Fort Myers to key west

We left ft Myers crewed up by the Seagraves family,Dwight,Mary, and son Sam. Left at about 7pm and had a uneventful sail although a slow one(more on that latter). We arrived at Conch Harbour marina at about 7pm the next day! Great sunset on the way!



Next day I dove under the boat to check on why we were unable to make more than 6 knots, this is possible in the clear water here in KW! I was shocked to see a Forrest of growing things under the boat! Got in touch with a diver and got it cleaned the next day and later we saw 8 knots under sail! More better!

We did the entire kw crawl with the Seagraves, lunch at schooners, breakfast at Pepes, dinner at commanders, Mallory square, hogs breath, sloppy joes, and of course Kermit's key lime pie shop! Chinch Harbour has a rockin pool bar with a dj who shows up at 1pm and it is very interesting after that! Great local color if you get my drift!



The Seagraves stayed with us from we'd eve til Sun and we enjoyed every minute of our time with them!

Mon saw us saying goodbye to the wonderful Conch Harbour
(and the 170 dollar a day rate) and hello to the 3 dollar a day mooring ball out in man of war Harbour! See below pic of our view!




Not to long after the Seagraves left we were joined by our daughter Alissa and her hubby Jason, they flew in for a 8 day visit and we showed them the key west we have loved for these past 15 years.



-Above is a shot of Jason poolside at conch Harbour pool!

Not to be outdone here is Alissa at the aforementioned pool!






We had a fantastic time with the kids and it was a sad parting when they finally had to fly off to Texas! But 8 days was a good long time to share paradise with our kids! Weve got great memories to cherish til the next time!

When our last visitors left we did a bit more sight seeing.....





Did the southern most thing, and the chicken thing....




The hwy A1a thing.....


Then it was time to sail up to our next stop, marathon!


More to come!

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Heading South.. Twin Dolphin to Ft Myers Beach

Our trip from Bradenton to Sarasota was uneventful, several bascule bridges and the fixed 65 ft  bridge near Marina Jacks in Sarasota. We arrived about 4 pm and quickly got the hook set, launched the dink and docked the dink at Oleary's and went into town to shop and have dinner. Sarasota has a great downtown easily accesable to boats anchored or on mooring balls near there. and they have a whole foods grocery just blocks away.

Friday we again went in for breakfast and then back to the boat, stored the dink on the arch and raised anchor and headed south again to Venice, destination crows nest marina. We arrived at the marina after a nice run down to Venice. Pretty water and a few dolphins! Crows nest is right inside the jetties making for great clear water and dolphins all over the place. They have nice facitlities and a  26 year old parrott named Pepe! he is the same parrott my wife and I got to know when we were chartering a boat doen that way in 1986! If you whistle jingle bells he will talk his head off!

Sat we took on some fuel and again headed south, destination the famous Cabbage Key resort that is famous for being the birthplace of Buffetts biggest hit, Cheesburger in paradise! We anchored next door at Useppa Key and really cool private island. We launched the dink and motored over and hit the resturaunt and smapled the Cheesburger ( really good) and as the ritual prescribes we left our signed dollar bill on the wall. It joins 70k worth of dollar bills! They say 10k falls off  each season and they donate it to charity! Apparently Buffett left a ten spot on the piano in the bar area, but someone took it. So he sent them framed 1 dollar bill that they keep behind the bar now. We had a great calm night at anchor. Alissa and I spent a few hours sitting on the deck listening to the dolphins breach and admiring the circle around the moon.

Sun we hauled anchor and headed again to the south, destination Ft Myers beach and salty sams marina. We enjoyed a good trip down, much busier than the other legs though, lots of big power cruiser waking us all the time. We arrived at sky bridge at low tide thank goodness, its listed as 65 feet, but clearly is more like 65 feet at low tide and 64 at low tide or less. We made it thru and made our way past the mooring field and tied up at Salty Sams marina. We quickly determined that this marina even though it has floating docks, and a couple of good eateries, (one I watched the super bowl that night)its just not the place for us. The next morning we checked out the shoreside facilities at the Matanzas  a night or 267 dollars a month. That sure sounded better than the 496 dollars they wanted for a week at Salty Sams! So we checked out of SS's by the 11 oclock check out and moved on to a ball, where we are now and will be till the end of Feb!

Yesterday we put our daughter on a airplane back to Ft Worth, we had a wonderful visit with her and enjoyed sharing the trip down here with her!

I will post some pics of the trip down and will post shortly about or stay so far in Ft Myers!

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!

Some Summer snapshots

Well summer has come and gone, been so busy hard to belive its been almost a yr since the last post.
These are shots from this summer.

Had a great time at the Ft Worth Boat Club as guests of my Son and law and daughter!
Also included is a shot of the boat under its summer shade!
Last Anita in front of the Oscar Meyer weiner mobile in Little Rock!

We are busy getting the boat ready for an adventure. More soon

Discovery has new Crew!

Sat December 18th at 12;57am, Edolie Brise Willett joined the crew! Her displacement is 7 pds  4 oz, and  her length overall is 20 inches. She has fine lines and a great builders, Katie and John Willett!  Captain Bob and Anita are proud granparents!

New Orleans Trip

Middle of August and my birthday rolls around again, so we decided to head to New Orleans. Had a great long weekend in the french quarter. Anita and I always enjoy the french quarter, did the usual things, walked the streets, window shopped, had donuts at Cafe du mond, oysters at Felix's, rode the trolley down to the garden district. Had our pics taken in front of Jackson Square. Had a hurricane at Pat Obrien's. Even took a carriage ride this time. Love that Cajun feelin!

Willett family goes to Ft Worth Zoo

This past summer the Anita and I were lucky enough to have the chance to spend a week up in Keller with my Daughter and her husband Jason and we were joined for a week by my son John. Johns back in school studying to be a Occupational therapist and was off durning the summer so he had the chance to spend some time with his sister and we joined in. We had a great time with our children and one of the many things we shared was a trip to the Ft Worth Zoo. Its not every day you get to spend such quality time with your grown kids, without the distraction of there children. THis was a once in a lifetime experience and Anita and I soaked it up. Going to the zoo with our grown up children was a real treat and brought back so many memories of times we shared with them and little kids at a park or a attraction, sure is pleasant to not have to worry about them wandering off, or having to change a diaper or....... whatever.