Tarpon Springs to Fort Myers

For the past two days we have been traveling towards Fort Meyers where we will be crossing into the Okeechobee.  The weather as well as the scenery has been beautiful.  There are no locks in this section but there are plenty of bridges to go under.  While most are high enough for our 21 foot height there have been many that we have to wait for until they raise them for us to pass. This usually happens very quickly.  Once we waited for 18 minutes.  We are looking forward to starting across the Okeechobee tomorrow. It is hard to believe that tomorrow is the last day of April.  We are looking forward to our daughter and son-in-law's visit coming up May 7-10. We will be heading up the east coast by then.





Sunshine Skyway Bridge 175ft  Vertical Clearance



Lift Bridge

                

Swing Bridge

Saturday in Tarpon Springs

After arriving in Tarpon Springs on Friday evening  we decided to spend all day Saturday to enjoy the small town.  Tarpon Springs is known as the biggest producer of sponges from the ocean in the US.  This quaint town has stayed very true to its original beginnings.  It is the next best thing to being in Greece.  The Greek heritage is very strong here and so is the Greek food. After enjoying our day and resting up a bit we left out on Sunday morning the 28th. Following are a few pictures of Tarpon Springs.





Sponge Museum




Finger Sponges

          

Downtown Tarpon Springs

         

Sponges



My Therapy in Her Slip

Steinhatchee to Cedar Keys

After crossing we pulled into The Sea Hag Marina in Steinhatchee on Wednesday April 24th.  We arrived at 7:00 pm. We decided to leave early for Cedar Keys as our next jump down the gulf.  We went out about ten miles to make our way down to  Cedar Keys. This day turned out to be beautiful! The seas were calm and the dolphins were a plenty. We traveled 61.8 miles to reach the Cedar Keys.  This is a very shallow area and you must watch the markers and the tide tables carefully is you wish to anchor here. We did both and anchored out by early evening on Thursday April 25th.The jump to Tarpoon Springs from Steinhatchee was just too long a day. We knew we had to leave at first light if we were to get out of Cedar Keys before low tide. Our day began very early on and we were then off to Tarpon Springs.

Sea Hag Marina Steinhatchee

     

First Light at Cedar Keys

Captain Pulls Rear Anchor Cedar Keys

The Crossing

Finally!!!!  We left out early this morning to make the gulf crossing over to Steinhatchee.  The first part of the day was quite rough.Most of the day was 2 to 3 feet waves with several 4 foot rollers thrown in for extra measure. We traveled for eleven hours and covered 86.1 miles to reach land today. We finally arrived in Steinhatchee at 7:00pm.  We are staying at the Sea Hag marina tonight. We did visit a local restaurant for dinner tonight.We were much to tired to cook tonight and quite hungry. We still have another day of going offshore a bit before we reach Tarpoon Springs. We are doing shorter hops to cross the gulf instead of pulling an all nighter. The dolphins continue to join us and swim under the boat.  The good news is no special problems that the captain cannot fix.Time to plan tomorrows distance.

Waiting in Carrabelle

We are still here in Carrabelle waiting for the weather to settle down so that we can make our crossing. Mike is taking care of some maintenance items on the boat.  We are enjoying the small town and have taken several walks and checked out the local stores. Local boaters are not venturing very far out themselves due to the wind and rough waters.  We are still waiting for Buddy the local weather expert to say go. While we are anxious to continue we knew waiting here would be likely. I am adding a few shots of Carrabelle for you to see the small town.

Carrabelle Harbor

         

Downtown Carrabelle

It's Only Diet Coke Officer

                 

World's Smallest Police Station

Local Residents

            

Off the Bow of Our Boat

Panama City to Carrabelle

The last few days has taken us from Panama City to Carrabelle.  We have now officially covered over a thousand miles of our journey. We arrived in Carrabelle yesterday and are now waiting for the gulf crossing weather to allow us passage.The gulf waves are much to high to cross today. Tomorrow is not looking much better.  This is a well know spot where most boaters wait for the weather window to allow a smooth passage over the gulf. Boaters pick different towns to cross to depending on their boat and time frame.  We will be crossing over to Steinhatchee.  We are enjoying a little down time here at the Moorings of Carrabelle Marina. Supplies are close by and we are enjoying their transient lounge.  We are anxious to continue but have no choice but to wait at this time. 

Shrimp Boats

          

Shrimping in St. George Sound

Some Inland Waterway Pictures

We had a great day today  and traveled 60.5 miles. Don,t forget we average only about 7 miles per hour. Below are a few scenes that we have seen the last two days. Joe asked for more pictures.




Cannons at Fort Pickens

                

Destin Harbor

Bridge to Panama City

Grand Lagoon

                

Dolphins (zoom in)  They Love the Boat

LOVE THOSE PELICANS

                   

BUSHWACKERS

ICWW

After the bad weather yesterday, which kept us in a bay all day, it was nice to get under way again today. We did however enjoy the dolphins in the bay.  They passed through three different times feeding and playing.  This evening we are in Destin Harbor.  We enjoyed a dinghy ride to shore and  walking around the area. Tomorrow we will continue across the Florida panhandle.

Side Trip

For those of you following our blog you may have noticed we have not blogged since last Tuesday.  My mom was in the hospital and not doing too well so an unplanned trip home was needed. Things are looking better and we have now returned to continue our loop. For those of you considering a long trip you need good friends along the way to help you out.  We were lucky to find Marty in Pensacola.  We had met her once before and she let us tie up to her dock while we rented a car to drive home.  THANKS MARTY!  Once home a new place was needed for my cats and dear friend Kayla said bring them to me.  Everyone needs good friends and she is the best. THANKS KAYLA! 


Kayla and Me



The Bay and Inland Coastal Water Way

The bay crossing was a bit choppy but all went well.  We are currently enjoying the ICW.  We have already sighted several dolphins and pelicans.  Along the way we came past LuLu's place and stopped for lunch tying right off at the dock.  LuLu is Jimmy Buffet's sister. We spent last night in Roberts Bayou.

Makes Our Boat Look Very Small



Time to Feed the Birds



    



LuLu's



ICW



           

          

Mobile Harbor and Mobile Bay

We made it to salt water today.  Mike is excited to say that the boat got us all the way to salt water on 202 gallons. That's 769 miles!  We are spending the night at Dog River Marine in Mobile Bay. Our plans are to leave early morning and cross the 23 miles of Mobile Bay and get over to the Inter Coastal Waterway. While the river has it's own charm the ocean view cannot be beat.

            



Mobile Bay



           

From Demopolis to Okatuppa Creek

We left out early this morning from Demopolis Marina covering 97 miles. This is our longest day so far. We have now left the Tennesse-Tombigbee and are now traveling on the Black Warrior-Tombigbee. The weather was beautiful today after all the rain yesterday and we were anxious to get closer to mobile bay.  Since there are no more marinas for the next 216 miles after leaving Demopolis;we are staying the night at Okatuppa Creek which is a small anchorage at mile marker 123.2. Plenty of fuel in the tank to make it to salt water,yeah. Supper is cooking and the captain is fishing.

Demopolis Mile 216.1

TWe are still traveling the 450 miles of the Tombigbee.  After staying the night in a cove marked for good anchorage we left out early this morning so we could make the Demopolis Marina.  This is the last marina until we reach mobile bay. The day has had some beautiful sights but it has rained all day.

White Cliffs of Epes(made of Selma Chalk)



Two Whist;e Pass Between Bends in the River



Fly Bridge where We Spent Most of Our Cruising Time



Nice Day

What a great day.  The sun shone all day. We are still traveling the Tombigbee but have left Mississippi and are now in Alabama. We moved right through two more locks and covered 52 more miles. We stayed in a small marina just behind the historic Snagboat Montgomery which we toured.

Living the Dream

       

Down the Tombigbee

Snagboat Montgomery

Day Two on the Tombigbee

We got a very late start today out of Midway Marina because of the dense fog.  We finally got under way around 10:30.  We did not make very many miles today because of w aiting for the locks.  We got in behind a barge and  they always get to go first.  It was however a beautiful day and we enjoyed sitting out on the front of the boat waiting our turn. We will be staying at mile marker 358.2 tonight at the Aberdeen Marina.  This is a place we visited seven years ago when we first brought our boat home from Florida.