Fort Myers to Punta Gorda

We loaded up 8 days worth of food and water and set off on the next leg of the adventure to Panama City. A brisk westerly made a choppy sea at first until we passed under the Sanibel Bridge. We stopped for the night at Ding Darling Wildlife Reserve on the west side of Sanibel. A great anchorage and a peaceful night with only a dolphin blowing to break the silence. Roseate spoonbills, herons and ibis were feeding until after dark along the mangroves.

Ding Darling, spoonbills

Day 2 we sailed to Captiva, a pretty island but not friendly to visiting sailboats. They charge high prices for docking and won't even let you take a shower without paying for a whole day. Even after buying fuel they wanted us to leave the dock right away.

Day 3 was a 10 mile trip to Pelican Bay on Cayo Costa. A sheltered anchorage and a beautiful island. We saw manatees, dolphins, an alligator, a hammerhead shark, several snakes, a raccoon, and plenty of birds including a bald eagle. We ended up spending 4 days here.

Sunrise at Cayo Costa

Beautiful Cayo Costa

Racoon

A nice coachwhip snake

We decided at this point to explore Charlotte Harbor instead of continuing up the ICW. First stop was Burnt Store Marina. A nice marina but enclosed by buildings so not much of a breeze on a very hot day! Friendly staff though and nice restrooms and a very reasonable rate.

Burnt Store Marina

We left early hoping to catch the easterly night breeze but no wind so had a day of motoring to Punta Gorda and the Laishley Marina mooring field. This marina has the friendliest staff so far a super sailors lounge and restroom. The other residents in the marina have also been very helpful in sharing their knowledge of the area and also sharing interesting sailing stories.

A rainbow over Punta Gorda

A windy day at the mooring field

Punta Gorda was severely damaged by a hurricane 10 years ago and many of the buildings and much of the infrastructure is new. It is unique in that they have kept out all fast food chains. It has a bit of a Disney look about it.

The nice long floating day dock at Laishley Park Marina

We are getting ready to depart again. Looks like the wind will be good for Monday morning.

Next: Cayo Costa (again), Boca Grand, Don Pedro State Park........

Naples and Fort Myers Beach

After spending the 4^th of July at Naples City Moorings and watching 2 spectacular fireworks displays from the boat we set off early on the 5^th for Wiggins Pass and the Delnor Wiggins State Park.



A Naples channel marker

A Naples Beach Shack

Nice quick sail, 6 to 7 knots in smooth seas. Wiggins pass is quite narrow gets even narrower as you enter the park. There is a small lagoon in the park which was ideal for us. We dropped the anchor in 2’! The daily thunderstorm tested our holding but we passed.

Wiggins Pass

Our daily storm in the Delnor Wiggins State Park Lagoon

On to Fort Myers Beach next and the City Mooring Field. We chose to stay out on the ocean side and approach the mooring from the west instead of the Big Carlos Pass to the east. The main beach was packed with weekend holiday makers and several boats with parasails were operating in the area.

The Fort Myers Beach mooring field

Fort Myers Beach

The moorings at Fort Myers Beach are administered by the nearby Matanzas Inn and are really quite nice and the staff are friendly and efficient. They have the best bathroom facilities we have seen at any marina and a clean coin operated laundry. There are grocery, hardware, and marine stores nearby and a trolly bus service if you need to go further afield.

We have stayed longer than expected at Ft Myers Beach due to some fairly foul weather systems moving into the gulf. Even had a strong gust flip our dinghy over at the dock and Neptune grabbed one of our oars. The people here are so nice, one guy grabbed the overturned dink and saved further loss and someone else went back to their boat and returned with 2 new oars! Thanks Fort Myers folk, you are just great! Hopefully we will be on our way again in a few days.

A small waterspout over the beach

A cold front approaching

 

Next: Sanibel, Captiva, and Cayo Costa Islands, Boca Grande, and Venice Beach.

Back on Board!

We are back on board our little Seawind after almost 2 years. The last 22 months have been really busy but truly interesting. We worked for a few months and then did a 10 month backpacking trip around the world, spending most of the time in India and South East Asia. (Blogs for that trip are still being completed ).

Anyway, the boat is in fine shape, a little more faded but Calusa Island Marina took fine care of her. We put her back together at our old spot at The Pink House Motel and set off for our next planned residence, Panama City, FL. The plan is to take around 2 months to get there stopping and exploring the Florida west coast as we go.

We set off from Goodland and snaked our way up the ICW via Marco Island and on to Naples where we will be staying to enjoy the Independence Day celebrations before moving on to Fort Myers. The Naples City Dock is a small but really friendly marina. We chose to stay on the moorings as it gives us good privacy and at $10/day it is good value. They have clean showers, and laundry facilities on site and a good grocery store in easy walking distance.

Naples City Dock Florida

Big storm approaching at Naples



A few minutes later
 

Beautiful sunset after the storm

Next, Naples to Fort Myers..........

Last sailing trip for a while....

I have been pretty slack at getting this post out but anyway here it is now:
We are planning the next crazy adventure which requires us to earn a bit of cash (not so easy when one is lounging around on the boat) so we decided to hang up our sails for a while, put the boat in storage, and get a real job.

We found a very reasonably priced storage facility in Goodland FL called Calusa Island Marina but first had to sail to Marathon to get a few things sorted out and then the 100 mile trip up to Goodland.

Our anchorage at Islamorada

The sail from Islamorada to Marathon was a short one, only about 6 hours of sailing but we went via Channel 5 and on the ocean side of the Keys with a stiff onshore breeze. It was choppy with a lot of reflected waves off the shore, the most uncomfortable sail we had yet. There was also a lot of boat traffic adding wake to the mix. We got quite wet and were really tired of being jerked around by the choppy seas by the time we reached Marathon.


Channel markers at Little Basin, Islamorada

Cormorants on an Intracoastal Waterway channel marker

Approaching Channel 5 bridge

Channel 5 Florida Keys FL

"Bobby The Viking", one of the colorful characters in Marathon FL

Having got our business out of the way we set off for Goodland. We decided to take 4 days to get there with stops at some of our favorite places and some we still wanted to see.


Leaving Marathon under a beautiful rainbow

Leaving the Keys behind, heading to Sandy Key

Sandy Key is always a great place to anchor with lots of birdlife and good protection from the prevailing wind so that was day one. The second day we had planned to sail to Whitewater Bay but decided to sail by as there was a thunderstorm approaching and also the following day's wind was forecast to be against us. We made Lostman's River by late afternoon and anchored in the bay at the mouth of the river. A great anchorage but a fairly big storm hit us just at sunset and lasted a couple of hours. Our anchor held ok but we still got a bit anxious after our previous experiences with these violent storms.


Storm approaching at Lostman's River

By morning we were surrounded by dense fog which made a surreal scene with the world around us just gone and the water dead calm. We motored away using the GPS and watched the world return as the fog burned off. An hour or so later the wind came up from the north east at around 15 kts and we were soon racing along close hauled. The short fetch from the shore kept the sea flat making a superb sailing day. It was so pleasant we decided to carry on all the way to Goodland.

Before hauling the boat out we needed to clean it out and sort out what would go with us and what would stay on the boat. Also the mast would have to come down and the sails needed to be washed to get rid of the salt before we packed them away. We found a nice little motel with a dock, The Pink House Motel, at Goodland where we could do all we needed to do. The motel is old and has a lot of mismatched cutlery, crockery, and furniture but very clean and the owner was real friendly and made us feel at home.

Moored at the Pink House Motel dock.

Drying the sails before packing them away.

After 2 days of vigorous cleaning, sorting, and packing we had the boat ready to be hauled out. With the mast tied to the deck we motored the mile or so over to the marina. The staff at Calusa Island Marina are great. It only took a few minutes to get the boat out and at no time did we feel anxious at all. They pressure washed the bottom and put her into covered storage. They are most professional and run a neat and tidy marina. So that is our boat's home for a while.

Our future sailing plans (probably towards the end of 2014) are to follow the Florida coast north and continue around to Texas and Mexico...........

   

Crossing an Ocean in a Seawind 24 - articles

After publishing my last post on crossing an ocean in a Seawind 24, I received a surprise email from the guy who sailed that Seawind 24 catamaran from San Francisco to the South Pacific. Mihaly Kun very kindly sent me a copy of all the articles. They were written by Mihaly and his wife Judy and are absolutely riveting. I have great respect for this little boat after the bit of sailing I have done but these guys have tested a Seawind 24 to new heights. Well done Mihaly and Judy and lets not forget young Jeremy and Joshua. Thank you for a great story! I had these articles linked online but they are no longer available so if you would like a copy please email me; eezikapeezi(at)Hotmail.com.

The story may leave you wondering what happened to Jeremy. Except for total loss of memory from before the accident he recovered completely and has done exceptionally well and is currently doing a PhD in math and computer science (his blog - http://jeremykun.com/). Joshua has also gone on to do great things; a documentary film maker  (http://www.oakhousefilms.com/).

Next: Hanging up our sails for a while..........

Crossing an Ocean in a Seawind 24

One day while I was sitting out on the deck of our boat enjoying the sunset, a guy in a dinghy came by and said that he crewed on a Seawind 24 from San Francisco to Tahiti. At first I didn't believe him because I have done lots of research on these boats and never heard of this adventure. But he was adamant and went on to say that the boat did great and handled the seas well. It took them 54 days to do the trip. Unfortunately he was in a bit of a hurry and I didn't get more info than that but he did shout back that Multihulls Magazine did a series of articles on the trip back in the nineties under the title "Adventures of a Seawind  24".

I contacted Multihulls and enquired about the story. Eric Erwin from Multihulls wrote back and confirmed the story and kindly offered to scan and send the articles to me as they were not available in digital format. I have not yet received the copies but he sent me some information and the dates when the articles were published. Some of the magazines are available on ebay if anyone is interested in buying these back issues. I will however edit and credit and share excerpts from the articles should I receive them from Multihulls.

Below are the magazine dates with some information:

 

MM May/June 1997 – 

Adventures of a Seawind 24

A family of four, makes their first transpacific crossing.

MM July/August 1997 –

Adventures of a Seawind 24, Part II - Outfitting a Small Cat for a BIG Voyage

By Judy Jacobs and Mihaly Kun

Over the period of 2 1/2 months, Mihaly disassembled, waterproofed, and strengthened his small catamaran. The sails, electrical system, and electronics were all upgraded. He replaced the stove, trampoline, beds and engine, while adding a lot more other equipment. This outfitting process seemed next to impossible, Mihaly would soon find out.

 Mihály Kun is coping with lack of room on a 24-foot Seawind catamaran during his family’s circumnavigation. Unlike on luxury cruising catamarans, space is at a premium and the weight of items is critical.

MM Sept/Oct 1997 –

Adventures of a Seawind 24, Part III – San Francisco to Tahiti... Crossing the Pacific

by Judy Jacobs and Mihály Kun

It’s not smooth sailing for Mihály and Roby as they journey from California’s Morro Bay, through the doldrums, and eventually arrive in Rangiroa.

MM Nov/Dec 1997 – 

Adventures of a Seawind 24, Part IV

MM Jan/Feb 1998 –

Adventures of a Seawind 24, Part V

by Mihály Kun

In part five, the saga of this intrepid sailor takes us from Samoa to Tokelau. Read about the tale of the Ghost Island, and the lure of the master fishermen.
Women on Atafu are busy dividing a shipment of chicken, while others play dominoes.
The only time this beach cat has actually been beached was on the island of Nukufetau, in the country of Tuvalu.

MM March/April 1998 – 

Adventures of a Seawind 24: Part VI – Atafu to Tarawa

by Judy Jacobs and Mihály Kun

The family’s long journey abroad comes to an abrupt end in Tarawa, when the youngest son, Jeremy, is run down by a distracted bus driver.

 

 

The Hurricane Plan

The 2013 hurricane season is already with us and although not many damaging hurricanes have crossed the Florida Keys it is really important to be prepared. We have poled local knowledge and formulated a plan for the boat and for us should one of these storms come our way.

We asked a guy who has been here at Islamorada for 15 years if he stays on his boat during a hurricane and he said he did it once and would never do it again. Others who have not yet experienced one said they would stay on board if they could get far enough into the mangroves. The official opinion here is "DO NOT STAY ON THE BOAT". We have decided that if it is a minor tropical storm we will tie up in a nearby channel and stay with the boat but for a strong tropical storm or hurricane we plan to tuck our little Seawind 24 up a narrow gap in the mangroves about a mile from our present anchorage and leave. We have spoken to a local resort and we can get a room there for cat 1 & 2 hurricanes. Larger storms require that everyone evacuate to the mainland anyway.

The plan is to remove all our valuables, including passports, cameras, computers, electronics, etc. and stow everything else inside. We can then tie up to the surrounding mangroves with all the rope we have and head for our room on land. If it is forecast to be a cat 3 or more we will also drop the mast and lash it to the deck. Hopefully the boat will still be there in one piece when we return.

As far as survival supplies is concerned we are just following the locally recommended list which is basically food and water for 3 days and various other equipment needed if the power and communications are out for an extended period. Being off the grid and independent already, life on the boat has, by its nature, prepared us for surviving without outside help for a while. I hope we do not have to test our preparedness but if we do I will post an update on how well it worked.

While on the subject of weather I thought I would just post a recent pic of a waterspout we saw from the boat.

   
Next: I met a guy who sailed a Seawind 24 from San Francisco to Tahiti........