The Adventure Begins

Well after years of planning, saving,preparing, planning, we finally are "out there". We sailed Discovery across the Gulf of Mexico early November. We had several issues during the crossing. First the weather did not cooperate. Our expected south wind never materialized so we had winds on the nose for the entire trip! Second, we had several occasions of clogs in the fuel line caused by algae growth even though i had the fuel polished prior to leaving. Then the engine overheated casuing us to divert to Port St Joe in the Florida panhandle. We spent a couple of days in this wonderful town and managed to find a good deisel mechanic who diagnosed the problem causing the overheating and got us going again. We motored up the ICW to Carabelle and spent the night there. We left out early for Tampa the next morning and again hit winds on the nose as we tried to close the gap between us and the Florida mainland. Unfortunately we had another bout of fuel line clogs. Finally got that cleared up and just in time the wind went NNE and allowed us to sail at full speed (8 knots) into Edgemont channel! We motored( gingerly) up the Manatee river and docked at Twin Dolphin Marina. We spent a couple of months there at Twin dolphins and highly reccomend this place! Great floating docks, a old downtown area just 2 blocks away with cafe's, coffee shops and watering holes. Below a shot of the dolphins that followed us out of Port Arthur Jetties! 

     Recently, due to a RIFF at PHH my retirement was accelerated and we decided to begin the trek down south on the Florida west coast with the Bahamas as our eventual destination. More posts and pics of that trip will follow! Below is a pic of Anita with the Edgemont Key Light house in the background! 10 days after we left the Port Arthur jetties!