Everything works now

With all the improvements we did over winter, we assumed it would take a while to get all the kinks worked out.  For example, the engine still wouldn't idle reliably, but "The Boat Guy" fixed that in Venice.

The most stubborn of the non-working items has been the depth sounder. Thanks to a helpful call to tech support, we bought some petroleum jelly and moved the transducer around the hull until it worked. Now we just need to mount it permanently in the new location. 

Whew, is nice to have everything working the way it should!  We'll see how long that lasts until the next thing needs fixing. Of course there's still that stubborn leak near the companionway slide....

A long passage

There are only a couple small, and therefore tricky, inlets between Sanibel Inlet and Gordon Pass, just below Naples. Luckily, we had a good weather window and put in a 32.43 NM day without
Incident. It was a nice introduction to sailing in the Gulf and even larger Gordon Pass was pretty lumpy. There was also a little time to explore Naples and see the pier during golden hour. No I've cream for us in this upper crust town; it was gelato! 3.9 KT average over 8:13 for a total odo of 154.07 NM.

Busy day

Had a delightful broad reach and run from Cayo Costa to Sanibel island in mostly picture perfect weather. Near the Sanibel inlet, a freak spitting rain caused us to don our foulies for the first time under way. After docking, we stocked up on gas, Ice, water, did a load of laundry and provisioned up the larder. After all that work, we treated ourselves to fish dinners at Gramma Dot's dockside restaurant. Very yummy!! 22.70 NM at an average of 4.0 KT over 5:40. Total odo 131.64

Catching up on the log

Monday 2/20
The forecast promised a light north wind; perfect for a downwind run from Punta Gorda. Indeed, the passage started out with a splendid few miles out the Peace River wing on wing with the drifter. Soon the wind died and we had to motor. When it finally did build again a couple hours later, it was right on the nose out of the west. With daylight waning, we ended up motoring the rest of the way to our Anchorage in Cayo Costa's Pelican Bay. 22.10 NM, total odo 92.23 NM.

Tuesday 2/21
Spent the bulk of the day enjoying the beach, sea shell hunting, and hiking the trails at the state park. Splurged on some ice cream at the camp store. After rowing around Manatee Hole and seeing two of the"sea cows", we went in search of a protected hidey hole in preparation for the rain that was forecast for Wednesday. Motored a total of 3.0 NM and ended up a half mile away from our previous anchorage on the opposite side of pelican bay.

Wednesday 2/22
After hard rain overnight and into the morning, it mostly cleared up by 15:00. We decided on a change of scenery to give as a head start for Thursday's longish sail to Punta Rassa near Sanibel Inlet. Sailed 3.70 NM to the south of the Broken Islands and another private anchorage. Total odo 98.94 NM.

Passing storm

This was more spectacular than the double rainbow we saw half an hour ago.

The latest in Yacht wear

Today is just a rain day, so I thought I would catch up on some blogs. This is Steve wearing the latest in sun avoidance gear (aka a $10 pair of old man pjs). He says they work great, light airy and fashionable! 

The Gulf

We hiked 3 miles total to go to the Gulf side and back. Here's a pic of the Gulf.