Crossing the Gulf

Every night at the C-Quarters marina is docktales on the porch. Since we have close to 30 boats doing the loop moored in the vicinity, it becomes quite a party. There is a lot of interaction with folks finding boating buddies to cross the gulf with. There are boaters that can go fast and will be crossing the gulf in daylight hours. We usually go 8 knots and it will take us 19 hours to cross. We have found a few other boats that will be going the same speed. We just need to coordinate the time of departure. Everyone has become a weather expert. There are a few favored websites for weather prediction. We prefer Windfinder, Predict Wind and Windy. The apps were indicating that December 11 and December 12 were good days to go. The swells were supposed to be from the north, northeast with a moderate swell and long wave period. Just the way we like it. It is recommended that we leave at 3:00 pm to arrive after 10 am so the sun is not in our eyes and we can spot the crab pots in the water.

We pulled out of our slip at Carabelle to stage at one of the barrier keys called Dog Island. After we anchored, boats kept coming out behind us. Pretty soon, it looked like we had a flotilla of 14 boats crossing to either Tarpon Springs or Clearwater. We chose Clearwater because there were no more slips available in Tarpon. We up anchored at 3:30 pm and were outside the channel by 4:00 pm to start a long 18 hour crossing of the gulf. The northwest wind gave us a following sea which increased our speed and made the boat toss from side to side. It was not a bad side swell, but we did not feel comfortable doing much other than driving the boat.

There were no clouds in the sky all night and the star show was incredible. We got an awesome sunset followed by a fabulous sunrise.

We did get a few winks of sleep during the night. We ended up having to slow down from our normal speed to arrive at that after 10 am window. As it was, the sun was bright and the reflection off the water obscured some of the many crab pots we cruised by to get to Clearwater Pass which is the entrance to the intercoastal from the gulf.

It was tiring, but a successful crossing without too many boat inflicted black and blue marks. We are booked into Clearwater marina for a week and plan to retrieve the van from Panama City. We made all the plans that included a rental car before finding out the parking lot at the marina is a municipal paid lot at $2.25 an hour. I can apply for a monthly pass at a considerable cheaper price. It is a shame that I would buy a monthly pass and used it for four days.

Florida is expensive for boating. It costs about $150 a day to stay at marinas. We really consider the safe harbor membership to be a money saver. In the last two weeks we have stayed 6 nights at Safe Harbor marinas and have reserved another 8 to be used before Christmas.