Well, today was a fabulous and relaxing day. We started the day hanging out and playing games (chess and backgammon are among the current favorites, although once the Arbisi clan arrives, we'll be in for a serious Apples to Apples match). While Josh and I played, Scott finished his work on the generator, which of course is working now...need I say more? We walked into town and spent some time cruising through the 3rd Street South shops, 5th Ave shops and Tin City. After a long walk, we decided to head back to the boat and watch a movie. Josh chose [View Full Entry]

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Today started out breezy and cool, so we decided to take a walk along Ft. Myers beach. We walked out onto the pier and saw a huge stingray and a bunch of snook. The water here is green and clear. After breakfast, we set sail for Naples. Next stop is Naples Yacht Club. Along the way, we saw a bunch of dolphins. Off in the distance, Scott noticed something rather large floating in the water, which he thought was a sea turtle. It was a very large sea turtle, but unfortunately, it was not alive. It appeared to have been caught [View Full Entry]

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We started the day with a trip to Caya Costa beach to look for shells. As we were walking along the beach, we noticed something long and dark swimming close to shore. At first we thought it was a shark, until it poked it’s cute little nose out of the water- it was a manatee, and it swam to within 5 feet of Scott! We followed it around the beach for a while and then it finally got bored of us and swam away. Since we were having issues with the generator, we decided to head to Ft. Myers. We called [View Full Entry]

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We decided to head over for a true “Cheeseburger in Paradise”, so we ventured another few hours south to Cabbage Key and anchored off Useppa. We anchored and went for a long bumpy dingy ride into Pineland for some gas for the dingy. We were laughing so hard because the wind and tide made it a VERY bumpy ride. We did see a school of dolphin actually jumping out of the water, so it made the ride worth it. We did make it over to Cabbage Key for dinner, where we were among just a handful of left over weekenders. We [View Full Entry]

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We awoke to the heat of the morning…the generator kicked off. Scott figured out what he thought was the problem, fixed it and we were headed about 4 hours south to the Crow’s Nest in Venice. We had a gorgeous sail south. It’s warm, but not too hot. We tied up at the Crows Nest and headed over to the shallow spot just to the east of the marina where we floated in the water for a few hours, cooling off. After dinner at the Crow’s Nest, we watched a movie in the cockpit of the boat. There were a ton [View Full Entry]

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The Cooper family set sale from St. Petersburg, FL around 1:30 p.m. The goal for the day was to make it to a favorite spot, just north of Long Boat Pass. We dropped the anchor around 6 p.m. amidst a sea of dolphins, popping up all around the anchorage. The wind was blowing and the heat of the day was cooling down. We spent the evening at Mar Vista, a local restaurant where we feasted on awesome calamari and seafood. It was a terrific end to the first day of an amazing adventure! Did I mention that the Cooper boys decided [View Full Entry]

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