On Wednesday, December 20th, we gathered our laundry together and dinghied over to Bob and Phyllis' house around noon to borrow their car to go to the laundromat and grocery store. We then returned to the boat to get cleaned up in preparation for dinner with Bob, Phyllis and Hal (from the sailboat) that evening.
As we were getting ready, I noticed a houseboat that had been anchored behind our boat appeared to be dragging anchor and was continuing to get closer to Hal's sailboat. We watched it for a few hours and finally decided to radio Hal at Bob and Phyllis' house to alert him. Bob and Hal came out to Kings Bay in Bob's Bayliner to check it out and ended up calling the Coast Guard to report what was happening. They, in turn, managed to get in touch with the owner who said he would take care of it.
Since Bob was already out in his boat, we rode with him and Hal to the house for dinner. Bob grilled Caribbean Jerk Chicken and Phyllis made some wonderful Caribbean-style rice and a killer salad. After a great meal, we settled in for a game of Mexican Trash Train which lasted until 1:00 a.m., at which time Bob took us all back to our boats in his Bayliner.
Having stayed up so late Wednesday evening, we decided not to leave Crystal River until Friday and spent Thursday lounging around the boat and catching up on e-mail. We left Crystal River shortly before 8:00 a.m. Friday morning and wound our way through the long river channel into the Gulf. We left at low tide, so the water was much shallower in spots than when we originally came into Kings Bay and we experienced some tense moments before we finally got into deeper water.
It was a windy day with some pretty rough water, and the eight-hour trip to Anclote Key turned out to be exhausting as we dodged literally hundreds of crab pots along the way. Crab pots are big cages (crab traps) with ropes connected to floats on the water. The floats are roughly between the size of a softball and a soccer ball and are difficult to spot in rough water, so we had to constantly be on watch for them. If you run over one, the rope connecting the float and the cage gets tangled in your prop and the only way to get it off is to get in the water, swim under the boat to the prop and cut the rope. Fortunately, we haven't had to do that... yet.
This is a crab boat checking its traps in Kings Bay where we were anchored.
We reached Anclote Key about 4:00 p.m. and anchored in the wind and rough water. We were hoping the island would offer some protection from the elements, but it didn't and we continued to bounce around on the waves and swing in the wind. Even though storms were forecast to move in overnight, we were both so exhausted that we managed to sleep right through them and woke up Saturday to a beautiful, calm morning. Even though the boat's depth finder indicated that we were in five to six feet of water, it looked more like two feet as we could clearly see the grassy bottom, along with our chain and anchor which was now behind us!
After getting the dinghy down, Todd took Buddy to shore and we then went over to the island to look for seashells. When we returned to the boat Todd called Chicago Mike who we met this fall, along with his brother Paul, when we were tied up at Waterfall Cove on Pickwick Lake. They both live in Chicago and were in Tennessee visiting local friends, Tena and Keith. We had received an e-mail from Mike in response to our holiday letter and learned that he was in Clearwater, FL visiting his parents. Since we had to go right through Clearwater on our way to St. Petersburg, we decided to leave Anclote Key and spend Saturday night in Clearwater.
These are the shells we collected on Anclote Key. As you can see, the sand dollars are much bigger than those we found on Crooked Island.
Todd consulted the Cruise Guide and found a great municipal anchorage in Clearwater right next to a restaurant called Frenchy's, so we made arrangements to meet Mike later that afternoon. The trip took about four hours, and I spent most of that time trying to get our computer navigation system to work. Fortunately, we were back in the Intracoastal Waterway once we left Anclote Key and it wasn't too difficult to navigate without it. We met Mike at Frenchy's late Saturday afternoon where he treated us to a nice dinner, and we spent the rest of the evening checking out the nightlife in Clearwater before returning to the boat around midnight.
Todd and I with Chicago Mike at Kelly's Place, one of Clearwater's "hotspots."
Our anchorage in Clearwater.
Mike spent the night with us on the boat, so Todd took him back to shore Sunday morning and we began the final leg of our journey to St. Petersburg around 10:00 a.m. The majority of the twenty-five miles between Clearwater and St. Petersburg is in a "No Wake" zone due to the highly developed (both commerical and private) shoreline, so it took us about four hours to reach Cathy's house.
If you have been reading our blog from the beginning, you may recall that we met Cathy last February when we looked at a 42-foot trawler that was tied up to her dock. When we later bought "Life's2Short," Cathy graciously allowed us to have the boat delivered to her dock where we met up with Mike & Mary Hall in April and began our trip to Mobile. And we are grateful, once again, to have the use of her dock while we are in St. Petersburg, as are Mike & Mary whose boat "What Daze It?" is also tied up here.
A view of "Life's2Short" and "What Daze It?" at Cathy's beautiful home in St. Petersburg.
Although the weather on Sunday was very nice, storms were forecast for Christmas Eve and into Christmas Day. As predicted, the wind picked up overnight Sunday and by 9:00 a.m. Christmas morning, the day-long rain began. Todd and I spent a quiet day on the boat and were relieved to be tied up to a dock as there were several thunderstorm and tornado watches and warnings in the area. In fact, a tornado touched down just north of Tampa and either damaged or destroyed several area homes; fortunately, we only had wind and rain to deal with.
By Tuesday, the rain had pretty much moved through, but it was still cloudy, windy and much cooler. Todd took one of Mike & Mary's bikes and rode into town to get some engine parts and oil and then spent a good portion of the day doing boat maintenance (replacing deteriorated fuel lines, changing the oil, etc.) while I worked on the blog. Todd also put a new wheelbarrow together for Cathy and did some yard work which is part of our payment for docking the boat here over the next few weeks.
Wednesday dawned sunny and cool and Todd continued the yard work while I got things ready to go to Orlando on Thursday. Cathy is going to drop us off somewhere near the Port of Tampa Thursday morning, and Jennifer and Mark will pick us up and take us back to Orlando with them. We will probably be in Orlando through next weekend, so have a safe and Happy New Year and we will be back in 2007.
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