Duneden, Sarasota and the completion of our loop

As I mentioned in our last blog we really enjoyed Dunedin. We made good use of the pickup that  had time remaining on it from"If's" rental. Thanks, Tom! While most of the rental cars are four or five passenger, we had room for all six of us in the pickup. ( This rental became important because we purchased a similar vehicle after the loop).

One of our excursions included a trip to Crystal River too see the manatees.  The Average Looper group thoroughly enjoyed renting kayaks and getting up close and personal with the manatees.  Jan and I were content to sit this activity out. After picking them up we made a necessary stop for Jane to purchase some dry shorts. It seems the kayaks were a little wet.

Mark is a dedicated Browns fan and we enjoyed a game at a sports bar at the local mall. How perfect, the girls went shopping and Mark and I watched football.

We also made good use of the nearby Pinellas bicycle trail. One day after Jan and I returned from Tarpon Springs, approximately a twenty mile round trip, Mark and Jane borrowed our bikes so they could ride with their guests John and Maureen. After they returned, also from Tarpon Springs, Eddie and Linda from Spiritus borrowed our bicycles and also rode to Tarpon Springs and back. We feel bad though because Mark and Jane had tire trouble on one of our bikes and had to replace a tire and tube. Luckily there are several bike shops near the trail and they weren't inconvenienced very much.

Our time in Dunedin passed quickly and after ten days it was time to move on again even though we could have stayed much longer.

We traveled to Sarasota the next night and had an enjoyable time in downtown Sarasota. While walking around we followed our ears to some live music. The band and food were both good.

Leaving Sarasota the next morning we planned to stay overnight at Cabbage Key, continuing on the following day to Fort Myers Beach, our final leg. When we arrived in Venice I had had enough of the slow travel in the intracoastal and decided to go outside into the gulf. The water was calm enough and we enjoyed a smooth ride on our way to Boca Grande Pass where I planned to reenter the intracoastal. While traveling south we learned that Average Looper changed their plans, deciding to anchor in Pelican Bay on Cayo Costa. Since we had been to Cabbage Key previously and Jan is not the biggest fan of anchoring we changed our plans also.

After checking the chart plotter, we changed course and by adding only an hour to our travel we could be back in our own slip and complete the loop. We did it! We "crossed our wake"!!!

We traveled approximately 5800 miles in eight months and transited 155 locks.
We also rode our bicycles approximately 500 miles.

Some of our fellow loopers will be lifelong friends. It truly was the people we met and the friends we made that  make the loop the wonderful experience that it was. 

It was the trip of a lifetime and the completion of a long awaited dream. I thoroughly want to thank Jan, my wonderful wife for joining me on this trip and enjoying it as much as I did.

 

This is an overview of our travels from our Garmin chart plotter.

Tarpon Springs is predominately a Greek fishing and sponge town.

 

The Pinellas Trail had these attractive signs along the way.

 

 

Dunedin's sidewalk art features dolphins.

  

 

   

 

 

This bird was an expert at balancing on this line and catching fish.

 

Mark and John made the mistake of cutting through the brush and stepping on burrs. They are very sharp, hard to get out and stick to your hands in the process.

 

In Maureen's attempt to help Mark she stepped in some of Mark's discarded burrs.

 

Average Looper and Infinite Sea, another looper boat, at anchor.

 

We saw this interesting construction fence in Clearwater.

The people look real but are actually just attached to the fence.

 

A few Manatee facts.

 

Manatees aren't going to win any beauty contests.

 A little more manatee information.

It doesn't look like Jane and Jan are dressed for boating in Florida.

The thermometer below shows why they are dressed like winter up north.

Leaving Dunedin. We are awaiting Average Looper to leave the fuel dock so we 

can fuel and pump out for the last time on the loop.

This feels cold for Florida!

This piano was on a street corner in Sarasota for anyone to play.

There were several sculptures in downtown Sarasota.

 

I have to include our last sunset on the loop.

 

We are about to cross under the Big Carlos Pass Bridge and complete our loop.

 

The Admiral and Captain ready to install the Gold Looper Flag.

 

We are about to remove the white looper flag.

White means we are planning or in progress.

 

Changing of the burgee.

 

On with the new!

Gold means completion of the loop.

I have to admit that I was ready, more than once, to discontinue writing this blog. It is because of our faithful readers that I persevered and completed it. The difficulty began while we were in Canada and did not have decent internet access frequently. Once I got behind, it was a constant struggle that I never overcame to catch up.

Thank you for following along with us on this fantastic journey and giving us feedback on the blog.

Sincerely, Tom and Jan Mertz, Captain and Admiral of Navigator.

Crossing the Gulf of Mexico and enjoyable Duneden

Having received a favorable weather forecast it was time to make the crossing.

We were planning to cross with Frank and Gail on Double Time on Monday morning, the forecast looked favorable. We thought they would be an excellent buddy boat since they had crossed the Atlantic Ocean in their sailboat and lived on their boat in the Mediterranean for five years before doing the loop. I should explain that most loopers cross at ten knots or less which requires an overnight crossing of twenty or more hours. Jan and I were not interested in an overnight crossing. In fact Jan initially thought we would have someone else help me take Navigator across and she would meet us on the other side. I was happy when she announced that she would make the crossing with me.

At docktails on Sunday evening Frank, recommended delaying our crossing until Tuesday for a better weather forecast. That was totally acceptable to us as we wanted the best weather possible for our crossing. At around six am on Monday morning Frank knocked on our boat and explained that the forecast had changed again and Monday was now better than Tuesday. Since we were both up and ready we hurried, said goodby to Mark and Jane, cast off our dock lines and departed. We were crossing the gulf! This worked out well for Jan since she got a good nights sleep not worrying about the impending crossing.

After clearing the buoys at East Pass I set the throttles and autopilot and didn't change either for almost eight hours. Double Time was ahead of us to start, traveling at twenty miles per hour. We traveled two miles per hour faster, a little slower than we wanted, but we wanted to stay close together. It was great to know they were there for 170 miles. Although we traveled slightly faster I could still see them on the horizon when we arrived on the other side of the Gulf.

About five hours into the trip Jan went below to use the bathroom and got motion sick. By leaving so quickly she forgot to take her pills, which she always takes to fly commercially. About an hour later the waves subsided a bit, her pill took effect and she slept the rest of the way.

After arrival and talking with Frank and Gail, we learned that we both had helped each other on the crossing. Frank navigates with his laptop and was unable to view his screen with the sun shining directly onto his helm.  He was very relieved to just follow behind us. Gail helped Jan understand that the seas were very "complicated" and that she had also gotten motion sick, which was very unusual for her.

We made it! 172 miles in about eight hours. Nice!

After arriving we saw Tom and Tim from IF, the grandfather - grandson team doing the loop. They had been there six days and were about to move on. I enjoyed a nice dinner with them in Tarpon Springs while Jan declined, recuperating from the motion sickness and medicine hangover. While returning in their rental vehicle, which was a four door Ford F150 pickup, Tom offered me the rest of the week rental. This rental becomes important later in the blog. He had paid for it until Friday and were leaving on Tuesday. Another Mertz Luck event!

Mark and Jane on Average Looper left Carrabelle around 4 pm on Monday and arrived at Marker 1 Marina in Dunedin around noon on Tuesday. Jan had a very nice buffet lunch ready for them after they were secured and checked in. I had dirty pirates again and everyone was enjoying their accomplishment. Frank and Gail also joined us, along with Average Looper's guests, John and Maureen.

We enjoyed Dunedin so much we stayed for ten days. We enjoyed traveling to Tarpon Springs to have dinner with Al ant Terri, bicycling a lot, a day on Average Looper at an island beach, a trip to Crystal River to see the manatees, Rib Fest in St. Petersburg with a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert and just relaxing.

 

Our last docktail party in Carrabelle before crossing the gulf.

 

This is the first few way points leaving Carrabelle.
I emailed these three photos to our son Mike in Chicago for our float plan.
If he didn't hear from us after twelve hours on the water he would have begun a series of efforts to locate us. The last effort to be the Coast Guard.
We were totally prepared with cell phones, EPIRB, DSC VHF radio and a life raft.
Thankfully none of that  was necessary and I remembered to notify him of a successful crossing.

 

This is the second set of way points.

Notice way point number 7 - 154 statute miles without a turn.

Obviously a record run for our loop!

 
This is the final leg of our gulf crossing on the chart plotter.
As you can see we traveled 172 statute miles from beginning to end.
We are very proud of this accomplishment both for us and the boat.
Everything went as well as could be expected.




 Double Time early on in our trip crossing the gulf.
Pictures seem to make the waves smaller than they actually were.

 

Double Time just about at the horizon near the end of our crossing.

 from left to right
Mark and Jane from Average Looper, John and Maureen Average Looper guests, and Jan and Tom

Gail and Frank from Double Time, Mark and Jane, Jan and Tom.

Dirty Pirates and lack of sleep put everyone in a jovial mood.

We had a lot of fun here.

The next blog will be our adventures while in Dunedin.

Pensacola and points east to Carrabelle

When the wind subsided we continued east to Pensacola.There we had dinner in a nice restaurant downtown, passing up the tempting takeout food that was sold from airstream trailers. We were disappointed that the dueling pianos were not playing the night we were there as this venue had been highly recommended to us.

Continuing east we anchored in a large bay surrounded by homes for one night before Pensacola. An amphibious ultra light air plane was flying around and practicing landing and taking off again.That looked like fun!

Panama City was our next stop for two nights. Wednesday night was Music Night in "downtown Panama City". We listened to a man singing outside a coffee shop that was very good. His "groupies" were almost as entertaining as he was. They were really into enjoying the whole experience.

We planned to anchor another night but ended up in St. Joe Marina because we couldn't find a good anchorage. The chart showed an area that looked excellent in a river but we couldn't find a suitable depth to anchor in. While at Port St  Joe we had docktails with other loopers. It had been a while since the last docktail party.

Thanks to Al and Terri from Terri Ann, we received a free night in Apalachicola. They made room for Average Looper and us on the same dock. We were supposed to pay but the attendant never came to collect and there were no further instructions. Apalachicola is an eclectic town. I had an interesting walk to the liquor store to get the ingredients for dirty pirates. After receiving directions from two people that I could not follow, I found the package store on my own. We did enjoy dirty pirates before dinner on Navigator with Mark and Jane and Al and Terri.

Our last stop in the panhandle before crossing the gulf was Carrabelle. Even though it is a very small town it does have a good restaurant and a grocery store that provide the necessary provisions for the crossing. There were lots of loopers waiting here for a weather window to cross the gulf. Should we cross tomorrow? Will the weather be better the next day? Another huge docktail opportunity.

The wind was temporarily gone.
Could we be so lucky for our gulf crossing?

 

This interesting clock was actually working.

 

Pensacola had these pelicans decorated for the military branches.
Now we have seen cows, chickens, tug boats, etc, etc.



These were done very well.

This man could really sing!

His followers were also very entertaining, singing along and dancing.

 

No, we never tire of sunsets and sunrises.
This time I know it is the sunset!

Quite the collection of trap buoys.

 

Some of the commercial fishing fleet in Apalachicola.

 

Carrabelle and many other cities have these patriotic memorials.

  

Carrabelle's claim to fame-
the worlds' smallest police station.

They also have this clock.

This sea wall doesn't need any marking as long as the birds maintain watch.

This section of the Gulf Coast Intracoastal Waterway is called the ditch
for obvious reasons.

Watermen making their living.

 

We always enjoy traveling with dolphins.

They are so camera shy though. 

Next time will be more from Carrabelle and our Gulf crossing.