From Trip South Fall 2011

It took twelve days on the hard but the engine is installed & running. It's such a relief to have that behind us. We launched this past Saturday in the first significant rain we've had since arriving in Florida. Thankfully, the weather was good throughout the repower since it would have made an already stressful time even more difficult had it been wet too. As soon as we were free from the slings of the Travelift, we boogied over to our slip to head to Punta Gorda for the weekend to see Bob & Maggie on Sea Tryst. A much needed break from all the work that we've been plodding through. It poured most of the way across the state, but then the skies cleared once we got near the West coast. For whatever reason, it rained all weekend on the East side and virtually none where we were!

It was so nice to see Bob & Maggie and all the work they've done on the house they bought last year. Their boat sits right outside the back door on the canal- what a luxury. We had such a relaxing time but still did a bunch of stuff. There's a bird sanctuary/rehab facility right down the street and they had 3 barred owls. Seeing them up close helped us determine that it was a barred owl that was hooting near us at the boatyard each night. They also had numerous sea birds, bald eagles, opossum, pelicans, hawks, etc. All of the birds had been permanently injured and therefore lived at the sanctuary. One healthy heron, who'd been born to an injured pair, was free to leave but chose to stay right there anyway. The staff called these healthy birds freeloaders, but fed them just the same.

From Trip South Fall 2011
Punta Gorda is a really nice town. It has a great bike path and FREE BIKES which we made use of. One night we sat in a park and watched the holiday boat parade, and what boaters trip would be complete without a ride out into the bay in the dinghy to get splashed by salt water and dodge a rain shower? We also did a lot of jabbering! It was a great visit and fun to check out the west coast for a change.

The day we left, Jon & I headed down to Sanibel Island to check out the area. We went to a wildlife refuge and walked the trails. We've been really enjoying the birds here. There were loads of white pelicans and roseate spoonbills, still not as close as I'd like for good photographs but we could see them well in the binocs.

The past 2 days we've been working out the kinks with the new engine and moving on with the rest of our projects . It seems that Yanmar (the engine manufacturer) switched to a cheaper fuel pump on the new engine & it isn't robust enough to pull the fuel through our filter system. Makes no sense since clean fuel is paramount, but we've got to change out the new fuel pump for a stronger one. I had prepped the green whale stripe on our hull while we were hauled out and planned to coat it here in the slip since it would be easier to reach it from the dinghy. Well I did that yesterday; it looks great from a distance but when you get close up, there's just about everything wrong with it that could be wrong- brush marks, actual brush hairs, air bubbles, debris from the air, bare spots, you name it. The only thing that didn't happen to it is it didn't get rained on! I've pretty much given up on becoming an expert at coatings for the boat. No matter how much I try, it never turns out really good and since I've been doing this now for 18 years, I can see that there will not likely be any improvement! Well, it helped me firm up my new year's resolution. It is going to be me telling myself over & over "Just forget about it! Life is too short to be stressing over ______!" I can apply this to a good portion of my life. Here's to a happy & freer 2012!

We're planning to spend Christmas here with Jon's parents and then head to Miami to see my family before shoving off to the Bahamas. We'd like to head to Panama via the Bahamas to avoid more great memories in Key West (2 puke bugs and 2 bad cold fronts 10 years apart) and also to cruise there a little bit since it's been years.

Jon just headed out to meet up with his dad for a wood carving meeting and I'm going to spiff up around the boat and then head down to Riviera Beach to pick up our liferaft from servicing. I'd like us to take out the marina's courtesy bikes and ride over to the beach today too. I think now that the engine is in, a little more balance in our days is important. Oh, and I've got to put the Christmas lights up.