This was the sort of day I dreamed about when planning our trip! It was about 80 degrees with wind from 5 to 10 knots. We headed out from the marina around 11 a.m. on our friend Mike's 27 foot Hunter. It was a nice change to have someone else do all the work! I only helped a little and his boat is remarkably more easy to sail than mine.
We arrived at Shell Island around 2 p.m. and dropped anchor while under sail (something I had not done before). There were lots of boats in the area and more arriving so following the lead of Mike's friend on another boat we raised anchor (under sail) and scooted down another couple of miles to a very deserted anchorage. We had a nice lunch - grilled Italian sausages and some Coronas, then piled in the dinghy to head to the beach. Mike has a hard dinghy and while it's a little tippy getting in - it rows great and the best part is it tows so quietly.
Anyway a quick row to the beach (again I got to sit back and relax) and we headed down a boardwalk over to the Gulf beach. The beautiful white sand beach stretched for miles in both directions with only a handful of people around. The sea, while not emerald green like Pensacola was still beautiful with very nice waves. Waves just big enough for swimming but not too big to be dangerous. We played in the water for a while, I had a quick run and then we spent a glorious amount of time just laying on the beach blanket listening to the surf and enjoying the fragrance of the salt air
We finally had to drag ourselves away so as not to miss cocktail hour. We'd been invited aboard a 54 foot center cockpit Morgan OutIsland for cocktails. Coleen had a great time exploring their boat and is determined that should be our next boat. After talking to the owner for a few minutes I decided otherwise. Way too much to take care of - plus it holds 300 gallons of fuel and I can't imagine docking it. He had some docking horror stories for sure.
We left our anchorage after cocktail hour and sailed back to the marina. We had the most beautiful orange moon rise. I fell asleep in the cockpit and I'm not sure if Mike got lost - but we didn't get back until 1 a.m. -- way past my curfew. I had a quick shower and crawled into bed at 1:30 after setting the alarm for 5 so as not to miss the arrival of the Easter Bunny :-)
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January 2019
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