Northward Bound

We are headed north now.  We have a deadline—always a bad choice to have deadlines on a boat (so that is a bad decision!).  Mother Nature loves to mess with deadlines.  Another wise, old adage goes like this:

The most dangerous piece of equipment on boat is a calendar.

You see, we have a wedding in South Carolina in mid-April, and we want to be there!  We are also putting Pandora in brokerage this spring in order to buy another boat, so getting her to her brokerage home before the wedding would be the best plan.  I’m sure Mother Nature will have a good time with our plans, but we have to make the attempt.  So we are headed north.

For the past week we have sailed north and just taken enough time to stop each night to rest before continuing each morning.  These have been long days, either sailing out in the Atlantic or motoring up the Intra Coastal Waterway. We even had two days with good wind for sailing up the ICW. While these days have not included any shore leave, there have been lots of interesting sights on the water:  flying fish, manatees, dolphins, shore birds—even some very interesting man made birds that have been thrilling to watch as they fly overhead.

We missed getting photos of all the lovely wildlife, so I’ll just include some sunsets.

And this tiny island where someone had set up a tent!

Yesterday we arrived in Daytona and decided we’d like to see this city that we have previously always passed by.  We had a wonderful dinner at The Cellar, which is located in a beautiful early 20th c. house that used to be Warren Harding’s summer home.  What a lovely spot and a beautiful home.  The menu is amazing and so are the wine choices!

We ate in the pretty sunroom.  This photo (which I did not take!) was taken from the window table where Bob and I sat.

We arrived here on the last day of the annual ‘bike week’ here in Daytona.  We could hear the revving engines of many, many bikes as we set the anchor when we first arrived.  It put me in mind of the famous racetrack, and I did wonder if there were some kind of car race going on.  We will have to get ashore early this morning if we want to see the bikes before they leave town.  Perhaps this bike rally is a significant part of what makes Daytona so popular for college students on spring break.

Next stop is St. Augustine, a place we’ve visited numerous times, both by water and by land.  We will spend a few days there since we hurried out of town back in January when it was so cold!