Naples 1

We went back out Matanzas pass and into the gulf on the 19th of February. We cruised down the coast for a few hours to Gordon Pass, which was small but seemed pretty deep. We called TowBoat US before for the latest in local knowledge and it seemed OK.

Other than the traffic going in and out of such a narrow pass it was fine. We has some very large power boats passing us both ways. Between the million dollar power boats, and the multi-million dollars houses on the shore were had clearly entered an even higher tier of big money. Which makes the Naples City Dock that much more unusual. It is a decades old fixed wooden dock surrounded by money. In addition they have a small mooring field that it seemed we could get into.

After a quick trip to the fuel dock we headed over to a slip across a narrow entrance. What made it even more fun was a patio kind of area packed with folks with nothing better to do than watch someone screw up docking.

We were trying to back in, which got a raised eyebrow and a "good luck" from the dockmaster. In we went, past a boat sticking well outside the end of their slip, and a dinghy hanging off the end even further out. We went in and made the turn a little too late. Finally on the third try Heather nailed it, scooting back into the slip. No applause from the peanut gallery, but we were in.

Just saw on the news that the plan to completely tear down the docks and rebuild them had finally been approved, and demo begins May 1. Parts of the dock are supposed to reopen by the end of the year. It will lose a lot of character, but many parts of the old dock are closed and look less than safe.

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Ft. Myers Beach

We left Whidden's on Boca Grande in the morning of 17 Feb. and headed out of Charlotte Harbor back into the gulf. It was a nice big pass, but there were 6-8 foot swells, and breaking waves a few hundred yards off to the north. Once more than a mile out into the gulf (to avoid shoals) we turned left and followed Cayo Costa, the Captivas and Sanibel. The swell smoothed out once we were south of the pass. We followed the south tip of Sanibel to the east to Matanzas pass. We followed it in to behind Estero Island (Ft. Myers beach). We spent the night at a resort named Pink Shell. We walked to the gulf side at sunset, where the beach had this incredible fluffy white sand.

The plan was to get into the mooring field the next day, but it is run by the city, and is first come, first served. We headed over about mid-day, and while there were some empty moorings, they all had a life jacket, a fender, or even a dinghy attached. This is apparently the equivalent of a sock on the door. 

Since we couldn't get a mooring that day, back we went to the Pink Shell marina. We walked back down the island, which is just one big resort and party. I can't imagine what this pace is like during spring break.

We decided to move on in the morning. There is a small mooring field in Naples that we thought we could get into.

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Old and New Florida

So we headed south from Venice, and again, things were just going too well. We motored thru a particularly narrow part of the ditch that really was just that - a 100' wide canal that had been dug to connect other, more natural segments. Even when it opened up some in these more natural segments of the ditch it remained shallow, as evidenced by the fishermen standing in the middle.

Heather wanted to take a break from driving, so I took over at the wheel just as we entered one of those areas where it opened up. In addition, a Coast Guard boat zoomed past us, heading straight across the bay. I started to follow them, but then realized I had lost the markers. By the time I looked back down at the chartplotter and regained my orientation we were aground again. While the powerboat was able to take a straight line across, we had a much narrower path.

While I don't seem to have learned as much as I'd like yet about not going aground, we clearly had picked up a few things about what to do (and not do) after going aground. Again, we were very fortunate to be in sand, maybe even more mud. I tried motoring out again to little effect, so we quickly moved on. This time we had a rising tide, which was encouraging, but our problem was now more than a few more inches of water was going to fix. Another powerboat zoomed by, and at the top of the wake we were able to make a little progress, which told us we were close.

Fortunately we had a 15-20 knot wind coming abeam that had been annoying us all day. Out went the jib, which heeled us over about 25-35 degrees, and maybe more importantly, provided a substantial amount of consistent horsepower to help the engine drive us the few feet back to the channel. We bumped and grinded and plowed a few more feet and were free again. Heather drove for the rest of the day.

After plans A and B fell thru, and in a desire to keep moving south, we decided to forgo most of Charlotte Harbor for now and just spend a quick night in Boca Grande, which didn't require too long a day, and allowed us a quick exit out to the gulf in the morning (thru a major pass). We were not able to get into the most promising marinas and started calling others. We ended up at a place called Whidden's Marina, which has been run by the same family for 91 years. It was just down from our first choice marina, which was booked full.

It was a real tight approach, and we stayed on the right side of the last green piling at the entrance, but there was a string of dark colored crab pot floats to the left. We have been dodging these floats all over the place, and decided to take these to starboard. As it turned out these particular crab pot floats were not for crab pots, but informal navigation markers indicating the edge of the shoal area. We ran aground again, with the highbrow Boca Grande marina within sight of us, and us in sight of a quickly gathering crowd. Heather rapidly wiggled us off this mud bank and back into the channel, which was very close to shore. We headed into Whidden's and backed into a slip. Must have been a 13 foot and a few inches slip, because we just barely fit. Maybe we just pushed the old pilings apart to fit.

We decided to walk into Boca Grande, where it soon became clear that while Whidden's hadn't changed much in 91 years, much money had been poured on the sand in other parts of the island since. We walked to the gulf side at about sunset, then had a nice dinner a couple blocks in from the beach.

The night was a little nerve wracking as our bumpers squeaked up and down the pilings with the tide. Fortunately there were no wakes to speak of. 

In the morning I glanced up into the cockpit only to see a furry face looking down. We had acquired a stowaway cat which had managed to get from the fixed docks to our boat, something Heather was barely able to do. We kept the cabin locked up so he couldn't hide below, and after a walk around to make sure he had bailed, off we went back out into the gulf.

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Fisherman's Wharf

After Heather's birthday we finally got going again. We didn't really have a choice, as the owner of the mooring ball was returning. Not wanting to deal with another pass just yet, we stayed on the ditch heading south. After a pretty short and uneventful day we ended up in Venice at a marina called Fisherman's Wharf, which was immediately off the ditch. There was a nice restaurant across the parking lot, and it was Valentine's Day, so off we went.

We were within walking distance to a grocery store and a McDonalds, so we were set. We stayed two nights, I think because a mild front was blowing thru, then we continued our way south on the ditch.

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Sarasota

Well, after the grounding episode we were tired and ready to stay put for a while. The person who owned the mooring we were on was having some work done on his boat, so we were able to stay much longer than the two or three days we originally planned. This marina and mooring field is right in downtown Sarasota so many things were within walking distance.

The first night we had dinner at a place called Fish Camp, which was kind of a cross between the Blue Bayou in Disneyland and a Cracker Barrel that served alcohol. Lots of locals and very interesting people watching.

They had a Farmers Market on Saturday which was mobbed. People haggling over vegetables on the sidewalk of an indoor dealership that sold Bentleys was interesting. They also had an Art Fest with lots of cool things we couldn't afford and didn't have room for on the boat. Anyone need a 10 foot giraffe welded from 1/4 steel plate?

We rented a car for 24 hours, twice, to get to the grocery store and West Marine and such. We stayed so long we started having Amazon and such stuff delivered to marina. We ended up staying for my birthday (5th of February), and a week later, Heather's (12th). The humidity was so high we had fog more than once. Not what we were expecting in Florida, although it always burned off in a few hours.

Interestingly, one morning while I sat in the cockpit drinking coffee and surveying the downtown and the mooring field, I saw on the next row of mooring balls 60 feet away a mast sticking out of the water. This boat sank at its mooring, was raised, then sank again. It was raised a second time and stayed up, at least until we left. Someone else's adventure. We planned on pushing off on Valentine's day (my oldest sister Mariel's birthday).

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Grounded!

We left Desoto Point in the morning (1st of February), and went out into the gulf, heading south. It was a beautiful day, we got the sails up for the first time in forever, and we were on our way to Sarasota.

I had planned on going in New Pass, which was my first mistake, actually one of many. First of all, New Pass doesn't match the charts. As we have subsequently learned, most of the passes do not match the charts. Very few of the passes are actually appropriate without local knowledge which is very up to date, because they are constantly changing. I had not checked more than one source for info on the pass, and other guides were clear that it was inappropriate for us. Second, I hadn't called the bridge on the other side of the pass, or checked its status in some other manner. It was being repaired, and only opening on six hours notice. Even if we had gotten thru New Pass we would have been stuck behind the bridge. Since it was so pleasant and quiet while we were sailing, Heather had gone below to lie down while we cruised down the coast. I waited too long to get her up, and she didn't have enough time to get oriented since we were already outside the pass.

We headed to the pass, in retrospect going way to fast. We didn't know what we didn't know. Only at the last minute when the depth sounder jumped up did we try to slow down, and then it was too late. We were aground, hard.

We tried to power our way off, which was fortunately sand. After 20-30 minutes of that, and checking the tide tables, we realized we were on a falling tide (next mistake), so things were going to get worse before they got better. We called our tow company. By the time they got there it was less than an hour before dark, and we were really stuck.

The tow boat operator made a valiant effort. He pulled us at full power to little effect. Next we hooked up the main halyard and he pulled us over to maybe a 45 degree angle to reduce our draft. Still not enough. Finally he was getting low on fuel. Our choices were to get on board with him and go to Sarasota, or to stay on the boat. We decided to stay.

It was a long night, even with benign weather we were so fortunate to have. At low tide we were bouncing off the bottom and could hear waves breaking on the beach. Sand or not, it didn't sound good. The next high tide was at 3am, and we tried again to motor off. We seemed to be stuck in a hole about 20 by 40 feet, some of which we probably dug in the sand trying to get out. The next (slightly higher) high tide was that afternoon. Since I had nothing else to do, in the morning I took the anchor in the dinghy out to deep water. I spent the entire day kedging towards deep water. Every time a wave or something created a little slack in the chain I pulled it in. By high tide that afternoon we had plowed about 60 feet thru the sand, but deep water was still 20-30 feet away.

A second tow boat arrived just before the afternoon high tide. His approach was to use the massive props to push the sand around us, while pulling like hell. It took a while, but then we were free!

We immediately headed down the coast to Big Sarasota Pass, which despite the name, wasn't much better. Once thru the pass we lost the left channel, so we took the right channel towards the lift bridge. It got very skinny, but it was just after high tide and we made it to the ditch. We followed it back north to the Marina Jack mooring field in downtown Sarasota, grabbed mooring ball 8, then collapsed, exhausted but no apparent harm done. A little too much adventure for two retirees new to this living on a boat thing.

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