Tampa Part Two

We are back in Tampa to finish that which we should have done last trip here. For the past few days, Bear has been experiencing excruciating “Charley Horses” in her legs. That is a term which I have not heard in 20 years. They were so bad that she was thinking the back repair did not work. After all, it takes all her energy to keep me in line. She finally called the doctors and was told that it is simply a nerve rebuilding thing and they gave her some anti-spasm stuff. By morning yesterday, the symptoms were gone and so was her despair. That little sparkle in her eyes that says so much came back.


I had a chance to grab some really fitful sleep and weird dreams during my turn at the wheel yesterday. Being off Why Knot does present challenges. For instance: how does one get the room to move. The sounds normal to a boat on the water are absent thus challenging to good sleep. For the first time in days, we have not heard thrusters in the early morning, or the pop of the weather deck cooling in the sunset. Another sound that would keep land lubbers awake is that of the dock lines in the early morning hours that stretch and snap when the current caused by tide or some other boat leaving the dock cause WK to tug at the cleats on dock.

The great migration has started. The early arrivals in Charleston are the fast movers that seem to be in some urgent need to get to Fort Lauderdale or Miami to grab that slip reserved for the winter. They talk of three hundred mile days (some actually four hundred plus mile days) and the rough sea conditions caused by the storms offshore. At thirty to forty knots, even those smooth rollers would be uncomfortable. A few sailing vessels are starting to trickle past the area mostly heading to a staging points for the jump to the islands. Favored departure points are Fernandina Beach (Jacksonville, Fl), Forts Pierce and Lauderdale and then on to Miami and Marathon. Of these, Marathon is least spectacular but more boater friendly for those needing some work before the big punch across the Green Monster (Gulf Stream). Gary and Tess, have departed there heading for the Philippines via the Canal. We wonder where Rumba Line is these days. Keeln Time must be in the Chesapeake by now. The point is that like the whales, birds and Winter Texans, folks are starting to move south. We still have two months of hurricane season so some are waiting for the green light to sail south of Virginia as restricted by some insurance. As for Why Knot, the outcome of Monday’s events will determine our sailing schedule. If all goes well, we will come home in mid November then perhaps punch across that Green Monster to the islands for winter. We have done about everything we can think of consistent with our budget to rig Why Knot for the adventure so now she is waiting for crew to come up to speed. We would change some things such as holding off on the heavy provisioning until the need arises and we should have started this cruise much earlier in the scheme of things. Having waited so long to drop those dock lines in Port A has us thinking we only have about 35 more years to do this sailing thing. Then we may have to switch to the dark side and think trawler--- or not.