Florida Panhandle and Big Bend - December 2006
The
Florida Panhandle extends across the Gulf of Mexico below state of Alabama
almost to the city of Mobile. I never realized this until we did this
trip, but the distance from the tip of the panhandle near Pensacola along the top of Florida to
Jacksonville is actually a bit farther than the distance from Jacksonville down
the Florida Peninsula to Miami and the Keys.
I also never realized that Florida is in two time zones. The bulk of the state is in the Eastern time zone, but the portion of the panhandle that extends below Alabama is actually part of the Central time zone.
We left Mobile, Alabama with our friends Frank and Cindy aboard 'Peacekeeper'. We anchored out our first night off of Pirate's Cove which is just before the Florida border and had dinner in the Pirate's Cove restaurant and bar.
The place was literally crawling with dogs, despite a sign on the door that said 'No dogs allowed by order of the Alabama Health Department.' I asked about that and they said 'It's no problem, we just send the dogs outside when we know the inspectors are coming.' Hmmmm.... Anyway, I made friends with a huge hound named Tiki and that's a picture of Frank with Rusty. They did have wonderful pizza an cold beer (who could ask for more?). And yes, we did end up sharing some of our dinner with the pups - which you could probably guess by the way Tiki is licking her chops.
This part of the coast was hit hard by hurricanes a couple of years ago. We saw lots of grounded and abandoned boats as well as lots of new construction. Most of the new construction going up is condos, which seems to be the new blight of the east coast.
We spotted this new 'Rainbow' condo along the waterway.
We also saw lots of beautiful snow-white sand dunes dotting the Gulf side of the waterway.
We spent a couple of nights at the Palafox Marina near the old town in Pensacola. Like several of the marinas in the area, they were destroyed by the hurricanes of 2005 that devastated the Gulf area. This marina has been rebuilt and is a great place to stay in Pensacola.
Downtown Pensacola reminded us a lot of New Orleans with all of the decorative wrought iron in front of the old buildings.
Jeremy was happy to note that the Karaoke Bar downtown had posted his sign for an evening with with him leading the sing-a-long on Monday night. Well, maybe that's a different Jeremy...
Pensacola town hall. The clock out front was rescued from the clock tower of the old town hall before it was demolished and replaced with this new one.
Pensacola is home to the Pensacola Naval Air Station on which the US Naval Air Museum is housed. We were able to take a public bus onto the base to the museum where we spent a wonderful day looking at and crawling around all of the great aircraft and exhibits they hare there. The museum is free to the public, but they do require that you have a photo ID when you enter the base (an MP came on the bus to check our IDs when we got to the gate). The Pensacola Naval Air Station is the home of the Blue Angels, and the previous generation of their jets is displayed in the museum's atrium.
The museum is especially interesting because all of the aircraft are accessible for you to walk up close to and really get to see. They even have some where you cal climb inside, like this helicopter that I managed to climb into.
They also had the very first plane to successfully make it across the Atlantic ocean. No, not Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis. That plane is in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC. Charles Lindbergh was famous for making the first non-stop solo transatlantic flight on May 21, 1927.
The first plane to successfully cross the Atlantic was the NC-4 (shown in the picture below). Commanded by Albert Cushing Read with a crew of 6, the NC-4 left Rockaway New York on May 8, 1919 and successfully arrived in Lisbon, Portugal on May 27 after making stops in both Newfoundland and the Azores.
In our constant search for a better anchor, we found this one outside the museum as we were leaving. Unfortunately, I think is weighs more than our boat!
From Pensacola we headed east to Fort Walton Beach. This is a great town that is VERY boater friendly. They have a wonderful town dock that's free to stay at as long as you call the city manager and get permission. Fortunately, we had the phone number in our handy Skipper Bob guide. They even provide water and a free 'do it yourself' pump out station for boats staying there.
We had our first Florida dolphin escort as we came into Apalachicola. The dolphins love to ride the wake behind the boat. Jeremy thinks that the boat wake stirs up the fish so it makes feeding easier. I think they just want to play.
Apalachicola is a beautiful 'old Florida' town. This is a picture of the old 'Gibson Inn' hotel in downtown. We had lunch at the Apalachicola Grill under the gaze of a huge pink flamingo suspended overhead.
We were in Apalachicola for a couple of days waiting for the wind and waves to calm down so that we could start our way out into the Apalachee Bay and Florida's Big Bend. The Big Bend looks like a bite has been taken out of the Florida coastline on it's northwest side. Due to the topography in this area, wind and waves can stack up under certain weather conditions making the crossing to the west coast of Florida a bit rough.
Fortunately Apalachicola has a lot to offer the cruising boater. The town has a wonderful book store complete with a mini yarn store inside as well as a great cat 'Buddy' who's happy to sit in your lap for a cuddle if you let him. There's a cuban coffee shop that sells café con leche and has high speed WIFI internet available. There's also a great library that has PCs with internet as well as a great section of used books for sale. In short, many great ways to while away the time waiting for the weather to calm down.
This is a picture of one of the shrimp boats along the Apalachicola waterfront. It was cold while we were there (even the fisherman in the statue looks cold), and we were bundled up while we were wandering around town. I told Jeremy he looked like one of the 'boys from the hood.'
Apalachicola is also the home of John Gorrie, the physician, scientist, inventor, and humanitarian, who is considered the father of refrigeration and air conditioning. Dr. Gorrie's medical research involved the study of tropical diseases. He advocated the cooling of sickrooms to reduce fever and to make the patient more comfortable. He cooled rooms using ice in a basin suspended from the ceiling. Cool air, being heavier, flowed down across the patient and though an opening near the floor. This is a picture of a diorama showing how Dr. Gorrie would cool a sick room.
Since ice had to be brought by boat from the northern lakes, Gorrie experimented with making artificial ice. In 1845 he gave up his medical practice in order to have more time to work on developing a machine that could artificially make ice. He succeeded and was granted a patent for is ice-making machine in 1851. A model of this machine is shown below.
Impoverished, Gorrie sought to raise money to manufacture his machine, but the venture failed when his partner died. Humiliated by criticism, financially ruined, and his health broken, Gorrie died in seclusion on June 29, 1855. He is buried in Gorrie Square in Apalachicola. Of course, to those of us who bask in our air conditioned rooms (or boats!) during those very hot southern summers, he is a real hero!
We left Apalachicola very early in the morning (first light!). We needed to go out on a high tide (we were sitting on the bottom in the marina at low tide) - and unfortunately that meant a very early start.
Our plan was to head across Apalachee Bay to an anchorage in an area called Alligator Bay. From there we planned to make the jump to Steinhatchee. It was pretty rough once we were out into the bay, however, so we decided instead to head into the town of Carrabelle and spend some time there waiting for the weather to calm down even more. As with so many of the small towns we've been to along the way, this turned out to be another great stop.
Our first day there, we found this boat in town selling fresh shrimp. It was just about the best shrimp I've had in a very long time. On the way back to the marina, we came across the World's Smallest Police Station. Frank is displaying one of his shrimp next to the 'shrimp' of a station.
The evening we got there, the town was putting on a boat Christmas boat parade. Frank got out his Santa hat in preparation.
We had a front row seat for the parade in our marina.
And the boat that won the award for the best decorated in the parade was...
After a couple of days we finally had what looked like a pretty good (not great, but OK) window to get across the bay. We had to either go that day or face being stuck in Carrabelle for several more days. Normally we would have just stayed put, but we had booked a flight out of Tampa, so we were trying to get there in time to make our flight. Another early morning heading out. Fortunately it was pretty calm out on the bay when we left - at least at first...
As we got out farther off shore, the waves built until they were 4-6 feet. Nothing really that bad, but not that great either. There was a guy (Buddy) at the marina where we were staying that gave us some good information on how to get across. On his advice, we headed a north in order to get closer to the coastline as quickly as we could. Once we were closer to the west coast of Florida, the waves calmed down to about 1-2' which was A LOT better.
We got into Steinhatchee at about 3:30 in the afternoon and were greeted by this very cute blue-eyed boat with a great smile!
Steinhatchee house. The people here are SO friendly. When we passed by, they folks that live here came out on their balcony and yelled at us to come by for a visit when we got tied up at the marina. They also invited us to a Christmas party they were having the next night. Unfortunately we were only planning on spending one night in Steinhatchee, but it was very nice of them to invite us!
Leaving Steinhatchee, we headed south down to Crystal River. Coming into Crystal River we were thrilled to once again have a dolphin escort coming in. We probably had four or five dolphin swimming off the stern on either side of the boat. I ran back and forth with my camera and managed to get a few shots of them diving in and out of the water.
We also saw a small flock of white pelicans on the way in. We'd seen a few of these along the way on the Mississippi and Tennessee rivers. Once we got into Crystal River, we saw several of these 'weed eating' boats moving around. They're used to clean out the weeds growing in the channels so they don't foul boat propellers as you go through.
We stayed at a Pete's Pier marina in Crystal River. Nice marina with several live-aboard boaters staying there. We met a really nice couple in the boat next to us who were just getting ready to 'chop their dock lines' and go cruising full time in the next week. They were having loads of garage sales to get rid of all of the stuff they'd accumulated on their dock and in their storage unit while they'd been living on the boat there. I can SO relate to them! I still think that was one of the hardest things to do - getting rid of all of the stuff you accumulate while you're living on land (or permanently attached to land). Fortunately, I have many wonderful friends who either took the stuff we most cared about or were willing to store it in a basement or a corner of a garage while we're out playing (THANK YOU!!). The rest went to the Goodwill or the Salvation Army. Funny, with all of the stuff we got rid of, I can honestly say I don't miss any of it.
Crystal River, with it's many natural warm springs, is the home of many manatees. We took our dingy out for a spin to see if we could see them. We followed the tour boats and soon found several swimming in a small lagoon. Most of the shots below are of a mother and her calf that were lazily swimming around our dingy while we were there. What an amazing sight!!
You can just about make out their faces in these pictures I took as they swam closer to our dingy.
The mother came really close to the dingy and surfaced. Her back was covered with barnacles. The second picture is the baby swimming under the stern of our dinghy.
A close-up of the baby's face and the two of them swimming away after carefully checking us out.
Fall colors in the trees surrounding the lagoon.
Since Crystal river as so many manatees, most of the waterways are marked with slow speed signs. The biggest danger to the manatee is being hit by the propellers of speeding boats. As you leave the areas of highest concentration, the signs switch to 25MPH. I hope the manatees know that, since there is NO way they can get out of the way of a boat traveling at 25MPH. We were in no danger of getting a speeding ticket either. The most we can get out of Tardis these days is about 12MPH. We used to be able to go a little faster, but when we moved on board with all the stuff we kept we lost some speed. See, even more reason to be happy about getting rid of as much stuff as we did.
Leaving Crystal River, we headed south once again toward Tarpon Springs. Tarpon Springs was first settled in 1882 as a winter resort for wealthy northerners. It was incorporated as a city in 1887. The city is named for the tarpon, a fish that is found in abundance off the coast, but what it is known for is the prosperous sponge industry there.
John Cheney, an early resident of the area, discovered money could be made by harvesting the many sponges growing in the waters of the Gulf. Although Tarpon Springs was successful as a resort town, by 1890 the sponge business took over as the town's most important industry. The Cheney Sponge Company sold almost a million dollars worth of sponges that year. Over the next few years, Cheney brought in experienced divers from Greece. By using rubberized diving suits and helmets, the sponge harvest dramatically increased. By 1905, over 500 Greek sponge divers were at work in Tarpon Springs.
In the 1940s, the red tide blight dramatically reduced the growth of sponges in the area. By the 1950s, sponging as a profitable industry was nearly wiped out. However in the 1980s, new sponge beds were found and now, Tarpon Springs is back to being a leader in the world’s natural sponge market.
A shark gets Cindy's leg and a huge sea turtle in the Tarpon Springs city square.
We saw this great sponge fisherman stained glass door in a small house while walking around Tarpon Springs
Tarpon Springs has many great Greek restaurants. We had lunch one afternoon at one of them that also doubled as an antique store. The place was loaded with stuff all around the tables. Plenty of things to play with while waiting for your food to come, including this old 'Transformer' toy Jeremy found.
A couple of abandoned shrimp boats we saw outside of the Channel leading out of Tarpon Springs. Looks like they're leaning on each other for support in their dotage.
From Tarpon Springs, we headed south once again - but only for a few miles this time to the town of Dunedin. We had booked a slip for a month there as a place to leave the boat while we flew out of Tampa back to the SF Bay Area for the Christmas holidays. Wandering around the town of Dunedin, we spotted this neat Tiki Bar behind someone's house in town. I love the signs on the tree.
We saw this egret showing off his plumage on the top of a sign while walking around Dunedin one day.
Back in the Bay Area, we stayed out our friend Karen's house in Oakland. She was out of town visiting her mom on the east coast when we were there and offered to let us stay in her house and cat-sit our old cat, Sushi, while she was gone. It was great being able to spend time with Sushi. Jeremy also took advantage of the unlimited access to cable TV - something we don't have on our boat!
Updated January 4, 2007