Called It A Day

     Today was finally our day to have it happen.  We had friends tell us about it.  They have even posted pictures on their blogs.  We first spotted dolphins in Oriental, North Carolina back in November of 2010.  We have seen dolphins all the way down the coast from North Carolina to the Florida Keys.  We did not spot too many dolphins in the Bahamas.   The event was very spectacular.  It first started with 2 dolphins riding the wake at the bow of the boat.  Then, a fishing boat that had been keeping "pace" with us in a no wake zone pointed to 2 more dolphins riding the wake alongside the pilothouse.  For 5 minutes or longer we watched the 2 dolphins alongside the boat riding the wake, and it looked like they did it without a flip of their tale fin.  I guess you might say they were in a slipstream.  All while we were doing 7 miles per hour. Amazing.

      The events of the day do not stop there.  We also had an event that, well, is one that keeps you on your toes.  Late in the afternoon we were returning to an anchorage that we had used back in November when we first got together for happy hour with Joe and Ann from S/V Shortwalk, the Pine Island anchorage.  I may have made my cut a little too early, and we went aground.  This was not a typical grounding where you power through it or just a simple back up.  It probably took us 10 minutes to work ourselves out of that one.  Earlier in the day, we went to Manatee Pocket to anchor for the evening, and it was there that we had to power through a potential grounding because of skinny water that was a few inches shy of what we needed. As there was dredging work being done in the vicinity of the anchorage, it was all for nothing, and we left Manatee Pocket for Pine Island.  I guess the Manatee Pocket "grounding" was an omen.  After the grounding at Pine Island, we left with our tails between our legs and continued for another 10 miles, which brings up the 3rd event for the day.

     The final event took all day to develop and was a result of the 2 groundings for the day.  We logged 83 miles today, a new Big Run record.  Sharon and I weighed anchor at 6:50 this morning on Lake Worth.  At 7:15 this evening we dropped anchor at Sebastian inlet.  After 12 hours and 25 minutes, 83 miles, 6 bridge opening and 2 groundings we finally called it a day.

Photos of the dolphins playing in our wake.