mvalwayshome

August 18 2014 Monday  77 – 90F  hot and humid.  90% humidity

Days of cleaning, sorting, and moving aboard. Wayne is reading, reading, reading all the manuals left aboard.

Last week coming we saw this double rainbow. Nice! The second one is faint. Good fortunes ahead!

Double Rainbow -Punta Gorda Aug 13 2014

August 16, 2014 Punta Gorda, FL. 77 – 88 This is not a typo. Still hot and humid with afternoon showers. But….

We had a well deserved lunch near the Harbor Master’s office. As I am sipping iced tea, I gaze out over the few boats at the docks. Is that a fin? Two fins? Oh no!! Sharks!!!! Get out of the water!!!

Wait….we are at a marina. Sharks don’t normally visit marinas except in movies. Must be dolphins. Right?

Wayne didn’t see them. I swear I saw fins. Should we close the beach?

August 15, 2014  Punta Gorda, FL  77 -88 F Hot and humid…

Rain storm hit last night. Actually, this is summer in Florida so it storms every night. Last night I got a couple of photo shots. Let’s see how they turned out. Not too bad. Not awesome but pretty darn good for a phone camera. The last looks like the light overwhelmed the camera sensor. OR the Terminator just arrived

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Want to know what we have been doing for the first 5 days on board? The first two days were spent with Captain Dana, Mermaid Charters. She helped introduce the boat systems to us. How much to tip the holding tank fellows when they come. Marine life. We will continue training with Captain Dana after we get settled and are ready to move the boat.  The rest of the time we were learning how to get on and off the boat.  More on that later.  Learning to walk sideways along the outside of the boat.  Cleaning.  Learning our way around Cape Coral and Punta Gorda.  Getting used to EDT.

We turned on the power. Captain Dana went over the electrical panel. We have a DC panel and an AC panel. The first thing we did was turn on the Air Conditioners one by one. There are 4 aboard for the 4 different areas on the boat. We finally got 3 working adequately after tripping the dock-side circuit breaker several times. The Harbor Master was called concerned about the breaker. Turns out the breaker on the pedestal ( upright post that holds the utilities, water connections, etc. ) was bad. After it was changed out, we stopped tripping breakers! Yea! Cautiously, we only ran 3 AC units and no water heater to be safe. Who needs a hot shower in the summer, anyway?

The fancy electric toilet only flushes. The fancy part of it is broken. At least we have a toilet!! A marine AC/Plumber/ Electric toilet expert is on his way next week with replacement parts. Yea!  Just how far is the Harbor Master (where boater toilets/shower facility reside)?  No worries.  We have a holding tank.  We can get the ‘guys’ to come pump us out!!

August 14, 2014.  Day 3 of living aboard full-time.  Getting to know “Always Home”.  77 – 88F

The first two days were consumed with ‘getting to know’ the boat with a hired captain.  She went through many of the systems on board.  We learned how to flush the manual head or toilet for your landlubbers out there.  hahaha

We had water-water-everywhere and not a drop to drink. We needed to clean out the water tank. Cleanse and flush several times before we were confident that we actually wanted to drink from the spigot. That pot of coffee just had to wait.

We are exhausted with going up and down the stairs. As you folks with 2-story homes know, what you want is always not on the level you are on at the moment. We went up and down the stairs exploring as many nooks and crannies we could find. No need for a stair master. Aching legs and knees are free without a membership fee.

No pictures today. Who wants to see knobby sore knees, anyway?

August 12, 2014    77 – 88F  We have arrived at the Marina!!

Welcome to “R” Dock!

A nice introduction to the new neighborhood. Our only live-aboard neighbor on our dock. Our boat is currently labeled “Two Seasons”. We have changed the name to “Always Home”. Just give us a couple months and we will get the new moniker on it. “Always Home” is sitting at the end of a dock. The closest neighbors are gone for the season. This time of year only full-time Florida residents are about. Everyone else is enjoying cooler weather in their northern climates.

“R” dock is one of many within the Burnt Store Marina. Beautiful location. The grounds are gorgeous and well maintained. There are several Banyan trees close to one another creating quite a canopy. I need to get a picture. With the root strands falling from the branches above keeping the trees anchored against heavy winds. Of course having been raised in south Florida, I recognize several of the plants. Others I just like the color and combination of plantings. Not many hibiscus but I was told they are a high maintenance plant and not generally chosen for landscaping. I did not know that.

Siblings, do you remember the “Sea Grape” bush in our back yard?  I remember waiting till the grapes were nice and purple before eating them.  Delicious!!  There are several Sea Grape Trees on the grounds.  One is close to where we park the car…

Sea Grape Tree – at least 15 ft tall.

The Grape clusters..

Grape clusters on the Sea Grape Tree

The question is… will the birds beat me to the grapes?!?!