2018: St James City to Fort Myers Beach FL

12/5/2018
Depart: St James City Anchorage 9:00
Arrive: Salty Sam's Marina, Fort Myers Beach, FL 10:55
Distance: 10 NM

The temperatures dropped overnight. Good thing we closed all the windows on the boat before retiring last night. We woke to 59 degrees with a lot less humidity today. On the quite literally "bright" side, we had sun and not fog! Strong winds blew in over night. Since we would be crossing some open water, Clark said we should get an early start to avoid worse winds later.

As we crossed the inlet, the winds blew against our port side. Fortunately, with the full enclosure we were protected. Otherwise, the 25 knot winds from the north would have given us quite a chilly ride.

Crossing San Carlos Bay Inlet

We watched the channel markers closely to be sure we traveled the correct route. A false move around could lead to a serious grounding! As we headed towards Fort Myers Beach, we heard someone call to another boater on the VHF, "Boater just entering the Miserable Mile, you are on the wrong side of that red!" Clark and I agreed we did not want to be that guy!

Yikes! I see land on the wrong side of this marker!
Talk about "high and dry"!

Clark decided to get fuel before heading to our marina. We stopped at Ballard, Inc back in 2015 and got a good price on diesel, so he decided to go there again. While there fueling up, I had a very interesting conversation with the 71-year-old person serving us fuel. He said to me, "I bet you never met a cowboy working a fuel dock before."

From there it only got more interesting, when he decided to show me the gun he was packing. He said due to drug problems in the area, the local police told him they actually want him to be packing. As we talked, he told me more about himself, his ability to defend himself, his inability to feel pain, and a story of how he, afraid he would do her some damage, was coerced into a match with a 13-year old girl with green belt who shocking-to-him whooped his a$$.

He pretty much talked non-stop. His tales also included a rather sad story about his family history as relates to gun carrying. It turned out to be the most interesting fuel stop I have ever had. Meanwhile, as I listened intently to his stories, I periodically called out the gallons registering on the pump to Clark, so he would know when to stop fueling.

When Clark paid for the fuel, he asked the "cowboy" about the white building there and got a bit of a history lesson in return. Turns out the building was used as an ice factory back in the day when shrimp / fishing boats needed to buy large quantities of ice. After the boats got refrigeration units, the ice factory closed down. The 71-year-old cowboy had been a "shrimper" in his day and knew all about the business.

Old Ice Factory and Diesel Fuel Dock

As we pulled away from the fuel dock, I asked Clark if I should remove my headset. He surprised me by saying, "Probably not. Salty Sam's is right there in front of us." With that, I ran to go prepare my lines for docking.

I looked but could not see anything that looked like a marina sign for Salty Sam's Marina. What I did see directly in front of me was a big ole pirate ship. Up front, it looked like a man climbing the rigging. As we got closer, I confirmed my thinking that it was only a dummy hanging onto the lines. On the far side, a skeleton clung to the rigging.

"Pieces of Eight" Pirate Ship at Salty Sam's Marina

Not 15 minutes after we completed taking on fuel, we were secure in our slip for the night at Salty Sam's marina. Since they have been watching our travels, Jim and AC, our friends on "Hour Plan", contacted us a few days ago and suggested we get together in Fort Myers Beach. As soon as we docked, I messaged Jim to let him know we had arrived, and we made arrangements to get together for dinner.

Once we got the boat settled, Clark and I walked up and took a look at the marina. Fort Myers Beach is a resort-type town, and the marina is definitely in the spirit of things with all their colorful decorations.

A little Christmas spirit mixed in.

The Salty Sam's Marina is big on pirates. To go with their pirate ship at the docks, they have lots of pirate "stuff" on display.

One of the boats on the dock we are using is decorated for the holidays.

This looks like the dog from the "Grinch Stole Christmas" movie.

Around 4:30 we started to hear lively music and realized, as we saw lots of folks walking down the dock, that the pirate ship was about to set sail for this evening's sunset cruise. Clark came back from taking pictures and asked, "Are all pirates Irish? It sounds like they are playing all Irish music."

"Pieces of Eight" getting ready to set sail.

Man in the rigging is a life-sized dummy. 

Shortly after the pirate ship set sail for their sunset cruise, Clark got busy with our camera getting sunset pictures for the blog.

Jim and AC rented a car to drive over from Fort Myers where they are staying for a couple of months. They arrived around 6:00 at our boat as planned and then drove us to the Dixie Fish Company restaurant for dinner.  What a surprise we had when we found two more boating couples, that we know, there waiting to say hello. AC and Jim had decided to keep it a secret and surprise us with a small group get together.

Jim and Mandy - "Shell Belle"
AC and Jim - "Hour Plan"
Clark and Ev - "Sunset Delight"
Karen and Mark - "Captain's Choice"

We had a great time and lots of laughs over dinner. Karen and Mark are from Buffalo, New York. It would appear that the Fort Myers area is a Mecca for people from Buffalo. As we sat eating, not one but two couples from Buffalo came over to say hello to Karen and Mark. They just happened to be at the same restaurant at the same time. What a coincidence!

Jim had used the rental car to bring the six of them over from Fort Myers, dropped Jim, Mandy, Karen, and Mark off at the restaurant, and then drove over to collect us. After saying our farewells at the restaurant, Jim drove Clark and me back to Salty Sam's and then returned to pick up the rest of the group to return them to Legacy Marina in Fort Myers.

As Clark and I walked the docks back to our boat, Clark grabbed a couple more pictures before putting the camera away for the night.

Doggy shown in picture above - now lit up for the night

Christmas Sailboat reflection