The Rest of The Story- Part 2

From Appalachicola we headed down the ICW towards home. The panhandle has been getting quite a bit of rain while we were gone and there was a lot of debris floating around. We had to stay on constant watch to avoid downed trees and other nasty looking flotsam. We'd hate to have sailed so far to be done in by a floating car part!! The only concern we had was a bridge that is charted as 50 feet. Since our mast is 48.5 feet we were afraid that the high water would be too much. We made it up to the bridge, anchored out for a nap and went under at low tide. From there we stopped at St. Andrew's YC. It is a nice club that we have enjoyed several times in the past. It's a long walk into town but we are used to going a mile or so to have breakfast, catch a bus, etc so we enjoyed our last morning out.

The boat seemed like it was ready to get home. Since Carrabelle, it has run like a scalded dog. We even managed to average over 6 knots for the last 59 mile run back to FWYC. (Ok, you motor boaters, stop laughing, that really is fast for a cruising sailboat.) We made it back to our slip about 7pm on Thursday the 28th. We had enough energy to tie up the boat and have a drink at the bar. We hauled a van full of stuff home then cleaned ourselves up and tried to sleep in this bed that refused to rock us to sleep. Everybody asks what it is like to be back. We had a truly wonderful time out exploring and learning about cruising but it's good to be home, too. It is very weird to see things around town that seem unchanged since March. It is weird to drive again and this house is now much larger than when we left. We still have a lot to do like process 2 months worth of mail and remove untold layers of cat hair from everything but we're still glad to be home. We've already started talking about where we want to go next and what repairs/changes we need to make beforehand.

I'd like to say that the house is all back in order and so is the boat but I don't like to lie. The laundry is all done and you can see most of the table tops but that's about it. The boat is much cleaner and most of the storage bins are all nice and clean but we're still working on maintenance issues. We pumped and flushed clean the holding tank and we'll pull the head tomorrow and start that lovely job. I leave for Texas on Wednesday so we'll get as much done as possible before I take off. I will add some more details about living aboard as time allows.