"AIN'T NO SUNSHINE WHEN YOU'RE GONE...."

We left our home port of Titusville, Florida on Thursday, December 10th, and headed south on the Intracoastal Waterway. The weather was overcast, windy and threatened rain. It wasn't great traveling weather, but at least the wind was coming from the North, which pushed us along at record speed.

We anchored out each night and in the first three days of traveling had covered 136 miles.

One of our favorite anchorages is at West Palm Beach. It's near the winter home of my brother, Allen, and his wife, Dorie. The night we anchored there, we enjoyed dinner at their home and met Dorie's brother, Jim, and his wife, Geri. It was a great evening.

The next morning, as we pulled our anchor and motored out of the anchorage, a friend on a neighboring boat whom we had just met the night before, stood on the deck of his boat and serenaded us with, "Ain't no sunshine when you're gone..." We chuckled all the way out of the anchorage.

The engines have been overheating at times, for no apparent reason, so we stayed "inside" on the ICW rather than taking the faster route off shore. This section of the ICW has many drawbridges and we had to negotiate 20 of them between Palm Beach and Ft. Lauderdale.

Some of the bridges open on demand, but most have scheduled openings every 30 minutes. The timing is a challenge. If you arrive at a bridge too late, you find yourself treading water for a half hour, waiting for the next opening. On the other hand, it's good practice to attempt to hold 11,000 pounds of boat in one place, especially when there's much wind or current.

We arrived in Ft. Lauderdale with ample time to prepare for a visit from our son, Andy, and his girlfriend, Jill. They flew in from Seattle to spend a few days with us.