Today we headed off to San Juan Puerto Rico to join 26 of our friends for a birthday celebration cruise for Nan Starr. Most of us were on the 8:30am flight from DFW to SJU and it was a hoot having so many people we love on this adventure. We arrived in SJU, grabbed a cab to our hotel, and then went out for a nice dinner and meetup with everyone.
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| Hotel Balcony View of San Juan PR |
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| Dinner Group |
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| Captains Yoli & Alan |
Tom and Frank came out on Friday and we made a weekend out of going to Pensacola and back. Friday evening before we left, Glenn & Barbara Rudolph came by to visit. They are old cycling friends from Allen Texas that moved to Orange Beach when they retired several years back.
I bought some fishing gear, but fishing off the coast was a bust. The water was pretty rolly so we pulled in the fishing poles, put her on plane, and headed into the Pensacola Bay inlet. We cruised the bay and then pulled into Fort McRee anchorage, explored the old fort, made some dinner and called it a night. The next morning, we pulled anchor and slow cruised the ICW back to the Wharf. We arrived around 1pm, dumped the black tank, and docked up in time for the Cowboys game.
The game started off really bad, but the last half was worth it as the cowboys came back from 21-0 first half to a 21-24 win. Great game. We had several Bushwhackers, some coconut shrimp for appy's then after the game we headed to Louisiana Langappie's for an awesome seafood dinner and drinks. Ed, a friend of Tom's joined us at the bar for the game and also joined us for dinner. Sunday Funday for sure.
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| Tom, Frank, Barb, Glenn, Alan |
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| Meeting Hall at Rendezvous |
Nov. 17-20 is the annual Rendezvous for the AGLCA our boat club. Yoli actually went home on the 16th for some PT on her foot for the 17th. I attended the event by myself and really enjoyed meeting so many other loopers. Many were planning to do the loop and many were in progress with quite a few that have already gone around the loop at least once, some twice or more. It was a great group of people with several vendors and sessions on doing the great loop. The best part was the Looper Crawl where 50 or so boats opened their boats for attendees to visit many different looper boats. I really enjoyed talking boats with planning loopers. It was a lot of fun. We also met up with John and Pamela Brown on their Prestige 500 which happened to dock up right next to us. Good times with good friends, a Gooder week for sure.
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| Our Tennesse River Looper Mentor Group |
We get some home time, just about 36 hours worth. We attend the Chilli cook-off with Don and Jaqueta then load the truck for the 10 hour drive to The Wharf.
Dock Day, No boating. 3 nights at Safe Harbor Sportsman Marina here in Orange Beach, Alabama.
It was unexpectedly cold today with sunshine. It got down to 42 degrees and upper 40's and low 50's all day with wind that made it seem much colder. It was warm in the sunshine away from the wind. We decided to catch an Uber to The Wharf to check on boat docking accommodations and good thing we did. The slip they assigned us was an outside end slip on the ICW, which is the worst where wakes will rock you and push your boat against the dock all day. This would be ok for a day or two but not a month. So they were kind enough to move us to an inside slip but further away which is fine by me. So we have a good spot, not perfect since it is not a starboard tie up. Makes it hard to get around the dingy to get in from the port side. May have to launch the dingy to get it out of the way, we will see about that. We stopped by West Marine on the way back and picked up 150' of chain I had ordered to add to our 50' anchor chain which is not adequate for deep anchoring.
It is 3:30pm and are kicking back at the boat, may go to Tiki Bar again and do a rinse and repeat from yesterday with the Bushwhackers with 151 floaters and Fish and Chips, they were pretty good last night.
On another note, I heard from my brother Brad last night that he was going in early this morning for neck/spine surgery, Have not heard back yet from his wife how the surgery went.
Video on the operation which looks pretty intense. Its called Posterior Cervical Decompression Surgery where they remove a portion of several vertebrae and put in basically spacers to allow the decompression of the spinal cord that was being compressed by spinal growth.
Prayers and good vibes that it goes well bro, Amen.
UPDATE: on Brother Brad: All went well and is now in recovery. The next 12 months will be challenging to get back to his new normal. Looking forward to seeing him on Gooder Days in a year or so.
UPDATE: Yes we went to the Tiki Bar again last night and did a rinse and repeat with triple Bushwhackers, and did the fish and chips as well but with Grouper instead of Cod. All good, and Gooder with live music in the house. Gooder Times for sure...
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| Sunny Skies Ahead |
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| Passing Lulu's on the ICW |
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| First Dolphin Sighting |
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| Passing Oso's at Orange Beach |
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| We arrive Sportsman Marina for Fuel, Pump out, and 3 nights. |
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| Me :) |
Underway: 4:43 Duration: 5:15 Distance: 41.4 AvgKts: 8.8 MaxKts: 19.8
