Trisha & The Beach

Trisha, the closest thing to a daughter that I will have until I have daughter-in-laws, took time out of her vacation with family to visit us on the boat while we were in Labelle. We were all so happt o have a chance to spend some time with her and share our dream. She ended up staying a week, through New Year's and it was wonderful. The day we picked her up, we went to the beach in Venice Beach, Florida. It was great for all of us to get out and have some fun!

Drake, covered in sand after being buried, builds a fort of sorts.

Bretton 'lends a hand' to Valin who is carrying the boogie boards back from the beach.

~Sunset~

A great shot of new friends ~ Bretton and Trisha

Trisha, Valin, Blayde, Drake, Paul and Bretton enjoying an evening game of Cranium on the City dock in Labelle.

Trisha is absolutely terrified of heights, so I challenged her to overcome her fears and get up into the crow's nest via the Bosuns' chair. After many threats and shakes, she made it up the spreader bars, and I was SOOOO proud of her!!

Of course, while Bretton, Blayde and Paul let her down, they had to tease her a little with letting the lines go faster than they needed too... All in good fun!!

Paul and Trisha at the KC Masterpice BBQ cook-off, where we went to watch Robert & Waddie shoot off the cannon. Bet you didn't know that there was a whole culture of people that travel around and do BBQ cook-offs?!?!

Bretton, Trisha, Paul and Blayde enjoying a little photo sharing and UTube in Paul's room.

Thanks for coming to spend time with us Trishawww, I love ya!!

Our First Christmas Aboard

The beautiful Sailing Vessel (SV) Free Spirit docked at the park in Labelle, Florida.

Sherron bought us a great little 2 foot tree to decorate for Christmas that we were perfectly satisfied with.... The kids and us decorated and put out our cookie plate for Santa. But Miss Terrie got us this beautiful full size tree that we surprised the kids with on Christmas morning. It took up the whole Starboard side of the Salon! Paul, Bretton and Tamer all helped me with the decorating and present placement on Christmas Eve. It was a wonderful way to spend our first Christmas aboard Free Spirit.

Tamer, Laura, Blayde, Drake, Valin and Sherron posing for a rare family photo. See the little decorated tree beside me on the table??

Blayde, Valin and Drake inspecting a movie gift that will bring them lots of laughter... Happy Gilmore....

Forget the Christmas lights all over the eaves of the house and enjoy the banners and bows!

Blayde and Valin really enjoying their gift, and I Robot.

Laughter really is the best medicine for all that ails you....

Me and my dear, wonderful man!

Paul juggling what may have been his favorite gift of all - Hot Fries!

Only on a boat would you have to move all the presents, to access the removable panel to start the generator because the inverter started beeping for lack of power. In the middle of opening presents, Valin volunteered to get everything out of the way to start the generator. Must have been all the espresso and coffee drinks we were making with the Bosch Espresso machine that Leonard and Julie gave us before we launched!

An interesting photo picturing 4 rooms on the boat... Tamer in the aft cabin, Bretton in the companionway, Paul in the Salon, and Sherron in the Pilot Berth.

Stockings are the best!

What Christmas is really about; Family, giving, hugs and love!
& Mad Magazine :-)

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Blayde and Paul enjoying the decorative drawing that Paul put on his gag gift to Drake. He gave Drake a set of Pretty Ponies... That the boys took the heads off of, and had to see what happened when you joined them with firecrackers from New Year's Eve.
Happy Times!

Mom opening her Honeymoon present :-) Her and her dear beau were married on January 17th, 2009. We were thankful to be there when Hal drove to Glade's and placed the ring on her finger. We are so glad that she has found true love, and wish them all the happiness that life has to offer.

If they could only snorkel with the plastic candy canes that Valin got them for Christmas... It has to be better than all the cavities :-)

Paul and Bretton - Thank you so much for giving this time in your lives to be a part of ours! We are thankful that you are here, and a part of the Ship's family!

Back To Labelle ~ Our Florida Home

The Labelle Flea Market is one of our favorite Saturday pastimes. It was great to share it with our new crew while we were in Labelle outfitting and preparing to leave the country. I know that there are never many pictures of me for the blog, so we have Bretton to thank for this rare, although embarrassing photo :-)

Blayde and Valin finagling over a bunch of radishes.

Our dear and wonderful friends Robert, Terrie & Robbie on SV Wahine were so wonderful to us during our 5 weeks in Labelle. I cannot express our thanks enough for their friendship and kind unselfish nature. They are currently on a 18 month plan to move aboard and cruise their 60 foot steel boat.
Above, the boys and their 8 year old son Robbie went in search of bamboo and scored big. See it being trailed behind the dinghy??

Robbie, using all his strenght to haul it to shore so they can 'build' something out of it. Hmmm... As a matter of fact, I cannot remember what happened to it after the adventure of finding it.... :-)

Robert and his wonderful Father, Waddy built and travel locally with this amazing air powered watermelon(or whatever is handy) cannon. A few years back Waddy was asked and accepted an oppurtunity to act as a consultant on Junkyard Wars. They are very smart, creative and a like minded crew for Tamer. I was shocked at the power of this thing to launch watermelons!!

What a creative name, huh??

Bretton, a gifted photographer, was snapping some great shots atop the ladder when I took this picture.

Bretton, Paul, Blayde, Valin, Drake and Terrie watching a blast off!
P.S. Although this picture would indicate that Paul and Bretton were involved in a serious face off, this was definatly not the case :-)

Well duh?!?! Didn't you know that these roosters are always in the parking lot of the Labelle Post Office??

Paul and Robert, chillin' during Terrie and their son Ronnie's mutual birthday party.

Mother and son cutting the cake...

Our sweet Mom Sherron, saying hello!

Mmmmmm.... That cake was some yummy stuff :-)

To Tow Or Be Towed..... That Is The Question!

Hmmm... Well here is the section on "Tow"..... We were just North of Titusville a few miles when this little sailboat raced past us at about 7 whopping knots, and ran hard aground. We called them on the radio and asked them if we could offer assistance in any way. Here is Paul in the dinghy (getting completely soaked) running them a line to tie off to the bow of their boat, from our stern.

It is quite dangerous to the crew on board, and can be hard on the mechanics to perform this operation. We had to attempt 5 times, without running ourselves aground before we were successful in getting them free.

It took about an hour, but we felt really good that we saved them about $1,000!

Soooooo, this is where we were really thankful that we had purchased Tow Boat US towing insurance last March! We were just turning into the St. Lucie River, on the way to cross Lake Okeechobee, in 10' charted waters, and we ran aground. Now, let me tell you..... We have run hard aground probably about 10 times since we have been aboard. And because I have the Master Captain, we were always able to free ourselves under our own power. This time was a little different from the initial huummmppphhhh of hitting.

So after about 30 minutes of trying to free ourselves, I mentioned to Tamer that this might be the time to get our $125 back on the insurance. Of course, he would have rather waited until high tide, set off some anchors, and done it the old fashioned way. I, on the other hand, really wanted to make our scheduled anchorage, and make less work for him and the crew. Tow Boat US showed up about 6 minutes after the call and got to work.

Hey, ya know, this is pretty awesome!!
:-)

After trying to haul us off for about 10 minutes, the Captain of the Tow Boat US vessel allowed us to power up and aid him. It ended up taking all the power he had, plus all of ours to get us free of this shoal. Of course, I felt justified in the purchase of the insurance, as the bill for this would have been $811! It is too bad that it is not offered outside of the US where we are headed very shortly!

Sunsets, Sunrises, and Florida ~ Early December

Sunsets while at sea are more amazing than from land, by far. There are no distractions to the eye, just you, the sea, the sky, and the sun. Tamer took these while we were out for a couple of days from South Carolina to Florida.

The type of 'touchdown' that we are in tune with and understand!

Sunrise the next morning just off of the coast of Fernandina Beach, Florida. We spent a couple days here, and then a couple at Cumberland Island, Georgia across the inlet again. It was a bit chilly, so we didn't spend much time on the beach or in the water, but it was still really beautiful.

Drake stayed at the ship while we were provisioning in Fort Pierce, Florida. He is definitely our little fisherman, and proved his skills by catching a small hammerhead shark off the docks. He threw it back, but not before getting some great pictures to prove his fish tales!

Pretty cool, huh??

Sunset in Fort Pierce...
After we stopped briefly in Titusville, Florida to visit Leonard & Julie and P'tit Louis, we stopped here to do some transitioning. Kent needed to take care of some land obligations that prevented him from staying aboard. It was here that we were sad to see him go, but understanding of what he needed to do. Sherron also joined us here, and we brought Bretton Hubbard aboard the day before we got here, in Titusville. Tamer had interviewed Bretton while up in Alaska this past August. Because his schedule prevented him from arriving until December, we set him up to crew for P'tit Louis in Florida. Due to the fact that Kent needed to leave, and P'tit Louis would have been over-crewed after all, he was able to join the crew of Free Spirit. It is funny and unexplainable how things happen sometimes!

Bretton's first time at the helm of a boat! It only took a few minuted to realize that he was a natural!

Bretton and I locking through in the Caloosahatchee River.

A regular sight in the Caloosahatchee River, the kids probably wonder if this was the one that they named Bob while we lived at Glade's :-)