We departed today on a new adventure… Each spring for the past three years we have left Florida and headed to Block Island, Rhode Island and spent our summers. This year we have a new summer home… Stamford, CT. We will be docked at Harbor Point Marina in Stamford Harbor where I will be working for TowBoatUS.

We departed from Fishermen’s Village Marina at approximately 1200 and make a quick stop at the fuel dock to feed SAILS a snack and we were underway by 1235. We were given a great send off from our wonderful dock friends that came down to say goodbye. Leaving is always a sad time and the only thing that gets you through it as that you know you’ll soon be back and see everyone again next season.

SAILS not having been run since we arrived Thanksgiving last year was running fine and soon we were heading south down Charlotte Harbor. The harbor was very busy with a lot of boats out and about. We were not too far along when we heard a familiar voice on the VHF… Peter and Nancy Colket aboard SEA ANGEL were hailing Cape Haze Marina. I hailed them and we were soon chatting back and forth… they are members of our boating group… MTOA (Marine Trawler Owners Association) and we had not seen them since last year in Palm Coast, FL.

We continued on and soon were making the turn to the SW around Charlotte Harbor marker #5 and on the VHF we were being hailed… I responded and it was some our friends from Fishermen’s Village… Peg and Stacy aboard their sailboat… they were heading back to Fishermen’s after spending a few days out on their boat. We said our goodbyes via the VHF… no hugs… but we’ll see them next year with all our other friends at Fishermen’s.

We continued on and shortly we were entering Pelican Bay…. Felt really good to be back here… it’s one of favorite… or actually I would say it is our favorite place to anchor of anywhere we have been… we’ll spend a couple of nights here and continue on trip on Sunday. When we will go to Owl Creek Boat Works just east of Fort Myers.
We are scheduled to be hauled on Monday for SAILS to get new bottom paint.

We dropped the hook in Pelican Bay and were securely anchored for the evening at approximately 1600…. N26°41.042’, W082°14.521’. We traveled for 3 hours and 25 minutes and averaged 6.05 knots.