Bringing Happy Wife Home

10/20/23

We had left our Happy Wife out on the hard at Glades Boat Storage in La belle while we went to Europe for a months vacation. Where is La belle, you might ask? as we did too lol

It is literally in the center of Florida which means we had to cross two locks to get to it but we figured it was the safest place to leave her during hurricane season with us out of the country.

We had to have her bottom painted anyway and wanted to do this work ourselves which this yard affords you to do. Not many other yards allow you to complete work on the vessel yourself.

Unfortunately the past 2 boat yards did not complete the work properly and we wanted to make sure it was

Shaun headed down to start the sanding and scraping the day after we returned from Europe. It took him about a week longer than we expected it to but we were soon done and back in water where Happy Wife is happiest

Like most boat owners know, everything on your boat is broken, you just don’t know it yet. We started our motors to set sail and smelt an electrical smell coming from the port side engine

The entire engine room was filled with smoke and we quickly realized that the starter motor hadn’t disengaged and was burnt out. That meant tying up to the dock and waiting 2 days to ship us a new one from Tampa. Two of many things boating life teaches you is patience and to go with the flow! We had made friends with a young couple who were working on the boat next to ours and they kindly offered to take us to the store to get extra supplies

We made the most of the time there and had people popping in and out to tour Happy Wife on the inside

As soon as the starter arrived Shaun installed it which is not an easy job as it weighs about 85 pounds and were ready to leave early the next morning.

We traveled for 10 hours through the locks and anchored at Cayo Costa at 5.30 just in time for a beautiful sunset and dinner

We left for Anna Maria at 8 the next morning up the intercoastal which took 9 hours. We head an early dinner and prepared Happy Wife for our last short leg home to our marina

By 11am we were safely docked and settled. It has been over six months since we’ve been at home with our boat. I patted the old girls two engines and thanked her and God for our wonderful time together out on the open seas. The quote comes to mind again today for me…a ship in a harbor is safe, but that’s not what ships are built for!Until the next adventure…Happy Wife awaits! Grateful, Thankful, Blessed