Sailing on Katapoul

Still unemployed and loving every minute of it :)
Although i must admit, except for the occassional small child... I'm the youngest at this here Starbucks by about 30 years on average.... perhaps 40 years....
Now unemployed I've taken up Chai Tea with soy milk drinking to get my internet fix in ;)
Any ways... haven't been doing much work (okay, no work) on Athena...

BUT, i have gotten some sailing in!!!!
Tampa Bay to Naples on Captain John's S/V Katapoul. A great trip!
The log is presented on my Captain's Log blog ;)
here are some of the pics...
The first pic is Capt. John dinghy-ing out against the wind and waves to the sailboat with all of our stuff... The sailboats are in Davis Island Bay in the northeastern tip of Tamp Bay.
Lots of pics of the Sunshine Skyway crossing Tampa Bay... How often does one get to pass BENEATH the Sunshine Skyway, aye ;) This bridge frightens me to no end to drive over!


Captain John looking up at the skyway...








Be sure to note "well placed" dirty dish towels ;)
I think these are part of "the look" of a sailboat that has been "taken over by poor hippies" and not well taken care of... this "look" is to thwart otherwise thieves that might be more interested in a nicer looking boat ;)




On the other side of the skyway... exiting Tampa Bay. Take a look at the "tiny" bus on the bridge...

Tankers exiting too. We had to watch out for tankers as we were traveling through Tampa Bay and crossing the shipping channels.



Egmont Key just outside of Tampa Bay. A very pretty island.
With the weather of the day, I felt like I was back "home" in New England... cold and damp and cloudy ;) sorry New Englanders ;p



North Captiva Islands.
The sun sorta came out for a bit and brought the tropical greenblue color out in the waters.


Shrimper off of Ft. Myers Beach. This is a pic of a smaller shrimper, most of the shrimp boats we saw were much larger than this one.







Jen on deck before sunset beyond Naples.
I love spending time on deck. John liked to spend time down below.
In the background, George, the wind vane (evidenced from chain on tiller and small metal vertical sail at stern) is steering Katapoul ;)


Sunset at Naples just before reaching Gordon's Pass...
The Gulf has the most beautiful sunsets! even when you can't see the sun ;)
The wind and waves starting to pick up again...

As John noted, many people on shore probably enjoying the sunset with sailboat ;) we're probably in a lot of visitor's pictures ;p