Days 244,245: Turning EAST on the GICW

11/11/18 Sunday:  The weather settled today, we left Dog River Marina around 7:30 and made our way out into Mobile Bay.  The water was fairly calm at the marina, and a little choppier out in the Bay.  And it was cold!  The wind was from the north and had a chilly northern winter bite in it.  We were bundled up, and the wind wanted to blow us south.

Soon we were turning south, so then the wind was behind us.  That was much better.  We had a big flock of pelicans following for awhile, and then they were replaced by a big troop of seagulls.  They were dive-bombing and catching all kinds of little fish in our wake.  They followed us until we got near a fishing/shrimping boat, then they found better pickins.

We reached the bottom (south end, that is) of Mobile Bay, turned left, and headed EAST!  This is the first time since March – when we crossed Florida through the Okeechobee Waterway- that a left turn resulted in an eastward heading!  We made it to the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway (GICW).  Woo-Hooooo!

And soon it started to look like the ICW.  We entered into a channel, and it was fun to see the homes and condos, and residential civilization along the waterway again.

We came upon the Homeport Marina and Lulu’s restaurant.  It is owned by Lulu Buffett – as in Jimmy Buffett’s sister.  Our friends Parrot Bay and Bay Tripper (I lovingly refer to them collectively as “The Bay Boats”) were stopping here.  We might need to rent a car and come back to check this place out.

Just a few miles later, we arrived at our destination – The Wharf Marina in Orange Beach.  As usual, when they asked me the length of our boat, I said we are a 39’ Bayliner.  Well – they put us in a 40’ slip.  Normally this would be OK, but there was this huge beautiful sportfisher on the T-Dock right in front of us.  That made the fairway pretty skinny for us to maneuver into our spot.  Kenny handled it like a boss.  He pulled all the way in past the sportfisher, then started to back into our spot.  The dockhand climbed onto the boat that was in the slip on the port side next to our slip to take the stern line, and helped guide our port stern corner into the slip.  We slid right in, beautifully.  We were all glad that the wind wasn’t blowing crazy, because this was really a tight fit!  It will be interesting to get out of here!!

This marina has a big condo complex along with a village of shops and restaurants.  I picked it because I figured we could use some civilization and options since we were going to be here for a few days.  We checked in at the marina office, then went and found a restuarant for some lunch.  After all, it was just now about noon.  We found a place that had some live music for Sunday brunch, which was a surprising treat.  It was nice to be in a restuarant that had more than 5 tables.  I like the little local podunk places, but sometimes it’s nice to be in civilization.

Along with the shopping area, there was even a Ferris wheel, a zip-line, and a 15 screen cinema complex.

This is the boardwalk along the front of the marina.  We walked around and scoped out all the shops and then headed back to the boat to chill.

Island Girl is out there…. on the other side of that big sportfisher.

We settled in for a few days.  There is some stormy weather coming (again), so we’ll stay here for at least three nights.  From here, we’ll continue to make our way across the panhandle toward Carrabelle where we’ll stage for our Gulf crossing as soon as the weather shapes up for a good comfortable crossing.

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11/12/18 Monday – As forecasted:  the wind blew, the thunder sounded, the rain fell, and we didn’t go anywhere.  We’ve been watching the weather, looking for a glimmer of hope for crossing the Gulf.  It is actually starting to look like  Saturday may shape up to be a good night for doing the crossing.  We’ll keep watching!  If that is the case, we’ll need to get a move on!  It’s about 240 miles from here to Carrabelle, so we’ll have to get on down the waterway if we want to be there by Saturday.  We’ll need to skip some of the places that we thought we would stop and see along the way, but that’s OK.  We can always drive our car up here in a matter of hours to visit and explore.

There is about 160 miles of open water that we need to cross, which will take us about 18 hours.  Following the shoreline bend isn’t very feasible, as it is swampy, shallow, and virtually no place to stay.  There is a route, but it requires three good weather days to do it, so we would rather just travel across and get it done.  The preferred timing is to leave in the daylight, and arrive on the other end in the daylight.  To do that, we should leave the Pass at Carrabelle late in the afternoon, cruise all night, and arrive in Clearwater no earlier than 10:00am.  Any earlier in the morning makes it very difficult to see the crab pot buoys in the glare of the rising sun.

We will keep a weather eye on the forecasts.  I’ve been contacting other boats to see who is planning to cross, if their heading will be to Tarpon Springs or to Clearwater, and what speed they plan to travel.  If we can find other boats to cross with, it provides just a bit of emotional security.  So far, I think there are five of us that would like to cross together.  Currently the conditions are not good enough to make that crossing before Saturday.  Saturday may shape up to be a good one.  Or maybe Sunday.  We need to stay nimble and ready to move right along if we need to get to Carrabelle.  Unfortunately, Panama City was devastated by Hurricane Michael, so there are only a couple of marinas available between the Destin area and Apalachicola.  It isn’t a great touristy area to spend much time waiting like it used to be.  The marinas are all working diligently to get back up and running, but it is still devastated.   Each day brings more planning to get across what I think will be the most challenging portion of the whole Loop.