Okeechobee then Home Sweet Home

We took the now familiar route through the Okeechobee Waterway back to our boat storage yard, Glades.  Many speak disparagingly of "the ditch" but we've come to enjoy this route for the off-the-beaten-trackedness of it, if that's a word.  It is quite remote with much wildlife.  There were enough birds around to bring Alfred Hitchcock to mind.  In one stretch, from Clewiston to Moore Haven, we saw a baby alligator every hundred metres or so.  Steely little eyes upon us as we approach then slowly submerge as we pass by.

Well, at least I saw them.  This was still Jeffy's birthday week and the big thing for him on his birthday weekend is to kick back and watch the Masters golf tournament.  So I shooed him away from the helm for the day and banished him to the salon to watch tv.  Every once in awhile he'd come up stressed, I had turned a corner and he lost reception.  Occasionally, he'd have to follow the news feed on line for a bit until the course straightened out again and the tv reception came back.

We enjoyed several quiet nights at anchor on the Waterway, watching the fish jump and the birds dive and keeping an eye on where that pesky alligator had slinked away to -- there always seems to be one around us when we anchor on the Okeechobee.  After a few days out we nipped into River Forest Yacht Centre for a pump out and ran into friends Kent and Jane (M/V Rising Tide). They were in the final stages of selling their boat and switching to RV life.  It was pretty emotional for them. Our boats often get to feel almost like family.  It was interesting to us as we're thinking Gran Vida may be next in line for the broker.

Our boating buddy Michele (M/V Just Us) generously offered to pick us up from River Forest and drive us into Fort Myers so we could pick up our car and do the visiting circuit of our friends. It was so nice to catch up with our boating buddies in the area. The next morning Jeff moved the boat up river to Glades Boat Yard on his own and I met him there with the car for our last night aboard Gran Vida for season five.

First thing in the morning we were hauled and we tucked her away for her summer's nap, which is feeling pretty routine after five years.  We were on the road headed North by noon.

On her hurricane stands!

We hear it's still cold up home in Canada.  We've got jackets ready and boots packed in the car.  To be honest, I'm looking forward to swapping them out for my flip flops for awhile.  We are so blessed.  Not a bad gig we've got going but I do love the early spring as the ice goes out and everything turns green again.

Driving home through the mountains of West Virginia.

 The gears are shifting. We're getting our "home jam" on. Until next season, wishing you a Gran Vida.