HOME!
By
Allie Cantonis
Posted: 2020-10-04T19:24:00Z
Late Saturday afternoon (the 26th) we got good news and bad news. The good news was the Grady’s arrived!! The bad news was that our buddy boat discovered engine issues that they believed were not fixable before our planned departure. As disappointed as we were, we knew we couldn’t wait on them, so we planned to leave right before daylight the next morning.
Shortly after we put the coffee on, our buddy boat captain knocked on our window . . . the mechanics had departed about 4:00 a.m. and they believed they were fixed and could go with us on the crossing!! So, we planned our departure to coincide with them. We departed the slip shortly before 7:00 and negotiated our way down Scipio Creek to the ICW . . . our crossing was predicted to be less than 4 knots of wind and less than 1 foot seas. Before we left, we rechecked the weather forecast and noted that thunderstorms were to come into Apalachicola around 8 a.m. We decided we should be well south of those thunderstorms in an hour so we decided to go for it. As it happened, the thunderstorms stayed behind us the whole way to Clearwater!! The seas at first were a little more than forecast, but after we got into the Gulf and about an hour away from the storms, they decreased to a very pleasant “chop” such that Otto (the auto pilot) had no problem negotiating the planned route. We all 4 took turns at the helm which made it so much more pleasant than if it was just the 2 of us. We put on a “beach music” playlist and sang our way south. Our first sighting of land was the power plant at Tarpon Springs (the visibility wasn’t good enough to see the one at Crystal River). We started to get excited then and realized our dream of becoming Gold Loopers was going to be realized. Soon, the skyline of Clearwater Beach and Sand Key became visible. It so happened that with our helm rotation, I was the one who brought the boat into the marina. There to meet us was Jim’s daughter and our grandson! We got great pictures of us with our gold flag which now proudly flies from the starboard spreader. WE ARE GOLD LOOPERS!
OUR STATISTICS (over 3 years):
5919 Miles
646.37 engine hours
147 locks
2 countries
20 states
301 days on boat
251 days underway
156 Ports of call
Thus ends our Great Loop experience. We plan to keep the boat for awhile to determine what we want to do next, water-wise. In the meantime, we will enjoy having the boat in our “back yard” so to speak (she is docked at a marina about 200 yards from our condo) for a change. We greatly appreciate all of you who have followed our journey. Please stay in touch and hopefully we will see you either by land of by sea in the very near future.