We are in Palm Coast for a couple days and loving it. We happened on this place due to a couple of weather delays and wanting to catch either an ebb or full flood tide getting into New Smyrna (slack tide, no current). Our original plan was to be at the Riverview in time for their 5-course T-giving dinner but it just didn't happen so we backed off and stopped here. Stroke of luck. We got settled in at the dock around 2:30 and I asked in the office if a restaurant was open nearby. The gal said no but thought the yacht club might be serving until 4:00. She called the manager/maitre d' and he picked us up in his personal car. The buffet was fabulous. And we were warmly greeted by the commodore and his wife. Again, nice folks everywhere we stop.

We have lucked into and been welcomed by the most wonderful people and places all along our way. At Palm Coast we ran into another couple from Rochester that we'd met in Beaufort, SC - Red and Marilyn Grey on s/v Satori. They were business partners with an old friend of mine from 30 years ago, C.P.Maloney, in the Braddock Bay Marina. They also know my cousin Lynn who has been living in Sarasota for years. Lynn and her husband Mike are going to meet us in New Smyrna for a weekend. Another couple we crossed paths with a few times are from Sodus Point, an old stomping ground on Lake Ontario. Another on s/v Witchcraft from Kingston, Ontario, cruised occasionally to Fair Haven, NY where we had a family cottage and I first learned to sail. They also know Al and Jen on s/v Ruth. This cruising world gets very small at times.

Last night a couple on a trawler from Arnold, MD near our home invited us to join them for dinner at a terrific, family-run Italian restaurant in Crescent Beach, about 20 minutes away. The food was superb and the company, enlightening. Peter and Sandy are a very interesting couple: they left the winters of Massachusetts several years ago to open a machine shop in the West Indies, becoming the one and only provider of custom machined parts and tools in the Carib for awhile and a US Navy supplier. She taught in a school for the blind, grammar school and volunteered in a kindergarden. They eventually ended up in Maryland after a stint in North Carolina. This is their third year wintering on their Defever in Palm Coast. Nice folks we'd like to spend more time with.

Tomorrow: Daytona will put us in good shape to catch slack tide in New Smyrna.