Heading South,to our Favourie Harbour Host.

After we left  St Petersburg the Coast Guard
Issued a small craft warning due to a huge
belt of thunders storms heading for us. Mindful
of the last t/storm we were caught in we decided to cut the first day short and stop  at the nearest
Marina. Marina Jacks is set up for the I have
lots of money boaters, although their facility's were only average. My neighbour was a 47ft
Nordhaven, and he was nowhere near the most
pricy boat there. At  $2.75 a foot guess its conditioning me for the costly Keys. Guess
What, No Storm, windy for about 2 minutes.

Four 350 hp outboards, who needs 1400Hp
to go fishing

Swing Bridge, Bridge Masters are
always cheerful and obliging, this one
he has to control from the centre, must
do a lot of walking

Ospreys and Chicks, we get quite close when
passing and can see chicks in the nests.

Great Murals on back of
Industrial units backing onto
the canal near Venice.(USA)

Big one sitting on the bottom

Very busy Easter Saturday

Burnt Store Marina, best Fuel price on the West Coast
$2.04 Gallon, I filled right up.

The Easter Bunny at Cabbage Key.
Well known stopover, only accessible
by water. has $ Bills stuck on walls
and ceiling, The restaurant picks up
fallen notes and donates to charity.
Approx $10,000 per year. 

It was choppy and very windy, up to 20 Knots
the yachts were loving it.

This clown blasted thru the traffic at 25-30 knots
waked everyone.

Arrived at Kitty's dock around
the front was a immaculate
1969 Oldsmobile Cutlass.

Fort Myers is known as the city of trees

Visited the Ford and Edison
Estates at Ft Myers, well preserved homes
and Botanical gardens. Edison was a keen
Botanist and had an extensive lab and
gardens.
This was Henry Fords Holiday home.

This is a Calabash tree, the buds flower on
the trunk, hence the fruit grow off the
trunk also, most unusual.

Dawn with Mina, Edison's wife

Lots of colour

A Chev guy in a Ford Restaurant

Pretty neat Eh

Entry Doors

The Washroom

Daybreak at Kitty's

Our Gold Burgee with Harbour host
Kitty Nicolai

Sightseeing, farewells, and a mad Easter

St Petersburgh to Kitty's

We spent 5 days in St Petersburgh and as you can see from Colin's photos we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We walked the waterfront & lunched at a couple of the restaurants and enjoyed the newly redesigned Sundial Place that was open until late at night & housed an artisans food market where you could find anything from cheeses, air cured meat, preserves,fresh fruit & veges to hand made ice cream.

Shar, our boat broker's wife took us to a govt. licensing place to register our dingy which becomes necessary when you motorise it. We also visited West Marine (like a Bunnings for boaters) where Colin bought a new water pump to solve the constant problem we had had with the water pump cutting out because of overheating. He thought it had been leaks but had fixed them & came back to the conclusion that the pump was stuffed. When we got back to the boat he found that it had the wrong fittings after he had lifted all the floor to get into the engine room – dam, dam dam.

Next day Jim the salesman doing our boat deal came to the boat to take photos & then took Colin to West Marine again to exchange the water pump. This time it fitted & the problem was solved.

Next day we hopped on our bikes and visited the Chihuly Glass Collection, which you can see from the photos was magnificent. We also visited the Fine Art Museum. That night we had dinner at Jim's yacht club, Treasure Island YC with his partner Paula & her daughter Jennifer. They were very excited about their impending trip to Cuba the next morning. They are great travellers so were eager to hear of our trip to the Galapagos a couple of years ago. A night of great company, good food & a lovely setting.

The following morning we biked to the Dali Museum for a second visit which this time included a section on Walt Disney. We had lunch at “The Hanger” a restaurant at the airfield then on to our Wells Fargo bank, our favourite grocery store Publix, Wallgreens to pick up a printer cartridge & finally to a Russian souvenir store. All listed chores had been accomplished. That night we met Bob & Shar for dinner at St Petes Yacht Club. We had a great evening at a lovely club and reminisced with the nicest people over a very good dinner.

Next morning after viewing the cyclists racing in the local park we headed out of St Petes. As we reached the Sunshine Skyway Bridge a call came from the Coast Guard to keep a look out for a body in the water in the vicinity of the bridge. This is a favourite spot for suicides & thankfully a coast guard boat located the body before we got there. Then a report came of a drifting 12 ft Hobbiecat & later a capsized 21ft Cobia. Good Friday was turning out to be not so good.

We heard bad weather forecasts for the late afternoon (thunderstorms all along the west coast) so we cut our journey short to find shelter at a marina in Sarasota (Marina Jacks). It turned out to be very expensive @ $2.75 a foot – we usually pay no more than $1 and to add insult to injury the storm never eventuated – maybe a strong gust of wind for 10 minutes. This town appeared to be well off judging from the very lavish art galleries along the waterfront. The next morning we continued along the ICW under numerous bridges, in narrow canals along with all the mad Easter holiday traffic of small run-abouts and large powerful cruisers who tried to impress with their speed and ability to tip you side ways with their wake. We crossed the Charlotte Harbour to Burnt Store Marina where Colin saved about $58 on fuel. We docked there for the night – a huge marina that can slip over 540 boats.

We left next morning into a stiffening southerly & ripply sea. We stopped at the famous Cabbage Key restaurant for lunch with walls papered in dollar notes, admired all the history & bought the T-shirt. We continued into Pine Island Sound where the wind stiffened even more, the wave heights grew & Easter boaters increased in numbers & silliness. Late in the afternoon we entered the calm & peaceful waters in a Cape Coral canal and tied up to the dock of Kitty Nicolai – AGCLA 's 2015 Harbour Host of the Year. We stayed here in May 2015 & were warmly welcomed again.

Architecture, Art, Parks and Party.

 

Yes its official, we now are Gold Loopers, and have the Burgee to fly. The other is the
Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club Burgee, Google
it, you will be in for a treat. Several Friends
over here in the States are going to join.


Now the Architecture

Every thing Downtown is restored, new but looks old
all the buildings seem to blend harmoniously.

The New

The old

It just Works

The Chihuly Glass Art Collection is
well worth the visit, The Artist trained
at the Iconic Murano glass facility in Venice, which we visited while on a Rugby Tour in
20008, Yes we Rugby fans do have a bit
of culture.

A nautical theme, based on the old Japanese
Fishing floats, of which I saw many when
Fishing off the coast of New Zealand

This Magnificent display was
a glass Garden

A Neon based display

Once again was impressed by all
the Parks and Public Spaces
in St Petersburg

Our good friends Jim his
partner Paula and her Daughter
Jennifer, Dinner at the Treasure
Island club, to celebrate our
Friendship and the Ladies trip
to Cuba.

The Old Team Still together.

The next night at the St Petersburg Yacht
Club Drinks and Dinner with Bob Fillingham,
Wife Shar and us two. Bob is the Principal of
Fillingham Yacht Sales in St Pertersburg, Bob, Shar
and Jim have been the most helpful and
professional Brokers I have ever dealt with.

Bit of Architecture in the wrong slot, at
Dali Museum on our second visit.

This Beautiful 53ft Fleming was
Slipped behind Movin On, another
was in front of us, Just need to find
a spare million and I will have one.
Dawn was most insistent that our house
was not going to contribute to my
dream of having one.

Beautiful St Petersburg

Dawn outside Frenchy's Outpost , had
our last night out at Dunedin here. We left
at first light to travel the 35 miles to St Petersburg as poor weather was forecast.
First light means about 7.15 am as daylight saving
has started, seems crazy, glad I am not trying
to get children to school

Back to civilisation, glad the forecast was wrong

Tried to photograph this guy, was in a no wake zone.

Bit further along, this guy fly fishing
I slowed right down so I wouldn't
swamp him, gave us a cheery wave
a we passed, we were in the channel.

Cleared this bridge with a whopping 18 inches to spare

 

This little ship met us we
came into  
St Petersburg 

First order of business to celebrate completing the
loop with a glass of bubbly for the Admiral

The clubrooms

Pretty St Petes

Missed the Indy cars by 10 days,
they were still dismantling the track
whilst we were here.

Found this Artisans market, great food and produce

How's this for a Cheese Deli.

St Petes at night

Museum of Fine Arts

From our slip

Great sight from our bow. Downtown St Petes.


We have a couple of days left here, then on to Cape Coral
  to Visit Kitty Nicolai our Harbour Host of the Year, and
onwards to Marathon to catch up with Jammin Jane and Sea Moss.
Patriot is still trying to catch us up but constant poor weather in
the Gulf has delayed them.