Back in the yard for a week to get new paint.
What do we do for a week? Try to dodge Tropical Storm Debby, for starters. She couldn't decide whether to head to Texas or stay close to Florida - we chose to stay in Florida & head over the Tallahassee for a few days. Well....guess who joined us?
It started raining the closer to we got Tallahassee, and it poured all the way south to our hotel near Crawfordville. We stayed at the Best Western there - a/c! Telly! Proper showers! But, everything went dark at 11 p.m. and no electrics all night and the next morning - no free brekkie or all those mod cons we were loving. So, where do we go for breakfast?
Burger King, of course! It was still pouring, but Crawfordville still had electricity.
And what do you do on a stormy day in Tallahassee? Well, we found & walked both malls, got haircuts (ugh - I really miss Dottie!), hung out at Barnes & Nobel, browsed a Goodwill bookstore - that had a discount for old geisers like us!
Rang the hotel & found out that the electricity had been restored by 4 p.m., and all the power repair crews were staying there.
The town of Sopchoppy - yes, that's really it's name! - got 23" of rain, and that was about 5 miles from where we were staying. The coast roads and island roads were flooded & closed.
Got to watch BBC America - Top Gear! Graham Norton! - ad naseum!
The rain finally stopped, so off we took ourselves to Wakulla State Park, which was flooded & not much was going on, except for the roar of generators in the park office & lodge. We walked around the roads and some trails - they were pretty well saturated, but we looked for alligators, manatees, turtles, anything - but saw nothing but water. It's a beautiful place in spite of the floods.
Drove to the coastal town of St Marks, where there is a yacht club -
This is the sign......
This is the yacht club.....
Drove down the coast to Carrabelle & met a nice couple - Tim & Pamela Pennington, quite the legends on their big schooner Pamela Ann. They've lived on their boat for more than 20 years and were waiting out the weather at the marina - had a long, interesting chat with them. They're headed for Texas, the Panama Canal & Alaska.
This is Rusty, their companion on board - their boat is a steel boat, so the name Rusty might not be appropriate!
Continued along the coast to St George Island - which had only just had it's electricity restored.
Coast road
Headed back to Pensacola via Apalachicola, Port St Joe, Mexico Beach, Panama City, Grayton Beach & Seaside, Destin & Fort Walton Beach. Came across a beautiful but practically deserted town called Wind Mark Beach.
Back to the boatyard for our re-launch - hopefully the last one for a long time!
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