We have been in Florida now for over two weeks! We stayed at Harbortown Marina on Merritt Island Florida for a week to do some repairs from damages we incurred on our trip South.  Habortown Marina was great—very quiet, with nice facilities and a very friendly staff.  Very buggy though—I managed to get chiggers somehow at some point during our stay here. Although some will say I got them from a strip club that we ended up at one night while in Cocoa Beach, I imagine I got the walking through the grass somewhere at the Marina.  The mosquitos and no see em’s were pretty bad in the area too, although I was too busy scratching at my chiggers to really know if I was bit by anything else.

After our week in Merritt Island/Port Canaveral area, Ridge and I headed South to Palm Beach.  This was our first overnight trip with just the two of us…EVER.  It went well and we were able to sail most of the trip south.  Other than the occasional bickering which will from now on be referred to as “catfighting” (get it? because we are on a catamaran…moving on) we actually did quite well.  As I am writing this blog we have now been on the hook at an anchorage here in Palm Beach for five or six days.   Palm Beach is STUNNING and… no BUGS! The water is so clear here you can see right to the bottom.  There is an island not far from our anchorage, called Peanut Island, that has pretty beaches, great walking paths, a museum, snorkel area and campground.  We stopped in at Peanut Island not knowing about any of the aforementioned so did not bring a swim suit or snorkel gear (boo), but would love to go back as we saw some beautiful fish in the snorkel lagoon.

Last night we had some  friends drop anchor right next to us and we went over this morning and had breakfast and chatted about heading towards the anchorage near West Palm Beach.  This anchorage has a free city dock near by for the dingy and transportation all over the city.  Also, we were told there are some Christmas sand sculptures there which I am so excited to see as it doesn’t feel like the holidays down here with this warm weather.

Also, during our dingy excursion yesterday we met a local man, Cal, who also has a Fountaine Pajot Venezia 42! He is the one who told us to avoid the dingy dock we had been going to because it is sketchy and to head to West Palm.  Cal also drove Ridge and I to the hardware store to get some oil for the watermaker–super nice guy! Cal also called us last night and invited us to raft up next to him and some other boats and join them for Thanksgiving! Super excited about that and looking into what I can bring from our canned goods to contribute.

Time is flying by— we fly to freaking Australia next week and I am still doing some last minute booking and planning for that trip.  I purchased our tickets for our flight to Atlanta (we fly out of ATL to SYD) from Ft. Lauderdale and the rental cars in between.  Things are moving along nicely.  Still have been too busy to think about the fact that I will be on a plane for 24 hours straight, but I think I am just too excited to care at this point.