Incognita finds a new home

Sunday 3rd May (Cont)
Gary and Irene (from Thunder Bay, Ontario aboard trawler Mandi Ross) have a standard schnauzer and a set of dog clippers and offered to show me how to use them to shear Buddy.  Gary ended up doing the whole Buddy (how could we not have a picture of that) for which Buddy seemed to be very grateful.

We also got to talk to Joe Krunk about leaving the boat here.  Joe is in his early eighties and is in charge of the marina and is the ultimate authority on who gets to stay.  The place is always ‘full’ but clearly isn’t, so essentially Joe has to think you’re OK folks before you get leave your boat here.  He was quite non-committal but told us to come see him on Wednesday, his work day.

Nick aboard Tovaki,  happened to be  heading back to Miami the following morning to fly back to the UK and his family and offered to detour to Indiantown and drop me off to retrieve our RV “The Big Easy”.  We made a decision to take him up on the offer because even if Joe didn’t find us a spot we could take the boat to Glades just further up the waterway and leave it there.

We had Gary and Irene over for happy hour and talked about the marina and cruising in general.

Monday 4th May
6 am and we’re up and by 7:00.  Nick and I are buzzing down the highway going round north of Lake Okeechobee (incidentally the second largest lake within the US) to Indiantown.

By 9:00 I was pulling the cover off the RV, the engine started right away and after calling in at the marina for mail I took the beast to get the oil changed, the tire pressures checked (it’s an absolute b$%@# of a job to do without a truck style pressure pump and gauge).

After some shopping on my bicycle, it was ready to go and off we trundled.

We parked the RV fairly close to the boat and started the dreaded task of moving from one to the other before spending our last miserable night trying to sleep on the boat.  There’s nowhere in the marina to plug the RV in and run the air conditioner.
  
Tuesday 5th May
A long day getting things moved but at the end we head off in the RV to Granny’s Grove RV park to plug in and have blessed cooling, running water and showers.
  

Plus the campsite has a pool even though it was 93 degF. We are parked right next to Peter and Roberta who told us about the reasonably priced Granny’s and incidentally are also next to us in our mooring slip at the marina in their Catalac catamaran Llamedos.   A rather unusual name that has to be read in reverse.

Wednesday 6th May
We head to the marina as soon as we have paid for our stay at Granny’s Grove and we meet up with Joe and it’s a done deal.  We can stay and even use the spot we are in.

One of the reasons for staying here is that Scott, who is two boats over from our spot, had a friend coming who he said had completely rebuilt his engine for him and was a very knowledgeable guy.   Herb had arrived the day before as predicted and anchored his sailboat, Lively Lady, in the bay.  We met him and passenger Sayrah and when he’d finished dismantling Scott’s alternator he came and took a look at my problem.  In a couple of hours he had found the problem.  As most people I had talked to suspected , it turned out to be a fuel problem.  In the primary filter that is first in line from the fuel tank there is a small cavity that acts as a non-return valve.  I didn’t even know it existed but anyway it was practically filled with slimy crud.

We were very very grateful for his assistance.  Herb, it turns out comes from Calabogie just west of Ottawa.

Then it was back to moving our worldly goods.

Thursday 7th May
Peter and Roberta lent us their truck for the day and we used the opportunity to pick up stuff like fuel stabilizer etc.

Down came the sails and more stuff to move.

Friday 8th May
Back in the RV to the marina to motor into the next bay for fuel and a last pumput.  On the way, I couldn’t believe it, the engine failed again.  However, Herb was still around and diagnosed a leak in the bottom end of the filter that was causing air to get into the system.  New filter housing required!

After preparing the outboard for storage and removing it from my now quite famous (locally anyway) motor mount it was up on deck with the dinghy.

Saturday 9th May
Time to run the lines that will protect the boat in the case of a passing hurricane and finish removing the last of the stuff that’s going with us.  Another long day in the hot sun.  This is no fun – time to go.

Sunday 10th May
It took all day to tension the lines so the boat was away from the dock and cover the most vulnerable parts with tarps.

We had Peter and Roberta over for supper to celebrate our completion and readiness to go.
So ends another season of sailing.

A new place to leave the boat?

Wednesday 21st April (cont)
Along one side the yacht basin are docked shrimp boats.
 

So naturally we had to have some.  However, we tried these for a change.

They’re called rock shrimp and are a sort of cross between a lobster and a shrimp.  Hard shell and very delicate flavor.  We overpowered them with cocktail sauce and agreed melted garlic butter would be better.

Thursday 22nd April
It’s a birthday celebration day.  “Ah!  Now I’m 64”.  We did a spell on the beach.  Here’s the birthday boy prior to his swim.

Fort Myer’s Beach comes complete with pier.

Fort Myers Beach is actually on an island and after the swim we took a walk across the bridge with its spectacular views.

Here’s the west mooring field and we’re in there somewhere.

On the other side of the bridge are several restaurants and marinas.

But for birthday supper we chose a place next to the dinghy dock called Nervous Nellie’s where we had an excellent supper.

Friday 23rd April
Hung about on the boat for most of the day and then took another walk down to the beach area with Buddy for his afternoon constitutional.

Saturday 24th April
Set out for Fort Myers itself.  We were doing OK motorsailing at a good rate and then as we started up the river towards our destination the engine finally conked out completely.   We were sailing through a very narrow stretch with lots of power boat traffic and we didn’t feel too good about the whole thing so we called Tow Boat US for the first time.  Fortunately we had checked our coverage a few days before and upped it considerably which saved us a bundle.

By the time Capt Ed caught up with us we’d actually sailed through the worst bit and could have made it all the way.  However picking up a mooring under sail might need some practice.
Here we are being pulled by Capt Ed.

The bill for the tow (about 10 miles) was over $700.00

We were dropped off at a mooring ball in the Fort Myers Yacht Basin which turned out to be right next to a heavily used bridge and right in the waves created by several miles of fetch.

Sunday 25th April
After a noisy rolly night and the threat of a powerful front coming through it didn’t need much to convince ourselves that we might be better off in the marina since if the mooring gave way (I wouldn’t have trusted my dinghy to the line you are supposed to tie to your boat with) we had no motive force.

So Capt Ed to the rescue again and we get into the safety of the marina.

About two in the morning the front came through with a thunderstorm that hit two boats in the marina.  Oddly enough they weren’t sailboats.

Monday 26th April
We had reserved a car with our Aeroplan points so we could visit Sanibel Island a place with fond memories for us.

However, now we had a bit of mission first.   Several people had suggested to me that the source of our engine problems was the fuel lift pump and I should buy an electrical one and bypass the mechanical one on the Volvo.  I also thought it would be very useful to be able to drive the boat with the dinghy’s 15hp outboard motor.   So we went in search of pumps and pieces of wood.

After a couple of hours we had everything I thought we needed courtesy of Napa, Goodyear Parker Store and Home Depot.

We then headed out to Sanibel and the Ding Darling nature reserve.  However, it reminded us of when we took my parents there in May/June.  All the birds have migrated, except for this guy.
 

Maybe he just likes it there year round.
 
Tuesday 27th April
A day of laundry for Carol and a day of installing a fuel pump for me.  Unfortunately it didn’t fix anything but with the help of Roger (I never did find out the name of his Prout catamaran) we diagnosed that when the engine runs badly one of the injector pumps is not doing its thing.

Wednesday 28th April
I started construction on a mount for our outboard on the transom of Incognita.  After one day I produced Mark I which didn’t work.

Fort Myers has a beautiful historic restored downtown

with art galleries.

Yes, the following is an art gallery even though it’s right on the water (the white thing to the left is a faux paddle steamer for tourists).

There are theatres.

But most of the buildings seem to house lawyers.

The problem is that all this beautiful and original architecture

is kind of wasted because the place is dead as a doornail.  The place seems empty even during the day.
Apart from the odd restaurant there is really nothing to attract people.  Maybe it’s just the recession.

Thursday 29th April
Another day on the motor mount produces Mark II

After a little more sawing and hacking it works and we’re ready for off.

Friday 30th April
We waited until 10:30 for low tide so we wouldn’t have to fight the current and then after a less than glorious exit (skipper’s fault) we headed out on the main engine with the outboard just idling.

We lasted about an hour before the engine started to play up but we found that by running the outboard a little and taking some strain from the main engine all was OK.

This worked less well when going through the first lock at Franklin but we made it to a peaceful little anchorage just beyond the lock and when we backed down on the anchor the engine was perfect.
This was one pretty anchorage right adjacent to an RV park with a dinghy dock and free washrooms.
 

Saturday 1st May
Our final outboard motor configuration looked like this.

And it works not badly at all which is just as well because after an hour of travel the diesel quit completely again.  If there were no wind (not an option at the moment) it can push the boat along at about 4knots and the boat steering still works reasonably well.  Stopping and going backwards is an issue though.

The trip along the Okeechobee Waterway is very pleasant with grassy banks and not as much development as the Florida Intracoastal.

There are strange sights too, such as this collection of animals.

The light brown animal in the centre is a camel with a lama, plus horses, cattle and at least one  donkey.
The biggest problem with the outboard is gas consumption.  Unlike the diesel which sips half a gallon an hour, the outboard is guzzling over a gallon and hour and with a tank one quarter the size of the main boat tank, refueling is an issue.

We hoped to have stopped at Labelle which has lots of free docks but they were all full so we carried on to the Port Labelle Marina but when we got there we found they were closed on weekends and there didn’t appear to be a soul around.  This left us with a bit of a dilemma as it was too far to the next place suitable for staying overnight.

However, as we passed the eastern of the two bays we saw a sail on a boat so we knew someone would be around.  Sure enough we got someone’s attention and they helped us into a slip.

We got an immediate offer from Nick (aboard Tovake a Wharram catamaran he had just spent his first winter of retirement on with his family, travelling from Devon in the UK – not on the boat) to go and get gas in his rental car.  So after lunch I went the few miles into Labelle and we had fuel.

We spent the rest of the day meeting other boaters in this rather remote but very friendly place and after finding out that it only costs $3/ft per month to leave your boat here in the summer we started to think that maybe we should leave Incognita in the water here.  It’s very protected, the docks are new and substantial, the water isn’t salt and because of the locks there is no storm surge with a hurricane which is the thing that does the most damage to boats.

It’s getting very warm too.

This was the temperature down below, Buddy is not happy.  However, we met someone with clippers and tomorrow we’ll have a go.

Sunday 2nd May
Looks like another hot one so we take Buddy for an early walk and set up an appointment for Buddy to get his hair clipped.