We started out today with a walk to "Sailors Exchange", a boat store that sells new and used boat stuff. We have a list of items we'd like for the boat and are hoping to find used. On the top of the list is a spinnaker pole that will fit the mount we already have on the mast. This store was a trip. It is not that large, but is crammed full of stuff that looks like it has been salvaged off boats. They had a number of spinnaker poles out back, none of which had the fitting we needed. They looked through their other hardware to see if they had the fitting that we could then attach to one of the poles they had, but they didn't have it.

We looked at several propane grills for the stern rail, too. We found one that was old but never unpacked and used, but the rail mount didn't look like it would work for us, and on further consideration it was probably bigger than we need and can fit. We ended up with three toggle switches (I've been having to replace the switches in our cabin lights that are wearing out) and a pulley to use to make it easier to zip up our mainsail stack pack.

Gary met us there which was nice because it was about a mile from the boat and it was good to have a ride home. Before we went back to the boat Gary took us to a bicycle shop not far from here. We've been looking for tires for the folding bikes. This shop happened to have two that would fit so we bought them both. This was the fourth bike shop we'd been to (two in Charleston and another here) and we were happy to finally find the tires.

Back at the boat I fixed a little lunch while Bud and Gary flipped the dinghy upright on the foredeck and put the registration numbers on it. They tied a lifting harness to it and after lunch used the spinnaker halyard to launch it. Then they used our mainsail preventer to lower the outboard engine to the dinghy. Bud started the brand new engine. He took it out for a trial run and then again for a bit to break in the outboard.

Meanwhile I put a new tire on one of the folding bikes. Both our folding bikes were out of commission. The one I was working on had a shredded rear tire. The other one is the one whose tube blew up while we were sailing.

So now we have a dinghy and engine and one bike all working. Since the dinghy is functional we may move to a mooring ball tomorrow, as long as the forecast for the night is not too cold. The NOAA website predicts 49 degrees for a low, which is fine. The TV forecast gave a low of 29 degrees for tomorrow. That's confusing.

After the work was done Gary and I talked Bud into walking around St. Augustine for a bit. We walked through the old streets a few blocks over to the fort, Castillo de San Marcos. Downtown St. Augustine is close to 100 per cent tourism. There are restaurants, bars, art galleries, street performers, and stores selling souvenirs and oddities everywhere. The photo is on the main pedestrian street (you can see Gary, Bud and Fuzzy walking ahead of me), but there are several of the old streets closed to cars. Even those open to cars are almost too narrow to handle them. Gary said it's a nightmare to park, but it's all very nice for those of us who come by boat.

I put a few pictures of St. Augustine in the gallery. I started a new album for Florida, to make it easier to view the photos. I also reversed the order of the photos in the old albums so the newest ones are at the top.