No ice in the forecast here :)

I mean this sincerely, I feel badly for all the friends and family how are stuck at home, literally, in the 'monster storm.'  If I could beam you all down here right now, we'd have one heckuva good time.  It's 8:30pm, 73 degrees, and I'm sitting by the pool in shorts listening to a band.  Donnie pedaled off on his clown bike to go see his fishing buddies from last winter.  While the music is good, it's not nearly as good as Ben and Nat- you guys are much needed down here.  It's margarita Tuesday if that entices you at all!

Well, in spite of my best efforts to sleep in, sans alarm clock, we were awake at 7am raring to weigh anchor and move on down the line. Wait a minute!  We're HERE!!! Awesome....

Donnie and I visited Banana Bay Resort about five years ago when we were visiting Mac and Jean who were wintering here.  If you didn't know already, Donnie's sister, Diane, and her husband Dave transplanted themselves down here a few years before that and work at the Fisherman's Hospital in Marathon.  Through visiting with them at their church in Marathon, we met another friend, Dave, who is employed at Banana Bay Resort.  He invited us over to come use the pool and hot tub as his guests.  We were immediately smitten.  From the road, you would never know this place is back here.  It looks like a botanical gardens.  There's a large pool, hot tub, two tennis courts, a restaurant, tiki bar, dive shop next door, fishing boats, jet skis and such to rent from here, with a motel, cottages, condos, and a 34 slip marina that faces the Gulf of Mexico.  We said then, SOMEDAY, we'd like to own a sailboat big enough to take down the ICW, and spend the winter here.  We bought Marquesa off ebay three years ago on Superbowl Sunday.  We sailed one season with her at her home in Lake Hartwell, GA, then trucked her home to our pole barn for the last two years.  As you know, we trucked her to Charleston, SC, three weeks ago, and here we are now.

SOMEDAY is today! All day it has felt surreal!  We are here to tell you, ANYTHING is possible.  With hard work, a P-L-A-N, (:-) persistance, alot of elbow grease, some sacrifice, and the blessings of our five kids, family and friends; dreams do come true.  I was never happier then I was this morning, walking to Home Depot with my hubby across the street to buy my tomato plant :)  Just like I imagined, having my own little garden on a boat dock at Banana Bay Resort & Marina!

Today's projects were to get the bikes off the boat, tires blown up, the dinghy motor gassed and running, pick up our load of mail, get some prescriptions and a few groceries.  Donnie also scheduled a haul out with a boat yard right next door for Thursday.  The plan is to replace the stuffing box, do a proper repair on the support flange for the cutlass bearing, and do a little figerglass patch on the boo-boo acquired at Beaufort, SC, our second morning out. After all of that, it was playtime.


In the words of Paps today, "You two kids are happier than 'possums in
persimmons'"  Oh, Paps, you and your Kentucky-isms!




That's what I'm talking about!!!

So which project to tackle first?  The P-L-A-N for now is to accomplish at least one thing each day, preferably in the morning, so we have the whole rest of the day for fun and games.  Our social calendar is filling up already...the marina has a BYOB and hors d'oeuvres at 5:00pm every Friday. They meet at the peninsula/beach for socializing and watching the sun go down.  I'm thinking of introducing them to Venetian Night (hail to all our sailing buddies at MSC!) this next month. Yep, I already LOVE this place!