October 18, 2013

Today, Brian took me to the Stuffed Pig for breakfast; then a walk to West Marine. Back on board, I gathered our laundry - Brian dropped me off to take care of that and he went to run errands. Got all of our cold-weather clothing washed and packed away - yeah!!! Gave the inside of the boat a thorough cleaning. The outside could use a good wash down - get all of the sea salt off, but that will have to wait - hoping for a nice downpour. It is really hot and muggy here - not complaining, just will take some time to acclimate. We will most likely stay in Marathon for about a month. We are moored next to Wayne, so hopefully, even when he starts back at work, we will get to see him a bit more than the last time we were down here. On our trip down from Newburyport, Brian stated that, that's the most time I've spent with Wayne these past several weeks since Wayne left home at the age of 18.

Lots more boats here in the marina than I had expected even though it's considered the slow season - will get busier and busier here during the holiday season. Hopefully we will be off to the Bahamas before Christmas. It would be nice to see some of the cruisers that we had met last year.

Reading: Brian: Vince Flynn's Transfer of Power, Frozen in Time by Mitchell Zuckoff;
The Economist and Cruising World

Lauren: Vince Flynn's Act of Treason; The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr.
Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson; whipped through two Dean Koontz
books that I hadn't read before - The Good Guy and Breathless; When
I'm 164 by David Ewing Duncan; The Short Forever by Stuart Woods;
Sandra Brown's Exclusive; and a book I'll keep on hand that I
occasionally peruse through, is Jean Carter's Food - Your Miracle
Medicine

October 26, 2013

Having freezer problems - can't get the freezer to hold temp, so it runs constantly and is draining the batteries. We hemmed and hawed about it for a while; went and looked at installing separate fridge and freezer units (cost was ridiculous!). BOAT stands for Break Out Another Thousand or BOATI - Bend Over and Take It. Really, the costs for repair jobs are ridiculous! Decided that we should just raise up the floor of the freezer about 4 inches or so and insulate it. The freezer is so deep that Brian can barely reach the bottom and I have to literally hang into it (feet off the floor) if I have to retrieve anything from the bottom or when I'm defrosting it. Anyway, after talking to a few other boaters here in the marina we got the name of a gentleman that does fiberglass work - came highly recommended - Fiberglass Dave. There are so many 'Daves' in the area that their moniker is whatever their livelihood is. We borrowed a couple of coolers and picked up some dry ice to store our food while Dave worked on the units.

Brian and I decided to run errands while Fiberglass Dave was working as he would be at it for several hours. As we were getting into our dinghy, my sunglasses fell off, hit the dinghy - one of the lenses popped out and the lense along with the frames fell overboard. Brian immediately hung over the side and, unbelievably was able to snag both before they sank. Thank God, as that was my one and only pair. While he was rescuing my glasses, I was standing in the dinghy still holding onto the sides of our boat; the winds were whipping and the current was pushing me further away from the boat. Sooo, I was stretched out so far that I almost went for a swim. I still can't believe I was able to reach out my foot to the ladder (just barely) and jump onto it WITHOUT getting wet. Once on the ladder, I just couldn't stop laughing - must have been that adrenaline surge.

This morning Dave finished the job and we should have our food back in by noontime. We are very pleased with the work he's doing - very meticulous, price was great AND he does a thorough cleanup job - yeah!!!!

We had a cold front come through the other day - winds were mid 20 knots and up; it's suppose to last about a week. Brian and I are still walking around in short sleeves while locals were wearing long sleeved shirts and jackets. It's probably in the 70's here - very comfortable. The first night the winds started, it began raining about 2 a.m. I was excited as the boat was still crusted with sea salt. I got up and grabbed a small flashlight - held it in my mouth aiming it into the lazarette and started emptying it out looking for the long-handled brush used for scrubbing the deck. The lazarette is deep enough for Brian to stand in. Out came fenders, lines, pails, etc.; couldn't find the brush. While I was searching for the brush, I was thinking that if anyone was up and saw the flashlight moving about on our boat, they may have thought someone was on our boat looking to pilfer something - it's been known to happen. I got discouraged and stuffed everything back in and went back to bed. Once back in bed, it really started pouring, so back out of bed and this time I just grabbed a rag and crawled around on the deck scrubbing the topside, handholds, hatches, etc.; that was about 2:30 a.m. Back in bed again a bit after 3 and I felt so much better that that job was done; slept great after that. Now it won't feel so gritty every time we walk on deck and grab any handholds. Once word got out about what I did, I was asked if they could borrow me - real funny!

Last night we joined a few other boaters for a potluck dinner (breakfast food). There was quite a variety of food. Besides the fruit salad that I donated, there were frittatas, bacon, several varieties of potatoes, a swirl bread, breakfast sausage, quiche, etc.; also Bloody Marys. We enjoyed ourselves and met some new people; there is so much to learn from other boaters AND someone ALWAYS has a worse horror story than whatever you may have gone through while traveling.

Reading: Lauren: John Sandford's Phantom Prey; Iris Johansen's Eight Days To Live

Brian: Dean Koontz' Breathless and The Good Guy and he's thoroughly enjoying reading The Economist


October 31, 2013

Happy Halloween! Last night Brian and I joined a few other boaters for a couple of games of bocce ball - it's been a while since either of us have played - we had a good time.

Today we have Gary and Kurt from Keys Rigging tuning our rigging - it will make it a bit easier bringing in the Head Sail. The other day we took an eight mile walk up to the old 7-mile bridge and across it to Pigeon Key which was a postage-sized stamp of a piece of land. Neither Brian and I have done that much walking in quite a while, so it was a workout especially since we are not use to the Florida heat.

Our nephew, Eric will be here beginning of week visiting his father, so we will plan a day or two for all of us to get together.

November 6, 2013

Freezer seems to be working fine after having the bottom insulated and brought up to make the box a bit smaller and much easier to reach the bottom. But, the fridge doesn't seem to be as cold as it has been. Brian turned on the fridge controller (which we've never had to use) and it helped a bit. After a few days, Brian drilled a few holes in the new divider that was rebuilt by Fiberglass Dave, so that we will get the spillover from the freezer to the fridge - that worked.

Yesterday, Brian and I joined his brother, Wayne and his son, Eric for a trip to Key West. Eric had a rental and Wayne rode shotgun and played tour guide. Took some side streets we most likely would never had taken and learned a bit more about the Keys. We saw Key Deer - very small; went to the Blue Hole - an area about the size of an acre that was excavated for the fill and now is home to wildlife. The hole has fresh water layered on top of salt water. We saw two alligators, turtles, an osprey, several really small fish and an Anhinga which is a rather large bird. The head is similar to a cormorant's, but that's where the similarities end. The Anhinga is also known as a snakebird, Darter, water turkey, etc. It has an average wingspan of 46 inches and a body length of 33 inches. It often swims with only its neck above the water which is apparently how it came to also be known as a Snakebird.

Down another off the beaten path, we came across a huge wooden structure. Wayne was pretty sure it was erected in the '30's and used as a bat house to combat the hordes of mosquitoes when the Keys were being developed in that area. Pretty neat structure - too bad there wasn't a historical plaque on it. After the builder completed the structure, he put thousands of bats in it from the Midwest. That night they all disappeared and never returned. The legend is that the local mosquitoes ate the bats.

For lunch, we stopped at the No Name Pub for pizza - the pizza was delicious, but just stopping in to see the interior of the Pub would be a highlight for anyone. Every square inch, and I mean every square inch, of the inside is covered in several layers of one dollar bills.

Once in Key West, we toured the docks looking at all the boats - I took a picture from quite a distance of Chuck Norris' boat. There was another very, very sleek looking yacht that we were told was Kenny Chesney's. This week, Key West is hosting high-powered speed boat races. We got to walk around and ogle the boats and the trucks that transport them - $$$$, $$$$$, $$$$. We walked quite a bit of the downtown. When we left Marathon in the morning, it was raining, but we had a good day in Key West - a few sprinkles, but the cloud cover was nice, because it was warm.

This morning, Eric gave me a tutorial on downloading pictures to Facebook so that I can create photo albums. Evan had also shown me, but I'm not a quick learner when it comes to computers. It will take me a while to get comfortable with that. I thought by using Facebook, I would most likely reach more people about our travels. There won't be a running blog, but a few pictures and a very short commentary should suffice. I'm thinking about just keeping up the blog for myself as a diary.

Eric left shortly after helping me heading to Titusville to meet friends and to go skydiving. He's never been; looking forward to it, but a tad nervous - who wouldn't be? He will be back late Thursday evening and hopefully we will be able to spend a little bit more time with him before he heads back home on the weekend.

This morning, Brian has been taking stock of all of our pumps on board, making sure we have duplicates and if not, ordering back ups. Let's see, there's two electric bilge pumps plus one manual bilge pump, a water pump, shower/sump pump and an a/c pump. He also found a roll of gasket to place on the inside of our hatches to keep any driving rain or crashing waves out of the inside of the boat. Even though the gasket has an adhesive, it didn't stay up, so he bought some type of glue and redid them - hopefully this time they will stay in place.

Reading: Lauren: finished a trio of fluff books by Kasey Michaels - Dial M for
Mischief, Mischief Becomes Her and Mischief 24/7 - not my usual read, but
they were given to us, so now I can pass them on. Next up is John Grisham's
The Rainmaker.

Brian: John Ringo's Claws that Catch (scifi); Cruisin' World

November 7, 2013

Last night Brian and joined several other couples for bocce ball - my team lost both games, but we had a good time. This morning I cooked home fries, eggs, English muffins and bacon then finished the last coat of varnish on all of the bright work. Today is our first day of winds less than 20 knots, so we are thinking about taking a dinghy ride up the creek out towards Sombrero Beach.

We have an elderly neighbor (Hank) that leaves his boat at first light for a bit and then once back on board he sits ALL day in his cockpit either reading or napping. Last time I baked banana bread, I had Brian drop off a loaf to him - he was tickled pink. Several days ago, we noticed that we hadn't seen Hank for a couple of days, so we stopped by the office voicing our concerns. Thankfully, Hank is ok and had taken a trip to St. Petersburg for a bit. Every once in a great while you hear of someone that has passed on and it takes a while before someone notices.

November 10, 2013

This past Saturday the plan was to walk to the City Marina Park for the Arts Festival that we had seen advertised all week. Then we were going to back track slightly to the American Legion to check out their weekly yard sale and we also heard the "Cheese Man" was back in town. At the same time, Marathon had a parade scheduled, so we would see that while we were either perusing the yard sale or the arts festival. One, there was not one tent set up for the arts festival, though there were several soccer games being played by youngsters; two, there were maybe a total of four tables set up at the American Legion including the "Cheese Man" and three, the parade consisted of about 10 vehicles (mostly flatbed type trucks with people either sitting or standing in the bed of the trucks) adorned with red, white and blue banners, lots of flags, some of the men were in their uniforms AND they drove by at about 35 mph - no kidding - that was the parade. So, we decided to continue our walk to IHop for lunch and we waved at the parade of vehicles as they zipped by. On our way back to the marina we stopped to purchase cheese from the "Cheese Man" - Brian chose an onion cheese and mine was a hot pepper - yum.

Eric came back from his trip up north to Titusville to skydive. He was so nervous about the skydiving, but ended up having a blast. While his father was at work, we taught Eric how to play Mexican Train (dominoes). He seemed to enjoy it and we enjoyed his company.

Today, Brian and I decided to take another dinghy ride to Sombrero Beach before the rain started; practically no one on the beach at 8 in the morning. We swam a couple of laps hugging the shore and just enjoyed the quiet. Bought myself a better quality mask (the Costco brand just didn't do it for me - too many problems). Tried it out and works great! Walking the beach, I found a piece of blue sea glass - it's not quite "ready", but to me, it's a keeper; the blue glass is so hard to find. The other day when we were here, I actually stumbled across a Hamburger Bean (it actually looks like a miniature hamburger). The whole time we were in the Bahamas, I never found any. These beans originate in tropical regions of the world. They are also known as "sea beans" as they are carried by rivers into the oceans. Mid afternoon, the heavens opened up and it just poured and the winds whipped up - almost lost our beach towels - had them hanging out so the rain would rinse out the sand and salt, but the winds were a bit much.

I have mastered getting the dinghy started, driving it and bringing it to the dock and getting it tied off to the cleats - freedom!!!!! Lol Probably doesn't sound like a big deal, but it is. Still working on learning my way around Facebook.

November 12, 2013

Last night we invited Wayne over to discuss traveling with us after we leave the Bahamas. Wayne seems excited about it and there were quite a few issues to discuss. Brian would still like to circumnavigate - me, not so sure about that still. So, having a third person aboard would ease my mind. Though, do we want to give up our privacy for the next couple of years? Will we be able to stand each other day in and day out? I am willing to travel beyond the Bahamas this year; it would entail some overnights, but only one or two overnights at a time - rest would just be day hopping to the Virgin Islands.

Read: Brian - Cruisin' World Magazines, Passages South (The Thornless Path to Windward)- 10th Edition by Bruce Van Sant

Lauren: Plum Lucky by Evanovich, Malice by Lisa Jackson

November 18, 2013

Not much going on. Yesterday, Brian and Alex from Kay-tee took down an old storm sail track. Brian hoisted Alex up the mast so Alex could take out the screws that were difficult to get out, but Alex used an impact driver and it made the job less difficult. Brian is also thinking about adding a strong track to our existing slot on the mast for our mainsail. That sail is very difficult to raise and bring down and I can't handle it at all. The mainsail never comes down more than ¾ of the way, so Brian has to stand on the Sissy or Granny bars to finish taking it down and when we are under way, this can be a bit precarious. I'm always behind the helm pointing the boat into the wind to make it easier bringing the sail down, but I'm watching to see if Brian is going to slip and fall - THAT is a tad nerve wracking and would not be so great if one of us got injured. Adding this strong track should make handling the mainsail much easier. I need to be able to master the sails if Brian is down for some reason.

Last night, we sat out on our top deck - actually sat on our rescue pod (emergency raft) as other than the cockpit there is no place else to sit. We were discussing the constant maintenance of our abode. It's not like when we were C.L.O.D.s (cruisers living on dirt) - this is just constant maintenance. Because of the boats constant motion, moisture in the air, the corrosion from the salt, the wear and tear of the lines, sails, etc., there is ALWAYS something that needs to be maintained almost on a daily basis. So for those that think we are out here just sipping sundowners and lazing about, well.....we are sort of. And the dust and dirt - where the heck does that come from??? Tho, I suppose I wouldn't be happy unless I had a rag of some sort in my hand or a dishtowel (my crutch) hanging over my shoulder.

Another issue that NO ONE wants to discuss is cockroaches. We were playing a game of Mexican Train recently when I saw the biggest cockroach ever walking across our ceiling. I wanted Brian to use the fly swatter (wouldn't kill it) to stun it, making it easier to grab (he was also closer). Have to say, these cockroaches don't freak me out, but I'm disgusted if I even think we have any on board which apparently is so, so common on boats. So that's one reason for the CONSTANT cleaning, wiping, putting down Boric Acid everywhere, etc. Anywho, Brian didn't use the fly swatter (he tried to catch it), missed and now we have no idea where it is. We are assuming it is still on the boat. They only come out at night and we discovered they not only crawl extremely fast, but they fly. We think that's how we got this one - just flew onto our boat and made it self comfortable - yuck! One cruiser we talked to, mentioned they have been battling cockroaches for 4 years - she has an immune system problem, so cannot use any chemicals to battle the little suckers, but she did discover accidentally, that they like Kaluha - she had left a small amount out overnight and there were about 5 floating in the glass in the morning - hmmmm. To me, that is NOT a waste of good liquor - lol. These cockroaches are crafty little buggers.

November 21, 2013

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PATTY AND COREY

Since we have talked to Wayne about joining us next Spring to travel with us after we leave the Bahamas and he has excitedly accepted, Brian decided it was time to go through his tools, spare parts, hardware, etc. and consolidate. We needed to make some room for Wayne's things. The boat looked like a bomb went off. I spent all morning sorting tapping screws, flat head screws, nuts, bolts, washers, etc. (can never have enough). We came across a small can of white paint - not much, so I decided to paint the insides of a couple of bins while they were empty - used up the paint and made the bins look better. This morning everything was put away.

Last night we met up with other cruisers and played a couple of games of bocce ball - my team finally won a game.

Brian has decided to go forward with the Storm Track for the mainsail. Tomorrow, we unhook from our mooring ball and head up a canal to Sombrero Beach Marina to have the work done. Brian and his brother, Wayne took down the mainsail and took off the boom (saving us a few dollars). On our next calm day, Brian is going to hoist me up the mast (first time) so that I can plug the holes that were left behind from taking out the old storm sail track. We found aluminum putty that we were told will work better at filling the holes than using rivets and last forever.

This morning we took a 2 mile walk to the Wooden Spoon for breakfast and stopped at Home Depot (again) on the way back. Back on board, I decided to finally tackle washing the third screen panel for our cockpit that I've been putting off and then I scrubbed our four float cushions and took up the floor grates in the cockpit and scrubbed the undersides of the grates and the floor. Again, it's absolutely amazing the amount of dust, dirt, hair, etc. that gets caught underneath these grates. I always feel so much better after giving something a good scrubbing.

December 1, 2013

Wow, hard to believe it's already December. We had a quiet Thanksgiving; met up with Brian's brother, Wayne and had dinner out.

Last week we took our boat to Sombrero Beach Marina to have it outfitted with a Strong Track for our mainsail. The day before this was scheduled, we dinghied over to see exactly where we had to take our boat - the slip was narrow and not much turn area as the water was rather shallow. So, of course, that night I didn't get much sleep fretting over getting the boat into the slip. Fortunately, I got the boat into the slip without any mishaps; another boater saw us coming in and came over to lend us a hand with the lines. I was such a nervous wreck about the whole thing, but kept it under control. Once the engine was off, I had to sit for a bit. I'm hoping one of these days I won't get so worked up about maneuvering the boat in and out of slips. Thankfully, it's rare that we do this, though grabbing a mooring ball in high winds and choppy waves can a bit difficult. Even anchoring has its problems at times, though we have picking up a mooring ball and anchoring down pretty good.

The last two days Brian has been shoring up our galley floor as it was a bit "soft". Wayne hooked us up with "Welder" Dave. After meeting with Welder Dave and deciding how to fix the problem economically and hopefully do it ourselves, Dave procured for us two pieces of 6 foot each aluminum bars. Brian was able to cut and bend the bars and use them as braces; a bit time consuming, but worked like a charm. I got to help by holding the bars in place while they were marked for cuts. I also handed tools and screws to Brian and I vacuumed up all the metal shavings and fine metal dust. Another job done!

Tonight the Marathon City Park will be turning on the Christmas lights. We will first stop by the Hurricane to see how the Patriots are doing, maybe have a few .25 wings and then head to the Park.

Reading: Lauren: John Grisham's The Last Juror; Mario Puzo's The Last Don; Jodi
Picoult's The Pact (I've read 3 of her books now and all 3 have been
engrossing); Lisa Jackson's Cold Blood

Brian: Bareboat Cruising; Grisham's Rainmaker and anything he can get info
regarding our cruise beyond the Bahamas

December 5, 2013

Two days ago, we got up fairly early, took a 2 mile walk to the Wooden Spoon for breakfast and on our walk back stopped for a few groceries. The winds were light, so I suggested to Brian that why didn't he hoist me up the mast so that I could plug the holes left behind from when we took off our old storm track? So I was put into the harness and then attached to a bosum's chair that has two side pockets. In one pocket, I placed a damp rag and a jack knife tied to a string attached to the seat; the other pocket contained my camera and the aluminum putty to fill the holes. On the first tug up, I internally started to panic, thinking "What the heck am I doing?" But I just concentrated on holding onto the stays as I was hoisted upwards. Once I was at the top of the old track area which was more than ¾ of the way up the mast, I took out my camera (hoping I didn't drop it - my hands were shaking quite a bit) and took a few pics. Then I started working on plugging the holes. The damp rag was to wipe off any excess, but it didn't work very well. I discovered that using the Jack Knife worked much better at scraping the excess putty off whether the putty was still pliable or even after it hardened. The work was a bit time consuming. I actually started enjoying myself up there.

Next thing I know, the Fisheries and Wildlife patrol boat was along side our boat. The officer in charge told Brian that we were here illegally because we did not have registration numbers showing on the boat. NOT TRUE. Our boat is Federally documented in the state of Massachusetts which is one of several states that DOES NOT require the owner of the boat to register the boat. Actually, if the boat is federally documented out of Massachusetts, you CANNOT register your boat. Some states that require your boat to be federally documented also require you to register your boat, but not Massachusetts. Brian tried to explain that to the officer. Anywho.... He wanted our papers and Brian said he wasn't going to leave me unattended up the mast. The FWC guy told Brian to "Get her down." Geesh!!! I was liking it up there. So down I came and sat on the deck while Brian had it out with this guy. Brian was CRIMINALLY (yes) charged for not registering our boat here in Florida. One; we can't - we are not residents of Florida and two; again we are federally documented - we don't need to. Not so according to this guy - he was not kind and gave Brian a difficult time. He actually told Brian he could handcuff him now and cart him off to jail - GOOD GRIEF? So, now instead of leaving in about the two weeks as we had planned, we have to stick around til early January to go to court. PS: Brian, of course, researched the ticket and the F&W guy actually cited us incorrectly - so hopefully, this will get thrown out of court. HMMMM, I was wondering what Brian would look like wearing bright orange jumpsuit. He said he would rather do the 60 days then fork over the $500. He would be fed, be in an a/c building, laze around and watch TV and on Saturdays, he may be let out to do community work - told him I would wave to him on my walk to the grocery store. And since I just learned how to run the water maker and flush it out and take down all the pertinent info for out water maker log, I should be ok being alone. I have plenty of food, propane tanks are full AND I can now operate the dingy - lol. He said it won't come to that, but......one can only hope.

Yesterday, we took our boat papers and our ticket first to the Marathon Tax Office - they are on our side. They did some research and printed off a couple of documents for us. From there they sent us to see the supervisor over at FWC. The guy we met with gave us a difficult time; left there and stopped by the county clerk's office to see if we could move up our court hearing - we weren't even in the system yet - that could take up to 30 days (according to the ticketing officer), tho we found out they have 5 days to get the paperwork in. Later in the afternoon, Brian took a walk to the Attorney General's office, but couldn't get past the secretary. There are at least two other boaters with criminal charges pending. The FWC has been a bit heavy handed lately and the cruisers here in the marina are in an uproar over the way they are being treated. Apparently, every three years, the FWC graduate students and take them out and wreak havoc in the marina. One boater got ticketed for having a small and I mean small hole in his throw float and was charged $78. Ridiculous! Another guy was out fishing in his dinghy and FWC was going to cite him for not having a throwable in his dinghy. If your dinghy is less than 16 feet you are not required to have a throwable float. He had the required whistle, light and life jackets. He asked FWC, "What happens if I fall overboard? I'm alone - who is going to toss me a throwable?" He didn't get a ticket. What FWC is going to do is run off boaters. This marina is probably the biggest money maker for the city of Marathon and it's a great marina - clean, plenty of showers, decent laundry facility, nice huge common room for reading, TV, games, working on computers; they even have rooms so that cruisers can work on large projects for their boats such as fiberglassing, sail repair, sanding, painting, etc. AND the people who run and work at this facility are wonderful. We boaters spend a lot of money here, between the grocery stores, the cabs, shuttles, renting vehicles, West Marine, Home Depot, Kmart, movie center, the theater for plays, the dolphin center, the turtle center, museums, restaurants, etc. Some of the boaters are already saying that they don't need the hassle and won't come back. What a shame! Quite a few of these cruisers are retirees and trying to enjoy their time here. Most of us are here for a few weeks to a few months getting ready to move on to other areas and it's a great place to re-provision and take care of other essentials.

Shawn, who I believe is in charge of the Marina is trying to schedule a meeting with the Director of FWC and the cruisers - that could be a pretty rowdy meeting. Brian also has a call into our Massachusetts Senator - still waiting on that return call.

December 13, 2013

Update on the FWC issues. The FWC refused to come and meet with the boaters here at the marina - well, that, of course, did not go over well. So after telephone calls to the Mayor's office and city council members and writing emails to get the message out there as to what's been going on, we cruisers have now been invited to speak at the City Council meeting and the Mayor and FWC has scheduled a meeting here at the marina to hear our complaints and review the regulations that are required by the FWC.

For us personally, after getting no where here with the local agencies, Brian contacted the FWC headquarters and a Major in the FWC returned his call and listened to Brian's grievance. After doing some research, the Major got back to us and agreed with us. We should have not been charged criminally, but he said we still had to pay a fine (less than originally cited). Brian thanked him profusely, but also let him know that it still wasn't fair that we were getting fined for something totally out of our control. There is no way for any boater from any state that federally documents their boat, but cannot register the boat, to legally be here in Florida waters. We couldn't register the boat here even if we wanted to because we don't live here. According to Florida law, you need a permanent residence here and if you sign Under the Pains and Penalty that you live here, it is perjury and Brian, being an attorney, could lose his license. Brian relayed this also to the Major. The Major has called us a couple of times and is genuinely concerned about this issue and agrees that the regulations need to be addressed - maybe he could eventually get our fee dropped.

Now that our fine has been dropped from criminal to a civil fine, Brian went to the clerk's office of the court, to see if we could move up our hearing so that we could hopefully argue our case and get the fine dropped. First we found out the date of our hearing was actually an arraignment date - good grief! Thankfully, the criminal charge was dropped and the court already had it in the system, BUT the first available date to be heard was in May - great!!! We could mail in an affidavit to the court along with the fine fee and then it would be looked at - we may or may not get the money back - my guess is not get it back.

Brian and Corey from "Thin Line" were asked to represent the marina at the city council meeting - they did last night. They each got 2 minutes to speak. Corey outlined the numerous complaints regarding the treatment by the FWC towards the cruisers and residents of the marina and Brian outlined our dilemma. Brian from "Sea Mist" is a writer/reporter. He came to our boat and interviewed us and took our picture and pictures of the boat. He will have the article published in Boat US and/or maybe another boating magazine - our 15 minutes of fame.

After last night's council meeting, several of us cruisers from the marina stopped at the Hurricane for .25 cent wings and to commiserate - it was a fun evening. When we got back to the boat, we played a game of Mexican Train - I'm on a winning streak.

Cold front came through last night - great sleeping weather. Still "cool" this morning, so a great morning for baking cookies while working on the blog. Also prepared a potato salad, cooked hardboiled eggs and made egg/ham/cheese sandwiches for breakfast. Never made it out of the galley til after noon.

December 15, 2013

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PATRICK

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BO (17TH)

Last night we watched the boat parade from our boat - about 10 boats total. Beautiful evening to sit out in the cockpit. We are ready to leave Marathon; waiting for a weather window. Brian has decided to skip town without paying the imposed fine for being here "illegally". At least it's not the criminal fine still that would follow us to Kingdom Come. Will probably do laundry and grocery shopping before we head out. Our friends Ted and Barbara from Rosa are here at a nearby marina having work done on their boat. They are hoping to leave this week. It would be nice to be able to travel with another boat over to the Bahamas.

We got our Air Breeze Wind Generator back from EMarine and low and behold their WAS something wrong with it. Thankfully, even though it is now out of warranty, they did not charge us for the repair. Brian worked on putting it back together and then I helped him put it back up on the arch - that sucker is h-e-a-v-y! Regarding the wind generator that came with the boat; we never knew if it was putting out any amps, so Brian bought an analog amp meter and NO, it was not producing any energy. EMarine said they would look at it, again, we have to ship it out - expensive and then there's the cost just to have them look at it let alone fix whatever is wrong with it. Last year we had SALT (Sea, Air, Land Technology) check it out. They couldn't find anything wrong with it, but charged us quite a bit just to check it out. They did say that it may not be plumb on the arch - LOL - good grief, it's a sail boat and always moving. It's NOT going to be PLUMB unless we are sitting on the hard. Anywho, Brian took it upon himself to try and figure out what the heck was wrong with it. He retraced the wires and found numerous problems, so he rewired the unit AND IT WORKS - YEAH!!! So, now between the two wind generators and the two solar panels, we are good to go.

This morning while Brian was futzing with the computer, I mailed out a few Christmas cards. I guess I should really learn how to send cards via computer. I'm just not tech savy, but I'm learning. Have to say it's been interesting perusing Facebook.

December 19, 2013

Last night the marina had their big meeting with the FWC, Mayor and City Council Members. Brian was one of the first to speak about our dilemma and asked if our civil fine would be dropped. We were told "no", but later during a break, Brian talked to a Captain FWC and said most likely our civil fine would be dropped, but he didn't want to announce it to the room, just in case..... WHEW! Didn't want that hanging over our heads. The meeting actually went rather well. I think the FWC "heard" us cruisers about their harsh treatment with the cruisers. We get that they have a job to do, but it's the way they were going about it. Left the meeting with a major headache.

Looks like we have a very short weather window Sunday through Tuesday if we want to leave for the Bahamas. We want to sail over, not motor, but just because you have winds, doesn't mean they are from the right direction for sailing - could make it rather rough. We may just chance it or we could spend more time here and wait for the next weather window. We are good to go - just catch up on laundry and a bit of grocery shopping. This will be my last entry til after we get either to or through the Bahamas.

WISHING ALL A WONDERFUL HOLIDAY SEASON AND A HAPPY AND HEALTHY NEW YEAR!