Back to St. Pete’s!!!

I have been putting off posting until I can load pictures. Decided to just post words. It may be awhile until I get on a WIFI connection to handle pics.
We left Port of St Toe Monday morning. Yes, we renamed the place. Lily misread their sign due to the funky lettering and thought we were at Port of St. Toe so that is pretty much what we call it now. Most of the first day out was spent in the ICW. All morning was heavy fog and we passed small fishing boats sitting silently at anchor in the fog. The ICW dumped us into the Apalachicola River, into Lake Wimico and finally out into Apalachicola Bay. It was a very pretty route to the Gulf. In Lake Wimico, we were attacked by a horde of tiny insects which slowly accumulated in the cockpit until we were all covered up with them. Then, back in the River, they all disappeared. We reached the Gulf at nightfall.
We had light wind all night and through the day. We put the fishing lines out again. The lures drag through the water, forgotten behind the boat, until someone hears a line start reeling away. Someone calls out “Fish On” and everyone jumps up. Jake and Randall usually work the fish on to the back deck and Lily and I run for the gaff, gloves, filet knife and camera. We caught a beautiful King Mackerel this leg. As Uncle Joe says, we do a little “Filet and Release” fishing here and there.
We crept quietly at dawn under the Sunshine Skyway bridge Tuesday. We had anchored at Mullet Key for a few hours sleep after the overnighter from Port St. Toe-Joe. As we pulled anchor a light rain began to fall and we slipped back into the shipping channel without any ship traffic in sight. As we passed beneath the bridge, I read aloud to Jake, Lily and Randall the wikipedia entry on the Coast Guard Blackthorn tragedy which occurred at the bridge in 1980. While looking up bridge facts, I also read about the number of suicides off the bridge and of the ongoing efforts of the local police force to educate the public on how painful this death is. Yes, I had them all in a seriously contemplative state of mind.
We had no firm plans on where to go but the marinas are a little pricey on a day-to-day basis. We got a mooring ball in the downtown mooring field only to find out that, due to this weekend’s Grand Prix race, they are reserved for the weekend. We piled off the boat and walked to Harborage to catch up with friends there. The aforementioned Uncle Joe had movies ready and waiting for Lily. We stretched our legs and did a little fish watching with Uncle Joe, said Hi to Dylan and Tammy, Dave and Yvonne of SV Abundance and Jeff of SV Ohana. We walked home in the rain and spent the evening watching one of Uncle Joe’s movies for Lily.
The next day, we took the trolley to Haslem’s Book Store. We dropped by City Marina on the way back and Lily got in some playtime with Emily and Sam of SV Solomon Lee. We ended up at Witches BBQ and had a couple of flights of craft beer at Witch and Ale. We had been back to the boat only a bit when Lauren and Archer of SV T Maru dropped by to catch up and take a little boat tour of Foxtrot. They are on their way out of town so it was great to get to see them before they left.
We left the mooring ball Wednesday and got anchored in the Bayboro basin. Now we are catching up on work and running errands. Jake has a lead on some weekend work at the Grand Prix. Will post pics when the WiFi is up to the job. Miss everyone back home and glad to hear that Western Oklahoma has finally gotten some rain.