Eagle's Wings Fall Cruise North

It's finally cooled off in Punta Gorda - so that means it's "Fall Cruise Time" on our sailboat, Eagle's Wings!  We pulled away from our dock on November 1st, our route being to Venice to join our boat club, the PGIslanders, for the Venice Art Festival and other destinations north.  We loved looking at the spectacular art and Joanne even won a purse in a free drawing.  Lots of club members attended - we had fun "docktails" and a nice dinner at the Crow's Nest.

We then traveled to Sarosota via the intercoastal waterway and spent 3 days there listening to the election results and enjoying the town.  On the way home, we anchored off of Cape Haze and in Pelican Bay.  Check out the picture of Richard.  He founded a rare arrowhead sanddollar.

We are looking forward to Thanksgiving.  My sister, Mary, and brother-in-law, Al, will visit from Indiana.  We are also hosing people from the Ukraine as part of a inbound exchange of the Friendship Force, our traveling club.


Pictures

Lin and Larry Pardey

Before PGI, think BR (Before Retirement) we were Texans. We sailed on Galveston Bay with the TMCA (Texas Mariners Cruising Association), the largest boating organization on the Gulf Coast.

One wonderful day while walking down the dock our commodore's cell phone rang - Lin Pardey called to arrange hosting by TMCA a seminar to be given in our area. So impressed with receiving a call from a famous person, John walked around for weeks with his hand against his ear saying I'm walking down the dock talking to Lin Pardey on my cell phone!

Upon handing me the Publicity function for TMCA, John advised me: if I don't have anything to say, I just make stuff up. Soon after receiving this advice, stories of tsunamis rolling through Offats Bayou, pirate ships ghosting along in moonlight and fair winds that blew us both up and down the bay appeared in local marine publications. Making up stuff works for politicians and it worked for me. People showed up at our monthly meetings just to see who we were!

Now, years after Lin and Larry honored the TMCA with their visit, I was honored to introduce them at the Punta Gorda Civic Center where Lin talked about The Compelling Power of Adventure. Rather than ramble on and on listing all of their accomplishments, I opted to relate the story of John with his cellphone and his advice to me and then said that for Lin and Larry, I didn't have to make anything up!




Bull Canyon, Lin's latest book remembers her relationships while building a wooden boat in the mountains. I recommend it to sailors and nonsailors alike.

Outland Hatch Covers

Outland Hatch Covers on Eagle's Wings

Our old hatch covers were falling apart. The sharp looking  navy covers with white piping matched the navy blue bimini but appeared to be expensive to repair or replace.  So when I saw an ad in Cruising World for these Outland Hatch Covers, I decided to give them a try.  So far so good -  Easy to install; easy to remove.  To order, the website provides detailed insructions for measuring your hatch dimensions, but James at Outland has many hatch patterns already so just tell him what hatch you have before you bother to make exact measurments.

Burnt Store And Moss Marine

Our blog is also our diary of sorts. We no longer assemble picture albums. So blogging is the way we assist our memories.  That is what this blog entry is about.

September 15-16.  I positioned us poorly for the start of a friendly IYC race to Burn't Store.  So we started late, very late, but still had a great sail.  Here we are passing the Start Line at Marker One "racing" to Burnt Store. 

September 20 -23 We joined a number of other IYC boats at Moss Marine in Fort Myers Beach.  We left on Thursday to motor (no wind) down to Ding Darling to anchor for the night.  We did  this position ourselves for an arrival at Moss Marine at slack tide the next day.  Was it ever hot on the way to Ding Darling; Joanne & I both got headaches from the heat; Bleu sprawled out on his back on top of the refrigerator and under the galley fan. The generator fired up to power the air conditioner as soon as we anchored. An impressive line of thunderstorms passed to the southeast of us.   

Look at the shoaling in Matanzas Pass on way to Moss Marine at Fort Myers Beach!  Apparently the EPA is holding up the Corps of Engineers from dredging the channel.

Bleu Blessed by Father Jerry

 On October 2nd, Joanne & I wowed the audience at the Civic Center as we provided commentary for our DVD picture and music show on our Austalian Trip with the Friendship Force.   A talk by Joanne on Charting to the IYC Admirals followed later in the week as did a blessing of Bleu by Father Jerry.  I was awarded Senior Navigator at the Power Squadron District Meeting. 

This week we attended an Octoberfest dinner at the Elks Club.  The SSCA GAM is this weekend; Richard is the Assistant to the Associate Facilities Corrdinator. Next Sunday, Richard has the honor of introducing Lin and Larry Pardey, world famous cruisers, at the Civic Center for thier talk, "The Compelling Power of Adventure." More Later.

Photos

Useppa Summer Cruise

A low black sky slowly but steadily marched off the mainland. Lightning induced thunder boomed in the distance.  Wind rose to straighten flags and pennants as rain began to pelt the decks.  Hugh waves rolled... - not -  Eagle's Wings was sheltered comfortably and securely at Useppa's marina. . It was Happy Hour on the dock but a wet walk to the Collier Inn for dinner!

Isles Yacht Club boats (seventeen in all) along with some from the Bradenton Yacht Club filled the marina for the End of Summer Cruise.  The happy bunch of cruisers traded sea stories and enjoyed the activities planned by Cruise Leaders, Erica and Judi.  Lucious margaritas were provided to us at Docktail Happy Hour and freshly baked muffins were delivered to us the next morning.  The afternoon was spent listening to live tropical music by the pool and partaking of a Pig Roast.  Yum!!   Later that evening we gathered on the dock for a BBQ/Pot Luck and Larry Stewart seranaded us with his bagpipes as we watched the gorgeous sunset.   What an awesome weekend!

Standby....











Note - If you mouse over the picture window above, Forward, Pause and Back buttons appear. Click on the Picassa symbol in the lower right hand corner to open the corresponding photo album.

We departed early Sunday morning and caught the edge of a rain shower coming up over Pine Island to the South.  The Chartplotter pictures (above) show the radar returns in dark orange overlaid on the chart. See the return from the rain off Pine Island (Bokeelia). The rain brought wind to briefly increase our boat speed.  But a moderation of our summer temperatures lasted all day making for a pleasant ride home. 


2009 Cruise with PGSC

Friends from Texas

"Are you uncertain of your sexual orientation?"  Jim Morris , a local "Jimmy Buffet" type singer, dead-paned into the mike after finishing one of his beach and bars songs. Whoa ... I expected another song to follow, but much to our amusement, a fella walked out in a long blond wig and curled up with our friend, Doc Mulloy.  Doc took it all in stride!  Such is life at the local bar a little ways up the Peace River called the Nav-A-Gator  (to our Texas Boating Friends, something like a commerical version of Andy Upchurch's Oleanders).


I will always remember Doc's phone call to us years ago as we were headed for a Shrimp Boil in Rockport, Texas.  "Where are youuu, Joanne and Richard?  Luke and I have got the shrimp right off the boat and they are HUGE!"  Our friends, Wayne (Doc) and Monica, are former Waterford Pier 18 neighbors and TMCA  (Texas Mariners Cruising Association) mates from Houston. Wayne closed his medical office for a week to visit us here in Punta Gorda.  Doc is a big Jim Morris fan!


Wayne, also known as Doc and as Shifty, graduated from Texas A&M in three years to attend medical school at the Univeristy ofTexas Medical Branch in Galveston* and followed up with a residency in Fort Worth. Doc can sure tell some stories and I want to  share one from his emergency room years. 

A fella arrived with a bullet in the top of his head. Doc ringed the neurosurgeon on call who asked Doc if he had any experience with this kind of matter. After Doc told him that at UTMB he had worked nights on a NIH grant cutting open dog's heads, the neurosurgeon told Doc that was good enough, just take care of the head-shot fella himself.   Well, back then, the nurses didn't like residents much and the one on duty was the worst in that regard.  She said, "Mulloy, you called the neurosurgeon in?"  Doc told her that he had and that he was to proceed on his own.  Suspicous, she called the neurosurgeon herself and then looked straight at Doc  saying, "If you mess up this head-shot patient, it'll be your funeral." Doc looked right at her and said, "NO - it will be his funeral!"  After cutting into the fella's head he removed a bone chip, extracted the bullet, replaced the bone chip, sewed him up and sent him home!

Let's jump forward forty or fifty years.  Doc was reminiscing about ferrying people to the TMCA French Picnic on Double Bayou from Marker 17 in his fishing boat, Lucky Strike.  That reminded me of standing  on the dock at Marker 17, (part of it anyway), and looking back out at Trinity Bay. I  felt a sense of timelessness as if I could be in a any decade of the last century. It has that special kind of beauty.  About a third of the dock's planks were missing, another third rotten and remainder were of unsure footing.  The rest of the Marker 17 Bar was about in the same shape.   I had come down the bayou in our dinghy to pickup Michele, my step daughter, who was driving over from Houston for a ride up to the picnic site, that was inaccessible by car.  As I walked into the bar, an old fella with long blond hair and overalls asked if I needed anything. I said that I was looking for a young girl.  He said somewhat emphatically that he was too!!!  That fella was Jim Bo, the owner.  

After Ike blew away Marker 17 and everything else Jim Bo had,  Doc arranged for TMCA to help get him and his wife back on their feet.   I understand Marker 17 has been rebuilt and Jim Bo is back in operation.

We had a lot of fun reminiscing about UTMB, Galveston Bay, TMCA and all the people we knew there.   We dined at Sharkies on Venice Beach, The Loose Caboose in Boca Grande, the Celtic Ray, Harpoon Harry's and the Isles Yacht Club in Punta Gorda; visited the Edison and Ford Winter Estates in Fort Myers; toured our canals in Chuck's fishing boat; sailed Eagle's Wings on Charlotte Harbor; and of course, listened to Jim Morris at the Nav-A-Gator.  We said good-bye after breakfast at Elena's Breakfast Place as they headed to Fort Myers for their flight back to Houston. We all had a great time.


Wayne's Photos

Just one more story - Back in 1997 Doc developed a little cough but otherwise felt fine. Monica insisted that he get checked out - and as a result, found that he had an operable growth in the upper part of one lung.  At the hospital he needed an admissions ID consisting of a long string of numbers followed by a "C" which he assumed signified Catholic. He was born Methodist but married Catholic so he called the church to request a priest to come and say something nice to him. Informed that he didn't rate a priest but that they could send a deacon, he responded that he could get anyone off the street to say something nice and then got so mad he couldn't sleep all night. In the morning, he called the Admissions Office demanding that they change that "C" to an "M".  In reponse he learned that the "C" stood for caucasian, not Catholic!  After the tumor was removed and he totally recovered, Doc named all his boats, sailboat Lucky, fishing boat Lucky Strike and now trawler, Lucky Us.








Word's of wisdom from Doc  - Never argue with an idiot. From a distance, some people cannot tell the difference.   Eagles don't chase flies.



* Michele received her MD from UTMB.  Joanne retired after 25 years at UTMB.

North Carolina

A Road trip to Asheville, North Carolina!  It was just the cure for hot Florida July weather.  We packed up the car and headed north.  Our first stop was Cumberland National Park off the coast of Georgia.  It was a short boat trip aboard the vessel docked at the historic town of St. Mary's to Cumberland Island.  Our park ranger entertained us with lots of stories about the Indians and the settlers.  The gorgeous oak trees shaded our pathways to the ruins of homes that were occupied by the Carneige Family.  They donated the island to the National Park Service for all of us to enjoy.  (It's the largest pristine island on the Atlantic Coast that is uninhabited).  We also hiked to the gorgeous shore to take a dip in the warm Atlantic.  Just wonderful!



Triple Falls

The next day we finished our drive to our friends, Betty and Richard Armstrong's, lovely home in Asheville.  The cool 80 degree weather was refreshing and it even dropped in the 70's during the evening as the lightening bugs twinkled off the back porch.  We had a super time celebrating Betty's birthday at a local French Restaurant.  During our 5-day visit, we hiked to Triple Falls and Crabtree Falls enjoying picnic lunches in the woods.  We also enjoyed listening to real mountain music at a festival in the downtown area.  But most of all, we appreciated the time spent with our traveling buddies - the adventuresome Armstrong duo!  They are always planning a trip to a wonderful destination - and will soon be enjoying Ireland and France.  Check out our pictures below.



Cumberland National Seashore Photos

North Carolina Photos