The parking lot here at the marina has been taken over by oil spill response teams. They have lots of boats, trucks, booms and other equipment on standby.
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We saw no oil on the gulf crossing but now the wind is from the west and pushing the oil closer to the Florida panhandle. Oil has been reported on the barrier islands of Mississippi and Alabama and a sheen is located a few miles off of Pensacola. We are starting to get worried as to whether or not we can make it back to Madisonville. Since we are so close we are really anxious to get home. We plan to leave early tomorrow and make as much milage as we can in the next few days. Things are starting to be put into motion here in PC. The red flag was flying today and all of the oil spill control workers were gathered on the pier as you can see in this picture. They are getting ready to deploy booms along the coast if necessary. Its making us a little antsy about what is going on. I'll keep you posted on our outcome as we progress toward home.
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We are back in Panama City. We left Marathon on Tuesday morning (5/25). We were supposed to have a good weather window for a couple of days and we thought we would make it all the way to Appalachicola in one run but as has been the case all year the weather did not do what it was supposed to do and plans changed in route. When we left Marathon the wind was light for a few hours and then seemed to build out of the northwest at about 20 knots and of course that was the direction we were heading so we were motoring into the wind. It did die down during the night so we kept going. On Wednesday mid-day we were near St. Pete and the wind picked up again. The waves were about 3-4 feet and again right on the nose. We had 165 miles to go to windward to get to Appalach or we could turn around and go back 15 miles downwind to a nice anchorage at Longboat Key. So of course we chose to turn around. We have stopped in Longboat several times in the past and it is a really nice place to stop. When we got anchored we were happy to see the boat "Cloud Nine" anchored near us. We had met Jon in Marathon in December and had also spent time with him in Georgetown. After we got settled in we invited him over for sundowners. It was nice to see him and his new little potcake puppy Yuma that he adopted in the Bahamas. We stayed in Longboat Thursday to give the weather time to settle down. The manatees were migrating through Longboat and we got to see several of them swimming around the anchorage. We explored by dinghy Thursday and went to a local restuarant/bar for happy hour with Yon. Had a good time and are glad we stopped here. When we left Friday morning there was very little wind but there was about a 2-3 foot swell from the northwest all the way across. We made good time and were in Appalachicola by 10 am Saturday. We hit the intercoastal waterway and went on to Panama City and anchored in Smack Bayou. Since it is Memorial day weekend we are going to stay here a few days until all the weekend boaters are gone.
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