Florida 120 day 1, Thursday 5/18

Easy rise at just before sun up. Got to burning water for coffee and oatmeal. Let the morning sun dry the dew off the tent, then thinking about what the day’s sail lay ahead. Slow me, was one of the last to raise sail and get off the beach point. Did not take long to catch some of the fleet in Perdido bay. Good breeze out of the SE, maybe 10 to 12 more or less, and first course made for a nice a SW reach to the intercoastal. Once in the intercoastal about marker 58, it would be lots of tacking from there to make eastward progress, generally with good boat speed at 5 to 8 kts. Got into a bit of a rhythm in coming about and was enjoying the sail, except for some power boats that were either clueless or way too curious about this Asutus tri and getting close and really giving comfortable leeway. The wind was a bit puffy at times, which provides for a nifty little bursts in speed, and power boats may not realize that so if they got too close, I either tacked out of the channel or stalled to give way (sailors should not have to do this, except all boats need to do what they gotta do to avoid problems).

The yellow is the outbound on Friday. The Yellow is the return on Sunday.

And so it was going, port, starboard, and back and forth, except at the approach to the Perdido bridge at marker 31. I think I was making 50 yards progress on starboard and loosing 20 yards on port, mainly to the head on current. Other boats dropped their put-put in the water and moved forward. I was thinking, ok lots of tacking, but still making some forward progress, seeing the shoreline slip backward on port not withstanding. Back and forth, concentrating on smooth come a bouts, when right there, 100 yards ahead, is this big fat westbound barge coming under the bridge and taking over half the channel. Sails be dammed at that point, pull the rope on the put-put, wind in the jib and let’s make safe motor-powered passage to starboard. The barge was like, yuge baby, and this so tiny Astus tri slipped on by way to starboard.

Once under the bridge, found that some of the fleet was tied up at the dock for a lunch stop at the Oyster Bar restaurant. I slipped over to the opposite channel shoreline for a sand spot to quickly beach and lower the main sail, then motor back to the dock. In retrospect, probably could have docked with the main still up, given the wind in my face at the time. There was a deck hand at the dock, mostly for fueling, but very helpful to take my dock lines and help me get secured. Once inside, use the facilities to clean up and then at the table to catch up with other sailors, talk about all that tacking and chow down on a grouper po-boy.

The destination for the day was Sand Island, which is a huge sand mound, no doubt from dredging to keep the Middle Ground channel passable. This island, along with the curve in the barrier island at the site of Ft. McRee, provided for a very nice sheltered cove. So after pulling away from the dock and raising the main, it was back to sailing the intercoastal into the Big Lagoon for a few nice close reaches. At the cove, there were probably twenty-five other sail boats. Found out that quite a few had sailed in from other launch sites; nice fleet of both production and home built boats. Eventually anchored to shore, next to other boats that anchored with at Dupont Point. Having met previously, was quite natural to resume the conversations about boats, the days sailing, weather and by all means, get into the cool water to soak as the sun was a bit warm that day.

Did take the time to be an archeologist tourist and walk the old remnants of Ft. McRee, dating to before the civil war and WW2. Imagine if the concrete bunkers could talk, there would be some stories to listen to. From construction by slaves to shore protection, to lives lost there.

Pensacola Naval Air Station is just to the north across the channel. That is where many naval aviators first trained and home of the Blue Angles. Did not see any flight activity that day.

A young lady Hanna sailing with her father Jeff in a very nice home built CLC pocket ship, is a student at Texas A&M. With my paternal side of the family from College Station, and knowing some Aggie history, we had interesting conversations. Another older couple Lee and Katie walking the beach, viewing the various boats, comes up and hearing this, they noted that they were from College Station. Well isn’t that interesting. Found out that Lee also is very good friends with one of my first cousins, Randy, that live there; it’s a small, small world.