Our initial journey to move the "new" boat from St. Petersburg to Mobile officially began on April 24, 2006. We had a safe, relatively uneventful journey, but we were extremely grateful to have Mike & Mary Hall (the experienced live-aboards) as escorts until we got into the Panhandle.

There is so much to do and so much to learn about the boat and their insight, knowledge and suggestions were invaluable – I don’t know what we would have done without them! We are still far from being pros but we certainly feel better about handling the boat than we did initially and hope to be much more comfortable with it by the end of the summer.

As for the trip, I am already a little “fuzzy” about where we went on what day and what all happened (because so much was happening all the time!), but we went to a city dock at Caladesia Island after we left the dock at St. Petersburg on Monday. We stayed one evening there (the gnats were really bad) and then we went to Anclote Key on Tuesday where we anchored out for the first time. Mary and I went over to the beach in their dinghy on Wednesday morning while the guys got our dinghy down and got the outboard running. We found several nice seashells, and I learned not to go shell-hunting without first applying sunscreen!

We left Anclote Key that afternoon and went to the city marina at Tarpon Springs to stay Wednesday and Thursday nights. The wind was blowing hard when we got there, and Mike was kind enough to “park” our boat in the slip for us after getting their boat secured. We ate dinner Wednesday evening at a great restaurant that Mike & Mary discovered when they were there earlier this year (Hella’s) and enjoyed a little window-shopping along the main drag.

Thursday was spent doing odds & ends around the boat and then Todd and I decided to take a break and go for a walk around town that afternoon. We needed the break and really enjoyed being “tourists” in Tarpon Springs.

We left Tarpon Springs Friday morning, hoping that the winds would be relatively calm for the 8-hour trip to Cedar Key, and they were. We arrived at Cedar Key that evening and by the next morning, the winds had picked up again and we were pretty much isolated in our respective boats for the next two days. The wind finally calmed Sunday evening and the four of us took the dinghies to Cedar Key, walked around for a little while and got a few provisions at the local grocery store.

The plan was to get up at 2:00 a.m. on Monday morning and be ready to pull up anchor by 3:00 a.m. to begin the Gulf crossing. Needless to say, we didn’t stay up too late that evening! As per the plan, Mike radioed us at 2:00 a.m. and he and Todd took the dogs to shore. We began the day as scheduled and, after a moment of confusion trying to navigate out of Cedar Key in the dark, were on our way.

As we got out into open water, the seas began to get a little rough. We experienced 3- to 5-foot seas pretty much all day, and what a long day it was! We finally arrived at St. George Island late that afternoon, without incident, and immediately brought the dinghies down to take the dogs to shore. Had we not been so exhausted, we would have spent more time on the beautiful beach there, but we were all pretty much done-in for the day.

We took our time leaving Tuesday morning and made it to Apalachicola around noon where we purchased 222 gallons of fuel at the bargain price of $2.94 per gallon. This is where Mike & Mary cut the umbilical cord and we continued the journey solo while they went back to the St. George Island area to explore a new anchorage before heading up the river north of Apalachicola the next day.

We traveled west for another 5 hours or so that afternoon and found a suitable (if not great) anchorage for the evening on the east side of East Bay. We put in a long day on Wednesday and anchored at Mary Ester, west of Destin, in a great little spot Mike & Mary had recommended. There were two fairly large cruisers and a sailboat in the anchorage with us but everyone pretty much kept to themselves. We took Buddy over to shore in the dinghy that evening (Todd had to row because the outboard didn’t want to start) and decided we would walk over to the Gulf Shore the next morning, which was about a half-mile from where we were anchored.

After a relatively leisurely Thursday morning, Todd got the dinghy outboard started and we made our way to the beach and then walked over to the Gulf Shore where we found several nice seashells and enjoyed some quiet time on the beach.

Thursday evening found us in Ingram Bayou – another nice anchorage recommended by Mike & Mary – where we ran into a sailboater who, oddly enough, turned out to be a long-time boating acquaintance of Mike & Mary’s! He invited us over to his boat for a drink and we then invited him to join us for dinner, so we spent a few hours chatting and making a new friend. Seems like an odd coincidence, but according to John (the sailboater), Mike & Mary Hall are well known in the boating world, especially in areas around Mobile!

We left early Friday morning so we could get across Mobile Bay before the wind picked up and the forecasted rain moved in. The water was calm and the trip was (thankfully) uneventful. We arrived at Dog River Marina around noon, tied up to the fuel dock and were just finishing pumping out our holding tanks when the rain began. It didn’t last long, but there was some pretty good thunder and lightning and we were glad to be at the marina rather than in the middle of Mobile Bay when it came through!

Todd and I were both relieved to have completed the journey to Mobile but we were also disappointed to be leaving the boat the next day to come back to Springfield. If all goes well, we hope to be back in Mobile by early June and ready to head north about a week later.