Back Where We Belong…Floating again after 6 months on the hard!11/13/2025

Today is Shauns 61st birthday and had hoped to be anchored in Boca Grande by now…but…its a boat and this is what happened. What should have been a splash and go turned into us staying in the yard for a week, which was not planned.

We went down a day a half before our return to the seas to clean Happy Wife and get everything ready for our trip back to Tampa

As they came to fetch us with the boat lift, in our mad rush, we realized that we couldn’t lift our dinghy off the ground where we had it stored as the winch had died. Nevertheless they put us in the water after about an hour of trying to pull it up by hand and then they moved the dinghy by tractor afterwards. Then we went to check the motors and our port side batteries were stone dead. We were mindful when coming down to bring our truck and leave it at the yard to fetch later. This was great because we could drive to Fort Meyers for parts and so on. We bought new batteries and fitted them that day.

Next, we put the generator on and left to buy supplies, only to come home to all the electric off with the generator still running. This was not good and we quickly realized that the mother board had gone out. Shaun ordered a new one which would only arrive on the Monday so staying put is what we did. We spent time doing small jobs on the boat and poor Cali sat around a lot watching us. We got the part in, replaced it and we were ready.

Now the weather came into play. For the first time in years our temperatures would drop to 35 feeling like 28! We have to go through two locks and the wind was going to be howling too so we waited until the Wednesday to leave. Excitedly we woke up, got everything ready to go and now the port side started button to start that engine, was completely dead

Oh Lord…by now we know that nothing ever goes according to your plans and you have to learn to let go. So off we went in our trusty truck to buy a new button at the tractor supply store and a remote push button starter which had to be heavy duty for our 871 Detroit's. That took hours to find and eventually we left the yard at midday… exactly one week later than we should have.

But…hey…we were out on the water and felt so relieved to juts be moving again towards home.

We went through the two locks, Ortona and Franklin and anchored right there overnight. They have state parks at the locks and so we could take Cali to potty, run and play which she really needed.

And so it is today, on this beautiful birthday, that we left early for Boca…using the remote starter and prayer to arrive and anchor at around lunchtime. It isn’t usually like this, but having the boat sit out for so long usually brings about all of these problems

We spent the next 4 nights anchored at Cayo Costa just enjoying beach walks, watching Cali trying to catch her fishies all day and having lovely sun downers and dinners too.

I set the table for Shaun’s birthday and we had a beautiful seafood spread complete with cake and candle.

On Monday we set our course to head up the intracoastal to Anna Maria. We were going to go on the outside but the winds had changed to onshore which would make the trip uncomfortable. There are about 11 bridges up the inside, but we fit under about 9 of them and all of the others that require openings were open at each one as we arrived so we had a super quick trip with no waiting at all. We anchored mid afternoon, took Cali to potty and had a lovely final dinner for this trip with a perfect sunset to add.

In the morning we set everything up to head to the dock at home. We sorted out all the fenders and ropes and left 8.30 for a smooth and peaceful ride home.

We have so enjoyed having these few days together at the beach despite all the problems to get going. Boating sure teaches you that you cant control everything and you truly have to go with the flow. Sometimes the ocean leaves me feeling so humbled - we are such a tiny speck in the scheme of things and our old girl, Happy Wife… carries us home safely each time

I never fail to walk through the hallway at the end of trip, pat her walls and say thank you!