Crossing the Gulf

We were anchored off the beach at Carrabelle, FL with three other boats.  Our Gulf crossing was tomorrow and we were all nervous.  We dropped our dinghy to go to one of the other boats to discuss our trip tomorrow and our dinghy motor didn't start.  It sat unused for 20 months and had some old fuel in it so we figured that it needed to have the carburator rebuilt.  We would do that when we reached a port where there was a mechanic who could fix it.  Both our heads (toilets) were also not working properly so we had a 5-gallon bucket set up on our sundeck for our trip across the Gulf.  We called our neighbor and he came and picked us up and took us to the host boat where we discussed various details about tomorrow's crossing. 

We were not sure if we were going to be able to sleep that night in anticipation of the 20 hour trip the next day, but we did real well and woke up rested.  We were not leaving until about 1 PM so we had all morning to prepare ourselves and the boat.  We filled a couple of boat bags with different snack foods that we could easily eat as we were cruising.  We felt it was necessary to secure anything that could move just in case we encountered some rough seas.  All of the forecasts were promising and we didn't expect any bad weather. 

Noontime arrived and three boats came out of the entrance to Carrabelle to join our group and we all headed for East Pass that took us to the Gulf between St. George Island and Dog Island.  We all stayed on channel 71 on our radios so we could stay in constant contact with each other and there was excitement over the airways as we all anticipated the next 20 hours.  None of us had ever done night cruising so we really didn't know what to expect.  After we ran for awhile, Leslie took the helm and Flint broke out his fishing rod.  He had no more dropped his line in the water and allowed it to troll behind us when he got a really hard hit on his line.  He yelled at Leslie to slow down the boat because he was having trouble reeling it in.  It was great to hear his excitement as he struggled to land whatever was on the end of his line.  He finally landed it on our sundeck and it was about a 5 lb. Tunny.  Leslie was busy at the helm so unfortunately a picture was not taken but this is what it looked like:

There were no further hookups, but the first one fulfilled Flint's desire to catch a fish trolling the Gulf.

We were out in the Gulf a couple of hours when we saw a pod of dolphin headed toward us and they were beautiful.  We didn't see them come out behind us so I went to the bow and they were traveling along with us.  Thankfully I had taken the camera with me and was able to get some great shots of them swimming next to the bow and then leaping out of the water to get their breath of air.  It was an amazing experience!

So far our experience had been very pleasant and we were enjoying everything about it.  Then the sun went down!!!  Ooh it was dark out there!  There was a sliver of a moon and it wasn't going to last long.  We could see each other's running lights and we were cheered by the Christmas lights all over the back of one of the boats.  Then the wind starting rising and the waves began to steepen.  The waves were on our beam (side of the boat) which rolled us from side to side in a wallowing motion.  For the next nine hours we cruised in these rough seas and tried to keep each others spirits up.  Thankfully we had secured everything that we thought might break.  We each took two hour watches and when not on watch we tried to sleep.  Flint had just laid down on the bench to sleep when a wave hit us and threw him on the floor with all his bedding.  He decided to stay there and sleep so that he wouldn't fall out again.  We were really surprised that we were able to sleep, but I think we each got about an hour of good rest in each of our off-times.  Thank goodness we have an autopilot because we didn't have to touch our wheel all the way across and we were kept on course even as we were constantly buffeted by the waves and wind.  Finally the wind began to lay down about 3 AM and we had a much more comfortable ride.  The sun rose about 7 AM but it was hard to tell because we were in a fog bank that blanketed the coast of Florida.  It was necessary to negotiate crab pots as we neared the coast so we all got in a line and the first boat would call out crab buoy locations over the radio so the boats behind could be prepared to miss them.  As we neared the coast the fog began to burn off and we were able to enter the Anclote River into Tarpon Springs. 

We were all exhausted and couldn't wait to tie up to our dock so we could get something to eat and go to sleep.  There was enough keyed-up tension that Flint decided to wash the salt off the boat before we ate but by the time we sat in our recliners to watch a little TV we were both sound asleep in a matter of minutes.  We didn't want to sleep too long because we wanted to sleep that night but the little nap took the edge off.  We met some wonderful people on our dock who invited us to watch the Christmas Boat Parade on the river that evening.  They offered to take us shopping the next day and we were grateful for their hospitality. 

The weather turned really bad the next day with winds gusting to 40 mph and temperatures in the 30's.  We secured extra lines to the pilings.  We must be learning to sleep through anything because the boat rocked all night and the lines squeaked loudly every time we rocked.  This weather lasted for three days so we stayed put and were able to get our dinghy motor fixed.  We went to church at a local church called the Community of Christ and were welcomed by all the members.  As we went through the service we began to take notice of some different things such as scripture from books we had never heard of before.  We looked in the hymnal to see who published it and we saw a stamp printed on the inside cover that said, "Reorganized Church of the Latter Day Saints" and we realized that we were in a Mormon church.  What a surprise! We had visited many churches in our travels, but this was the first Mormon church we have ever been in.

Flint had been spending his days getting our heads (toilets) working properly and one was finally working and he had ordered parts for the other one, so we were finally able to take time to check out Tarpon Springs.  It is a Greek town whose two main businesses are sponge diving and tourism.  Most of the residents still speak Greek as their main language.  We enjoyed checking out the little shops and we bought a little sponge to make a Christmas tree ornament for our "looper" tree whenever we get back to land and have a tree again.  We have ornaments from many of the places we have visited in our travels.

We connected on the internet with a man who served with Flint in the Navy 45 years ago who lives in this area and he and his wife came to visit us today.  The guys reminisced a lot about their Navy days on the fleet tug Arikara and we had a wonderful seafood dinner in town.  We are leaving tomorrow to head south (hopefully it will be warmer) toward Cape Coral where we will spend a month.  We will write one more blog before Christmas so get your shopping done and join us again next week.