Wednesday March 11: Sewing Sweatshop .....

The sun is now finally setting over the water so every night is an opportunity for the green flash.

Steve was the lone spectator the other night - I checked and determined no way was it going to happen - too many clouds.

But you know Steve - ever the optimist! He was the lone spectator to see one of the "brighest yet" as he deemed it.

Next time I'll listen when he says I should do something. Mmmm ... we'll see how that goes .... :-)

The fishing the other day was ok but not spectacular.

Sometime before we leave, perhaps Gary and Steve will find the perfect combination of wind, current and sun which will enable them to haul in a boatload of mangrove snappers!

In the meantime, they still go out enthusiastic and with dreams of the best of the fishermen :-)

For entertainment, we've recently discovered wine clubs! It's interesting with a wide variety of wines we would otherwise never try.

Introductory offers produce anywhere from 6 to 15 bottles of wine from small wineries worldwide.

Shipped free. Delivered to our door by the dockmaster. For about $7 a bottle - how do you beat that?

Bonus: last club included a free opener. Nice as ours was on it's last legs. Of course once we leave here all memberships are canceled - too hard to keep up with as we move :-)

 What I've missed the most for the past 4 days: the parquet floors at Matt and Wendy's home when he was stationed at Cherry Point.

Those floors were so AWESOME when making the front shade cover for Guppy. We are now reduced to using covered space by the pool or trying to work inside the cabin.

For the limited space, I've been quite happy with the finished products especially as two of the covers were close to a finished size of 12 feet by 7 feet!



Steve's been a great help by doing the 'on the hands and knees' work needed for some of the cutting and pinning.




And measuring. And sewing.



In the past 4 days, we've made three shade covers for three different boats!


One for Randy and Cindy on I Think I Can ... , one for Mike and Andi on Two Hearts.

And of course when we realized our cover needed to be replaced as well, that became the third cover to be made.

Even the duct tape we used in an attempt to temporarily fix ours didn't do the job! One the few failures for duct tape as it seems to work for just about any patch job ...

Steve was his usual inventive self again with an umbrella as he finished putting the last of the grommets on the cover for us.

Project completed!

This was not all work with no play for Steve.

Last week the local airport hosted the 1928 Ford Tri-motor airplane. Want to ride, anyone?

Several folks from the marina were game - including Steve!

Thank you, but I'll wait on the ground if it's all the same to you. 1928? Really??


But both George (Jenna Star) and Steve said it was great! About a twenty minute fly around over Marathon - including a flyover Banana Bay!

Sure is easy to see where the dredged channel out of the marina ends. The depth goes very quickly from about 10 feet in depth to about 4 1/2 feet just across from point on the right of the picture.

The yellow arrow is us!!

If you want more info about the Ford Tri-motor plane, click here.

This particular plane is owned by the Liberty Aviation Museum in Port Clinton, Ohio - close to our old stomping grounds!

Friday March 6: Too Much Play Makes Me Lazy ......

Well, it seems that the 3 1/2 day trip last week made me want to just stop the projects list and keep playing :-)

But it was time to get going on the list of things that we want to complete before heading up the west coast of Florida in 3 weeks or so.

More Guppy things in particular as anything that needs a sewing machine I would like to have completed before we leave Banana Bay

So back to the rain cover for Guppy. This cover will basically provide a bridge between the back of the flybridge and the top of the canvas over the aft deck.

Right now, when it rains we have to keep the cabin door shut or the rain just comes right in. With the new cover we can easily put it up or down so the door can remain open. Definitely a winner!

Project completed!!

Next on the list: new shade covers for the side windows. The old ones did a great job of keeping the sun out - so good though that it was hard to see through the screens.

So Steve's solution was for me to make new ones that would provide more visibility yet still keep the heat from the sun out.

Project completed!!



Next was to check our electrical circuits. This is a maintenance thing - just lets us know that all is well in the AC and DC circuits on the boat.

First was to verify that no AC current is leaking - meaning power coming onto the boat that is not also going back out of the boat via the shore power plugs.

Easy to do: just use a clamp on ammeter which reads the amount of volts in the chord. Because the power entering is positive and the power leaving is negative, we expect a reading of zero: +120 - 120 = 0. Check - done!

To check the DC circuits (power provided by the batteries) and to check if the zincs are doing their job, we use a silver half-cell.

This hangs in the water outside the boat. Using this with the ammeter we can measure and verify that all of the DC grounds are hooked up and have a good connection.

All were good except one connection to the cutlass bearing on the shaft. Fixed.

Project done!


Back to the sewing. Time to work on the hardest project for Guppy - remake the flybridge cover.

I made the first cover in Campbellford on the Trent. Having the boat right there made it manageable - it was the first flybridge cover I ever made without a pattern to follow but it turned out reasonably well.

Sadly the material I had on hand to make it just lasted only a couple of summers. Time to make a REAL one from Sur-last (made by Sunbrella).

How many hands does it take to hold the old (white) cover down in the wind while trying to pin it to the new (blue) material? Apparently quite a few - and more by the time we finished! It was great having folks walking by stop and offer to help :-) A work in progress.

Last project: replace the rusted brass plated steel grommets in the forward cabin cover (keeps the sun and rain off the front cabin and the hatch can be left open with fear of that sudden rainstorm when we are away from the boat).

Somehow I thought brass plated was ok. Wrong. Either solid brass or nickel plated brass (the choice as a replacement).

Oops - bad material choice again. The cover needs replaced after being in the sun for an entire year and a half. No problem - material will be in Wednesday ......

It's a fishing Friday for Steve - he and Gary headed out just a few minutes ago to try their luck under the bridge. Let's hope for a good day at sea as Steve terms it :-)

Sunday March 1: Back to Banana Bay: Trip Day 4

 Could Wednesday morning at Little Pine Key have been any calmer? It was amazing - seems like I've been saying that for the past several days!

Perhaps partly due to the lack of wind, the fog was back. Not so much right where we were but south of us.

The highway bridge over Bahia Honda was no longer visible. Jenna Star and I Think I Can ... waited a bit but then headed out. It wasn't long before they disappeared into the mist.



This is the shot of Jenna Star as taken by Cindy as they were part way back to Banana Bay.

No mishaps though and both boats arrived safely home.


It was still nice where we sat at anchor - time for some kayaking. The water was very clear so off we headed to check out the shoreline of Little Pine Key.




It was weird about the fog - it would roll over the island and then dissipate as it hit the water.

Kind of reminded me of the classic science fiction thriller The Crawling Eye from 1958 (Steve's favorite movie) - you know how the fog on the mountain suddenly started moving?

I kept a watchful eye out as we headed toward the island. Is this fog getting worse??

As I looked back at Yesterday's Dream (circled in red), I was hoping that the fog would lift a bit so we could find out way back!

No issues though by the time we finished kayaking the boat was in full view.

The island itself is mostly (if not totally) mangroves. There were several places where the sea grass had piled up enough that access to the 'land' was probably possible but it didn't look like it would be passable anyway.

Mangroves continually put out new roots - often forming small tunnels along the shoreline.

For more info on mangroves, click here.

Finally after some lunch, it was sadly time to pack up and head back to Banana Bay. Southwest winds were due in overnight - time to be tied to a dock again.

Thanks again to Jenna Star and I Think I Can ... for pictures ;-)

Saturday February 28: Trip Day 3

It was a nice sunset Monday night at Newfound Harbor - waters were very calm.

We were surprised to get up and find ourselves in a fog bank! This is very unusual for the Keys - probably that darn northern weather again :-)

So we enjoyed the morning and waited for the fog to lift.

The plan was to leave the harbor, head due south and spend the morning at Looe Key reef. We had been to this reef only one time many years ago and even though we heard it was really nice, the experience diving there was not great.

The water was very cloudy and it didn't seem like there was much to see. We were definitely looking for a better experience this time around!

I Think I Can .... with a very shallow draft of 2 feet led us over the shallow area leading back to the ocean. Nice as it saved us a mile or so of backtracking through the channel route we took in.

Once out in the deeper water, it didn't take long for Steve to get the trolling rods out and into the water. Surely he would catch something today??

But no. Empty hooked again. In fact the only strike he had the whole time out was day 1. Something huge was pulling out the line like crazy - sadly whatever it was came off before Steve could get it near the boat. Probably a barracuda but it would have been nice to see for sure.

Plus they fight like crazy!

It wasn't long and we were on the reef. The water was so incredibly blue, calm and clear.What a perfect day to snorkel!!

Jenna Star and I Think I Can ... picked up a mooring buoy and into the water everyone went.

Yes - even I went in :-) (Granted, I didn't go in at first but was convinced that it was a not to be missed day.) Tons of fish around and the water so incredibly clear.

Cindy and Randy's underwater camera gave George an opportunity to take some great pictures at the reef!

Two really great sightings: first was the turtle that Steve and George tried to herd toward the boat where Nancy and I were.

We were able to see it in the water but the picture George got of the turtle and Steve was great!

The other really fun thing? The Goliath Grouper that was hanging out underneath our boat!

Steve heard there was one that lives on this reef and is fed by the snorkel boats (not sure that is true) so he headed off - swimming around the

reef in search of the giant grouper. I had tired of swimming and headed back to the boat.

Imagine my surprise when I looked under the boat and there was the grouper! George took a number of pictures but it's really hard to get a perspective on the size of the crazy thing.

I outlined our prop in red in the picture right to give some idea of the size of this giant fish. Estimated at 3 1/2 to 4 feet long and 300 pounds?? Just not sure.

Fortunately it hung around until Steve finally returned to the boat :-)

Time to head to our previously selected anchorage near Big Pine Key. Jenna Star and I Think I Can ... took the direct route - we followed the reef line about 5 miles offshore. Longer route for sure - we'll catch up at the anchorage.


It actually turned out ok though as there were already some boats anchored where we were going to go. Change of plans and we ended up just west of Little Pine Key. Very nice!


Because of the change, we were actually anchored before the others arrived. Talk about flat water ....

It was getting late so no dingy exploring but everyone joined us in a combined dinner on the flybridge.

Great evening, great company .....

And another great sunset!! (well this is actually from the night before but was such a great picture :-) )

Thanks again to Jenna Star and I Think I Can ... for sharing photos - especially the underwater pics!

Friday February 27: Having Fun - Day 2

Thanks to Jenna Star and I Think I Can ... for sharing their photos!

Steve was up early enough Monday morning to catch the sunrise.

The weather forecast was finally just what was predicted! After a quick breakfast it was time to head out of the marina and on to Newfound Harbor.

We carefully headed out of the marina with Steve on the bow to watch for the deepest water. This channel is pretty shallow - even for our 3.8' draft. Success! No scraping of the bottom of the keel :-)

Our route from Banana Bay yesterday is in red on the chart left. Today we would retrace our path back out to the ocean side - heading southwest to the entrance to Newfound Harbor (in yellow).





I Think I Can ... was in the lead as we headed out from Bahia Honda.

We were next and Jenna Star followed behind.

The ocean side was much calmer than yesterday so it was a very pleasant hour and a half trip to Newfound harbor. We were in and anchored by noon or so.

Time to do some relaxing :-) Maybe a good book on the flybridge?? What a gorgeous day.

Just one little project: getting the Bose noise canceling headphones working. One of Becky's Christmas gifts were Bose's new noise canceling ear buds so what was she to do with her "old" headphones?

Sure - we'd take them!! Just needed to clean the battery connection a bit. Special tool needed - a dremel bit taped to the end of an awl. Maybe Steve should patent that :-)

Now he can enjoy peace and quiet as we travel. The engine noise in the cabin is - well, let's just say the headphones will be a nice addition! Thanks, Becky!!

 It wasn't too long until the dinghies came down. There were several islands around that we wanted to check out.


In particular, one called Picnic Island. Once we were a bit closer, we discovered why it was called that! A perfect place place for a picnic - like a miniature Big Chief near Orillia on the Trent.

Sandy bottom, relatively shallow. Clearly a gathering place for the locals.

On one of the nearby islands, we found half a dozen frigatebirds resting in the mangroves. First time we've ever seen them up close. For more info on the frigatebird, click here.

Usually we are looking for them flying as they are often an indication there are fish around! So the instructions to me when we're trolling are always: look for sea grass lines and look for frigatebirds. When spotted - head that direction :-)

It was surprisingly warm in the sun (remember the cold from the north actually extends down this far ... just sayin ...). Not a problem for Cricket though. Cindy just uses Cricket's life jacket as a handle and dunks her feet in the water.

We may turn them in to the SPCA.

Meanwhile, Gidget found her spot for the ride around. Never fell in the water either!

After snacks and docktails on the aft deck of I Think I Can ... it was time to follow George and Nancy as they headed back toward Picnic Island.

From there it was possible to see the sun setting over water. Was it going to be our luck to see the green flash???







Sadly not but it was a great sunset anyway.

 Funniest thing spotted today? George and Nancy found this little crab sitting on a leaf - paddling his way to ???