A Bit of This and That!

We have been either on anchor or on a mooring ball for the past 5 nights and one more tonight which means no wifi and no moving pictures from my phone to the iPad.  So I have decided to post without them to give a bit of an update. On Sunday 12/6 we headed south toward Sarasota.  We stopped at an anchorage about 10 miles from there because of time and found ourselves aground because we misread directions, water, and the channel markers but good old Boat US pulled us off the sand and we anchored safely with no problem.  Al has always said "there are 2 types of boaters, those that have run aground and those that will".

I also need to make a comment about the speeding situation!  Cap Al is more conservative than I even  want him to be and he went from a really slow area to an area that allowed "resuming to safe speed" which is a subjective concept.  We had been rocked many times by "Go Fast" boats all day!  So he gradually increased speed and suddenly a cop boat was at our side as we approached  a bridge that was tricky to get under.  Long story, short, this cop was having a bad day, he finally let us get under the bridge safely and then yelled some more at us on the other side until he let us go.  Completely unprofessional and wrong!!  It left me completely shook up and was unfounded!

Lastly, yes we did leave one of our antenna up as we approached a low bridge but that was just memory error.  We lowered all 3 attenae many times and just slipped up once.  I still trust my Cap!

This is looking from the ICW toward the Gulf side (or West) toward Longboat Key and

This is the view toward the East which is Sarasota.  While in Sarasota, we walked 4+ miles to see the Ringling circus museum and their home and art museum.  Had some pics of that but no real loss!

Another unbelievable sunset looking at Longboat Key! Each day we usually get a walk in so we used that on Tuesday to hit up Whole Foods in Sarasota and continue heading south.  We anchored one night in a neighborhood cove and then landed just East of Cayo Costa.

We went through all kinds of bridges and passed lots of small islands.

We even passed a steam powered little boat that looked like a little toy! 

We passed so many dolphins that provided unbelievable entertainment and then ended up near Cayo Costa which I have already mentioned in the dolphin post.  Any pics of the beach are on my phone but know, we have been over to the beach for the past 3 days and are very happy and relaxed!!  Tomorrow we begin a 4 day cruise across 160 miles of West FL. to East FL.   We will leave the boat at Stuart boatyard while we enjoy Christmas at home.  More in about a month!