We upped anchor at 8:30 AM to make sure no issues with being ready for the 9 AM bridge opening to exit the Simpson Bay lagoon at St Maarten on Sunday June 7, 2020 in the year of the ‘Rona. I was fully mentally ready to jump in the water and get to work if the anchor was stuck or something. Missing the opening would set us back until at least 2 PM and have some implications with the weather planning I had done. Plus there was another boat exiting we had communicated with to stay in radio contact during …
Category: Stuff We Do
Don’t Take the Typical Exumas Route-A Tale of Two Bahamas
Tale 1: Two years back we left the US for the Bahamas with a plan of seeing the Exumas of which we had heard so much. Like many cruisers, we had plans of going at least to George Town, had read our Van Sant book, and had our route in mind from studying our Explorer Charts. We picked our crossing window and after a few days made it over to New Providence Island like most guidance says. Sure, a lot of people say to skip over the Nassau area or New Providence all together, but the typical Exumas route is …
A Tale of Two ICWs
If you’ve been following along with us here on the blog or watching our YouTube channel, you know that we took the slowest approach to going north on the Atlantic ICW possible. This past spring we stopped at virtually every city or cool anchorage along the way north. We saw so many awesome places while meandering up the ditch with zero passages on the outside in the ocean from the Florida Keys all the way to Norfolk, VA. We did it that way because….well because the purpose of the trip was to see a bunch of places we hadn’t seen …
Holiday’s 2018 Summer Plan and Musings on Different Cruising Plans
Last year for our first summer living aboard Holiday, the original plan had been to cruise up the ICW and tour the eastern coast of the US. Our thinking was to ease into our new life before tackling big passages, see a bunch of cities we had never been to before, and hide in the Chesapeake or further north from hurricane season. After watching many friends leave Boot Key Harbor last winter and spring for the Bahamas and beyond, we changed our plans and decided to head for the islands. We had even made all the preparations to continue into …
2 and a half months in Boot Key Harbor Part 1
After realizing from our Keys cruising last year that the Boot Key Harbor mooring field in Marathon was by far the most protected, comfortable place in the Keys that also had the most fun stuff to do, we decided that this year we would just keep Holiday there through the winter and take side trips from time to time. Last year, we left the mooring field and took a tour of the lower Keys and Key West before returning to Boot Key and having to be on the waiting list for a while to get a ball back. It was …
Want a Fun on Holiday T-shirt!?
Hello all! We kept seeing people on other boats with shirts with their boat and boat name on them. We’ve been thinking, “We need some Fun on Holiday T-shirts too!” So, we designed some T-shirts for ourselves to wear and are putting together an order. The website we used allows for others to order some as well. There are some choices for regular, V-neck, and also a pullover hoodie. The group order goes in at midnight March 6th, 2018. If you are reading this past then, comment below, and when enough people want more, we’ll do another order. So, if …
A Guide to a Leisurely Trip across the Okeechobee Waterway
So, you’ve thought about crossing the state of Florida through the Okeechobee Waterway (or maybe you just want to read about our experience doing so and see some cool pictures). You’ve done a little research and read about locks, short bridges, shallow depths in Lake Okeechobee, or rough conditions in Lake Okeechobee. You’re wondering how narrow the canal is. Where do you stop? Is there room for anchoring? How many days should you allow for the crossing? Are there convenient, easy stops at regular intervals for the passage? Never seen a lock? Are they difficult? What about pirates? Ok, that …
10 Hours, and 20 Drawbridges, and the Presidential Exclusion Zone….Oh my!
After almost 2 weeks in Ft Lauderdale on the mooring ball, we were ready to get moving again. We had ordered parts and repaired quite a few things that had broken in the Bahamas: new anchor windlass motor ordered and installed, new propane solenoid control panel, repaired primary winch, etc. We had also spent a lot of time at the beach, seeing friends, eating out, shopping, and going to a couple of movies. Definitely a great intro back to the States. The plan was to head north in the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, go as far as we felt like during …