Street view in Gulfport

On Wednesday we motorsailed the 41 miles from Sarasota to Gulfport in light winds. We needed to cross Sarasota and Tampa Bays so the light winds were perfect for that - both bays were pretty smooth except for wakes. There are 7 bridges along the way and we expected to have some delays on the 4 that needed to be opened. There was a delay at the first one, but the rest were opened quickly. In fact, the last one, Structure C at St. Petersburg, is now a 65 ft. fixed bridge - what a pleasant surprise at the end of the day! It doesn't look like it's been open long; they're still working on the fenders and there's no height board. We saw a sea turtle, dolphins, fish waves (they look like little wakes but are actually lots of fish running at the surface), and lots of pelicans eating the fish (pelican bombs!). Somehow an invasion of love bugs attacked us in the middle of Tampa Bay, miles from land. Weird. There were so many all over the sail, the dodger, the cockpit, and us. We had to put the screen over the companionway to keep them out of the inside of the boat. Ugh! Finally they settled down to only a few by the end of the trip, but there were dead bugs all over the cockpit and deck. We have spent the last couple of days cleaning up the mess and exploring Gulfport. When we anchored here before we didn't go ashore. It's a pretty area, lots of small reasonably priced restaurants and shops and a small food store just 4 blocks up Beach St. from the dinghy dock (which is maintained by the city and is quite nice and convenient).