Stephanie hard at work in the galley preparing a fabulous Thanksgiving dinner.

The turkey is cooking on the rotisserie

Things coming out of the oven

Voila! A great thanksgiving dinner prepared by the Admiral, Chef, and my love. Thanks honey for making our Thanksgiving so special.

Beauty and the Beasts

The Seas were predicted to be 5 to 7 feet for the next several days, so we decided to take the inside route. (ICW) The ICW is a great way to travel up and down the East Coast when it is to rough to go out into the ocean, and the stretch between Palm Beach and Miami is one of the more interesting sections with all the HUGE beautiful homes, HUGE yachts, (hundreds of them) cruise ships in port, and great cities you pass right through the center of (the beauty), but the bridges (the beasts) are a pain in the butt. We could pass under a few of them with the antennas down, but we needed to have 19 open for us. Having a bridge open isn't a big thing when they are on demand, but the bridges in this stretch are on a schedule. Some open on the hour, some on the half hour, some on the quarter hour, and others open on the three quarter hour. If you get there too early you have to hold your position in a narrow channel with other boats and wait. We try to time them, but you have no wake zones, slow minimum wake zones, manatee zones, and you don't know where they are until you get to them. We do know how far the next bridge is, so we can do speed and distance planning if it weren't for the different speed zones. Well, you get the picture. Speaking of pictures, I have a ton for you that we took through this stretch of the ICW. Now you know what I meant by the beauty and the beasts

September Song (a love hate stretch) out
Bob


The first of 19 bridges we had to have raised between Palm Beach and Miami. It takes us two full days to go 70 nautical miles.

No, that's not a multi-family, it's a single family home.

It's warm down here

Believe it!

You never know what you are going to see on the ICW

Busy day on the water.

No, that's not a hotel, it's the side of the ship

Miami sky line as we cruise into Miami

One of the huge cruise ships in port

Views of Miami as we cruise through

Check out the guy with the conch

Port of Miami 

Ft. Lauderdale to see Colleen

We had made plans to meet up with Colleen, a cruising friend in the Islands in 2009. You may remember her from my blogs from our trip in 2009 to the Islands. Colleen and her husband John were on Gypsies in the Palace. While heading to Fort Lauderdale to meet Colleen, as luck would have it, we heard Tide Hiker (Norm and Vicki) on the VHF talking to the bridges about 6 miles behind us. We tried to contact them, but with our antennas down for some of the bridges, we couldn't hear each other. My cell phone rang and sure enough, it was Norm. You never know when your path will cross with cruising friends. Arrangements were made and the five of us were able to get together for the evening.
It was great to see you again, Colleen, and catching up.

September Song (Memories of the Islands) out
Bob

Colleen enjoying Happy hour on September Song

We love our Admirals

It seems like just yesterday when Colleen was with us on Gypsies in the Palace in the Exumas. Time flies when you are having a good time. Thank God every day at sea doesn't count against you.

Great to see you again Colleen!