ssloop: Port St Joe-Longboat Key

Thursday was fuel day! (ouch) As we left Port St Joe we took on enough fuel to get us to Apalachicola where we knew we would be topping off the tanks in preparation of our crossing of the Gulf of Mexico on Friday. A few hours later, after topping off the tanks in Apalachicola we inquired about pumping out our holding tank, only to learn that the nearest option for doing so was in Carrabelle. Going to Carrabelle would mean a 10 mile roundtrip side trip from our intended night anchorage. Once in Carrabelle after pumping out, yup...we again topped off the tanks. (Thinking it's time to start a go fund me page 😜) Last time, with a slower boat, we did a 24 hour overnight crossing, where with the PV2 we are able to do a daytime crossing. Because we had to leave before daylight, we made a practice run out East Pass, to leave a trail on our chart plotter to follow the next morning. Boy are we glad we did - we found one marker bouy to be under water and another one missing it's top. That night we anchored out behind Dog Island. A crisp clear night, with no moon, far from civilization, provided us with a spectacular star gazing event.

We pulled the anchor at 5am and it was dark, dark, dark, black dark! We followed our tracks thru the pass, observed R12 red bouy diligently flashing, a foot under water! Once the sun came up it was a nice cruising day with 2-3 footers. We arrived 9 hours and 160 miles later at North Anclote Key pass and dropped the hook behind Three Rooker Bar Island. This is a beautiful sandy spit of land separating The Gulf and the ICW.

Saturday morning we traveled 15 miles to Clearwater Beach Municipal Marina. After washing the Gulf of Mexico salt off the boat we walked into town to explore and have dinner.

Sunday morning was sunny and warm. Finally! We traveled 35 miles and dropped the hook in a high class residential neighborhood on Anna Marie Island. The afternoon was spent exploring nearby islands on the dinghy.

Monday was another beautiful day, so we traveled a short 10 miles and anchored off Longboat Key.
It was a perfect afternoon to dinghy out on the Gulf along the sandy beaches. In the evening we took the dinghy to shore for dinner at the Mar Vista Restaurant.

Two fer Tuesday! Tuesday morning we pulled up the anchor only to find another anchor line hooked on it. We were afraid it may be attached to one of the sailboats anchored nearby. But after unhooking it from our anchor and pulling it, up came 20 feet of line, 20 feet of chain and a nice used anchor that someone had lost. Captain "I don't sleep well at anchor" can always use another anchor!