Enjoying our time at Indiantown Marina & Boaty

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Geo: 27.0269, -80.4858

It was a quick two days when we dropped off the boat, had it hauled out and then flew home, but now that we've been back, it's been a month of living up, on the hard and figuring out why Indiantown was such a great choice for us!!! 😊

Yes, the boat's been up on the hard to satisfy our insurance and we've been doing various projects. The one big one was to get the bottom paint redone and to raise the waterline, but the rest of the projects have been small ones. More than anything we've been waiting out the end of the hurricane season (which officially ends on Nov. 30th).

Indiantown Marina and Boatyard has really surpassed our expectations on a place to be "stuck" during hurricane season. We've met so many fun people here. Indiantown itself is very small, but with it's Mexican and Guatemalan influences, what's not to love?! The food is amazing and even when we eat out, we are essentially getting a true "home cooked" meal!

After staying with Jim and Isabelle for most of our Toronto trip, we got to see Jim again in Florida not even two weeks later! Jimmy came down to West Palm Beach and rented a house on the PGA Golf Course. He invited us to visit. For those of us living in a boatyard, we were extremely appreciative and absolutely cherished each moment of being in the luxury of a house, let alone a huge amazing house with all the bells and whistles! Tony joined the boys when they played golf, and I stayed behind to enjoy the pool. We even went deep sea fishing! Whoa! We are so thankful to Jeff, Jimmy, and Nick for letting us be a part of their vacation. They included us like family, and for that we are truly grateful.

In our last week here, the marina staff have put on an entire week of festivities for American Thanksgiving. We've enjoyed live bands, catered dinners, games...the whole social agenda. We highly recommend this place!!! http://www.indiantownmarina.com

Nov. 27th – Projects done. Ready, Set, SPLASH!

Hello All,

Inspiration, Tony, and I are ready to go back in the water and with that we are winding up our time here in Indiantown, FL. It's been a month of living up on the hard...amongst the trees. A real life "treehouse". At least they're palms! 😊

The biggest project on our list was to redo the bottom paint and raise the waterline. When that was done, we moved on to a few of the smaller jobs on our list. Once those were done we started to come up with "while we're on the hard, why don't we....jobs". We are ready to go back into the water so that we can put our sails on and finally reorganize the boat and get ourselves "back to normal". (OUR kind of normal, that is!!)

We've met some truly wonderful people here and have had the opportunity of time to allow friendships to grow. Most of the friendships developed in the work yard as we were all situated close to each other and therefore saw the same faces each day. We met Marilyn & Patrick on "Jawbone", Kevin & Velma on "Hope", Dwight on "Serenity" and the big crew (canines included) of charter boat "Blue Fin" (http://bluefincharters.net) out of South Beach, Miami: Captain David & Jay (and their three Boxers: Renegade, Fancy and Skipper). We were so lucky to be surrounded by such a great group of people. We shared laughs, enjoyed lots of great music, and got each other through two things boaters hate: being in a boatyard, and endless days of backbreaking work while the boat is laid up.

Although they were not in the yard with us, we also met a lovely couple, Christa & Craig, as well as their good friend Steve (a seasoned sailor), who was assisting them now that they had purchased their first boat. Congrats guys! 😊

Indiantown Marina and Boatyard has proved to be a great choice for us. We've really enjoyed our time here. For the past week they've put on Thanksgiving Celebrations. There have been four nights of live bands, catered dinners, fun and games! Last night Tony & I came in third in the Grape Stomping contest! The staff here is so friendly, and accommodating. They do an incredible job. Check them out: http://www.indiantownmarina.com

The wildlife is kinda neat here too. We've seen an Armadillo crossing the road, only to startle a snake in the tall grass. Then the snake jumped about two feet in the air! Wild boars and turkeys can be found in the yard, Iguanas sun themselves on the pavement and we've had tree frogs on board. In the water, there are alligators, snapping turtles, and snakes! And just when I thought I was over my fear of spiders, the biggest, furriest spider I've ever seen was inside the boat with me. It resembled a tarantula (only smaller). Okay, the furry spider was NOT cool. In fact, I screamed at the top of my lungs, panicked, hyperventilated, and then came close to passing out. Apparently I have not lost my fear of spiders.

The weather has been downright wacky. The temperature has gone up and down like a bouncing ball. The change can be up to 45 degrees in 24 hours. I find myself bundled up and shivering in wool socks, sweatshirts and foul weather gear one day, only to peal off the layers and be dripping with sweat while wearing shorts, a tank top and loads of sunscreen the next! Even Tony goes from shorts and a t-shirt, to shorts and a sweatshirt. Whoa.

We heard about the haywire weather at home at the start of the week. We were sorry to hear that one boat at EYC literally fell victim to incredibly strong winds. While up on the hard, it fell over to rest on it's neighbouring boat. We've had Inspiration up on the hard, and strapped down for the past two months especially because in Florida, this type of weather is expected, along with bad storms, during hurricane season. This year, has seen so few tropical depressions in the Atlantic basin, so it really saddens us to hear that this has happened back home - to one of 'our own' within the EYC fleet.

Today is American Thanksgiving and we feel it is quite appropriate that we get to celebrate twice again this year. Both of us all thrilled to now be back in the water and FLOATING!! We were just launched yesterday with a stowaway from the trees onboard! A little tree frog joined us and...well...may still be with us! We lost track of him in the excitement of being held momentarily in the slings and then moving to a dock.

Oh, and to be clear, I haven't gotten over the spider scare. Now, I'm cautious every time I move things on board. It's like I'm waiting to find another one. And just to think, I had pretty much gotten over my fear of spiders when we hadn't been on a dock for 250 days. Not attached to land = no spiders. I'm going to set off a few spider bombs when we leave here just to make sure none are travelling with us! Hopefully I don't kill the tree frog.

Enjoy the next round of photos on the blog: http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog/inspiration38/1/tpod.html

I'm not going to number them this time, because I've figured out that I see different numbers than you do!!! Ha!

And y'all can now consider yourselves officially 'caught up'! Yahoo! 😊

Love and Kisses from the thankful crew of Inspiration! Xo

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Comments

[Liz Rentzelos]

you raised the bar!!! xoxo

[J.]

Taste testing a must - make sure they're fresh!