Crossing the Bays

We left Orange Beach bright and early and had a great day crossing Pensacola Bay, light winds and sunny skies. We were too early for the Blue Angel Airshow in honor of our Veterans, but it was good to finally get going. This is the first trip where I was needed to help David with navigation with my binoculars to keep us in the channel. Open water is alot different then our winding rivers paths! We had an 8 hour trip with our destination being the Sandestin Resort's Baytowne Marina. I had expectations from my past memories of a vibrant Wharf with shops and restaurants for a fun Friday night! When we got to our slip, we really had to wrestle with the winds just to secure the boat and after that, I concluded I rather stay on the boat. Besides, we were very entertained by our neighbor boat, Solaris, a large dinner sunset cruise!

We watched the different passengers coming for date nights, birthday parties and bachelorette parties. Very festive happy people! We didn't stay awake long enough to see their return at 9 pm but we were wide awake at 5 am to start our next bay day! On Saturday, November 12, we entered areas of Florida that we were only familiar with from 30A, but not from the beautiful Gulf side, but parallel on the ICW! We went thru open waters and then a smaller Army Corp of Engineers Channel that was filled with natural beauty. We saw today an American Bald Eagle, dolphins, a swimming deer, and an elegant crane. And no developements or planned communities!

The last picture is of a single female rower, on their way to Key West! After crossing St. Andrews Bay (Panama City Beach) we have settled in a very nice marina called Point South and there are several other loopers here, all of us trying to decide if we can figure out the weather and our next leg! Tonite we are in Pointe s