December 23 and 24, 2014=Maderia Beach to Longboat Key, FL

Tuesday, 12-23-2014: Low tide was about 07:30 so we waited until 10:45 before leaving to have some water under our boat. We made a quick stop at Clearwater Municipal at 11:45 and picked up our mail and were back on the water by 12:00. There are a lot of bridges on this part of the ICW so it was kind of slow going but we were doing pretty good. We got to the Welch Bridge in Madeira Beach and called the bridge tender for an opening and he told us it was temporarily out of order and he did not have an estimated time of opening. We pulled over to the side of the ICW and dropped anchor; by this time it was 13:30. We waited and we could hear them trying to open the bridge without success, it was stuck in the down position. The bridge tender would give us periodic updates. Finally by 15:30 we decided to stay put for the night as we would not have enough daylight to get to our planned destination so we let the bridge tender know.

By 20:00 the bridge was still out of order. We will see if it ready in the morning. It was a nice evening but a little windy. We sat out on the front of the boat and listened to live music coming from the American Legion Christmas party. We sat for a good hour or so, they were playing music from the 60's and 70's and I knew all the songs. It was an enjoyable evening.

12-23-2014: Our make shift anchorage at Mile 122.5.

12-23-2014: American Legion to our port.

12-23-2014: Closed Welch Causeway Bridge


Wednesday, 12-24-2014: Merry Christmas

We got going by 07:30. The bridge still was not working but we had low tide so we slowly drove under the bridge with barely enough room. We had 5 bridges today and made it under 4 without having an opening.  I guess low tide is good for something. Cortez Bridge was the last one of the day and only had 18' clearance so we called for an opening.  

We crossed Tampa Bay this morning. It started out with a light chop, then went to a light chop with 3' waves, and we ended up with 6' waves on our bow; it got very rough there for a while. It was 10:30 and we were almost across the Bay and we were trying to open the front window. We obviously were not paying attention and we went aground to our port side. We were only a foot or so out of the channel but that was enough to get us stuck. We tried to get ourselves off without success so we called "Tow Boat US". While Keith was on the phone, a man and his son who were out fishing nearby, asked if they could help us so we said OK. He took our anchor with lots of chain out and dropped it in the channel, then we brought the anchor chain up with the windless and it pulled us off the ground and back to the channel. We were back on our way by 11:30. We thanks the man and his son, gave him some money, and wished them a Merry Christmas. Thank goodness they came along because who knows how long it would have taken "Tow Boat US" to get there. As far as we can tell the boat is OK. We may have a little damage to our pride, but we can handle that. We got to our tie up for the night at Moore’s Stonecrab Restaurant, Longboat Key, FL, Mile 85.0 by 12:30. After we got settled in we went to the bar for a few drinks and lunch. Everyone at the bar commented on how beautiful they thought our boat was. This one older lady came up to us and said she was in awe that just the two of us could handle such a large ship. That made us feel good. We had dinner at the restaurant this evening. It started to rain some while we were eating but it was still warm in the 70's. Glad we are tied up.

　
CO's comment:  Remember the old adage; "Fly the plane". Outside the channel, it doesn’t get shallow gradually, it just drops off. We went from 10 feet in the channel to 4 feet and with a 5 foot draft, that isn’t good.

12-24-2014: Tied up at Moore's Stonecrab Restaurant