No matter how many times you see them, it is just amazing. Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/937913

After arriving in Sarasota, the sky turned gray and the wind kicked up to about 20 mph.  Temperatures were dropping and the boat was rocking. Not a day to tour the town!  We did go to Owen's Fish Camp for dinner and that was excellent!  Thursday had the return of sunshine and a bit warmer temperatures. The winds had died down overnight and that made it very comfortable outside. The marina shuttle took us to St Armand's Circle on the Gulf side of town. This area has lots of great shopping and restaurants. After checking out most of the stores, we went to Columbia for a late lunch to get some of our favorite Cuban dishes. This may have been the first time we've had ropa vieja since leaving Tampa about 25 years ago!

Back deck at Owen Fish Camp

Newspaper delivered to the boat - BTW it's not the NYT

Our slip at Marina Jacks

And I thought this was only an old photo!!

Sarasota sunset

On Friday, we left fairly early to continue south to our next port which was Royal Palm Marina. This is a small marina with a good restaurant and daily live entertainment. It was a sunny day that started out chilly, but was very nice by the afternoon. The tides continue to baffle me. We left Sarasota just after low tide and it was still low tide four hours later at our destination. The marina lost all of their entrance markers in Irma so it was a bit tense getting into the dock, but we made it and got tied up right in front of the restaurant.  The musician started a bit before 5, singing and playing guitar. Very enjoyable!  We stayed for a couple of hours having snacks and light dinner and then went back to the boat and listened to him until he stopped playing. Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/937913

Royal Palm docks

Our spot on the front row!

The entertainer

  

Fire in the sky

Saturday was an early morning to get started before the tide dropped. We were up at 6, got everything ready to go and then waited for first light to make our way to the channel. There was more water than when we came in so the exit went smoothly.  The day was cloudy and in the 50's with very little wind. Today we're going to Tween Waters Marina on Captiva Island to look for some shells on the beach and have dinner at Old Captiva House. The ride down was nice and we had pods of dolphin following for at least 2 hours. At times, there were 4 or 5 swimming and jumping on both sides of the boat. This was unbelievable!!  It took about 4 hours to get to Captiva and the entrance to the bay was challenging at best.  The markings were minimal, the tide was low so at one point we were dredging up the sand and then just as we reached the tightest of the markers someone in a small runabout decided to cut me off as he came out. It all ended up okay and we arrived and docked in one of the most unusual settings ever.  Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/941348

I can't get this amazing dolphin video to load, so click this link to view it!!  https://splice.gopro.com/v?id=VWpnPk

Interesting marina 

The Cat Whisperer has found another one

Not a pool day

The beach was pretty much empty - but we got some shells

History of  Captiva

Tomorrow we will leave to go to Cape Coral/Fort Myers to see our friends Carter and Susan.  We're also excited about the prospect of warmer weather.  There will be no early start as, once again, we have to wait for the tide to begin to rise so we can get out of this shallow bay!  South Florida, here we come!!

The Crossing and Tarpon Springs - Loop Trip Days 53 - 57

The opening for the crossing has arrived, but not without some added concerns.  The wind and waves have subsided and now the forecast says morning fog.  There are three other boats here at Carabelle ready to go.  We discussed the weather and our options.  Consensus is to go out to Dog Island and anchor to be ready for a quick exit into the Gulf at first light.  That being decided, Regina and I took off on one more bike ride.  The idea was to go back to Pirates Cove for lunch, but they weren't open so then we rode to the Junction and had soup and sandwiches.

On the bike ride to Pirates Cove

At about 4 PM we motored out of the harbor to an anchorage called Shipping Cove on the north side of Dog Island.  It was sunny, warm and calm winds.  This was not destined to last very long.  As the sun went down, the winds picked up and then the waves did the same.  It was not a really comfortable night as we rocked with waves hitting the boat.  I was up several times to see what was happening and mostly what I saw was fog.  Anchor lights on the other boats glowed in the haze so it was obvious that we hadn't moved and that was good.  I don't think anyone slept great that night.  Tomorrow will be a day to do something that most of us have never done and the butterflies are certainly in abundance. Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/933890

The "fleet" anchored at Shipping Cove

The sun rose about 7:30, according to the time tables, none of us knew that because the fog was too thick.  Even though that was the case, if this crossing was to be made, it was get moving or wait until the middle of next week for another chance.  Decision made, a little before 8 AM we began creeping out of the anchorage.  One person estimated visibility at 500 feet and I think that might have been about double the reality.  So on we go using GPS, chart plotter and radar to go out East Pass into the Gulf. There were at least 2 channel markers that we never saw in the fog.  A short run that should have taken 15 minutes turned into about an hour.  Once past the shoals, we hit some 1 - 2 waves but we're able to get some speed and not bounce around too bad. About an hour out one of the other boats, a big Hatteras called Sweet Relief, called to say that they were passing on our port. Out of the gray they appeared and went by knocking down the waves so I got behind them and ran in their wake until they decided to slow down. As we went on alone, Jan shot some video of us running which is really cool!  On we went continuing the longest single run we have ever made - 160 miles in 10 hours 45 minutes.  The other thing continuing was the fog, but finally at 3:30 in the afternoon, we actually could see blue sky and the horizon!  For the first time today, we could actually see where we were going. There were pods of dolphins jumping around us, birds flying and surprisingly ducks in the water.  At this point in the trip, we had three problems, but only began to recognize two of them. I had been calculating fuel burn all day and it became obvious that we had to slow down to conserve fuel so we would be able to reach our destination (problem 1) and we were not going to be able to get there before dark (problem 2 - remember that slow start). So we did slow down and continued on through the land mine of crab pots that had appeared and headed to the point where we would exit the Gulf going into the Anclote River.  The marker here is "R4" and as we finally got close with the sun setting what we ran into is the thickest fog ever (problem 3). Now it is pitch black, foggy and totally impossible to see anything so we slowly idle to a spot out of the channel and drop anchor to wait for morning and no fog.  Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/934700

Sitting in the morning fog

Okay, according to the chart plotter, we anchored right next to an island last night in the total pitch blackness. This morning when I got up and could actually see something, it is totally different from that. Honestly, it looks like we are back in the middle of the Gulf. That island is about a mile away and there are crab pots all around us!  Good news is that the fog has lifted and we only have to go 7 miles to Turtle Cove marina. So today there is no warming up the engines, it's start up and go at just above idle speed into Tarpon Springs harbor.  At idle our speed is basically 6 mph, so a little over an hour later we pulled into the fuel dock and got the last 140 gallons of diesel that they had. I needed about twice that amount, but right now, this was like gold!  Track and photos - www.ramblr.com/web/mymap/trip/273527/934706

There's that island that was so close on the chart plotter

Made it to the fuel dock!  Port tank was about the same as this one.

The three of us that were crossing together had dinner on Friday night at Rusty Belle's and our AGLCA harbor host, Herb, joined us. Everyone had a story about the trip over. No one made it exactly as planned, but all are here and had a great time dining and chatting. Saturday was a trip to Publix to stock up on food and another visit to Rusty Belle's!  On Sunday, Regina's brother and girlfriend came from Orlando to visit us. We walked into town to see the weekend craft fair, sponge docks, check out a Greek grocery and have dinner at Costa's, an authentic Greek restaurant.  It was a great way to end our stay in Tarpon Springs!

One of the old sponge drying buildings

Pond where the Epiphany cross diving celebration is held

Downtown harbor

We saw this little critter and a friend down at the sponge docks

And then we found a flock of chickens!

Sponge boat

Downtown market

Monday morning we will head out to our next stop. We're going to Gulfport on the south end of Saint Petersburg. This is about 40 miles down the ICW. Forecast calls for good weather so this should be a nice day. Next updates will be from further south and with any luck a warmer place!