Joe’s Bayou to St. Andrews Marina, Panama City, FL

It’s about the WEATHER!!!! We started early this morning, 6:26 am, the sun was rising as we raised the anchor and headed out of the bay. We noticed another trawler anchored in the outer bay as we left and spoke on the radio when they learned we were from Racine. He was born and raised about 3 blocks from our house and they currently live in Milwaukee, boat name “GiddyUp”.

The new replaces the old

The forecast was for east wind again this morning, then the front would pass and we would expect some rain and the wind would back to the north and the velocity would increase to 20 knots. The route was also interesting the first 20 miles in the Choctawhatchee Bay then 20 miles of canal called the “Grand Canyon of Florida” then to West Bay another fairly large body of water. Since the weather would digress toward the end of the day we started early. Nice light chop on the Choctawhatchee as expected, and the canal was well protected, but once we cleared the canal heading out into the bay the rain began in earnest and the wind picked up on our beam and soon we were rocking and rolling in 3 ft. seas on the beam. The wind was blowing so hard that even under the top with the windshield in place the helm chair and my backside were getting wet. I moved to the lower helm to get out of the weather as we bounced about. Finally, our course changed from east to southeast and finally to south, with the wind behind us the ride became much more comfortable and the rain stopped, the sun appeared and the seas calmed as we passed a narrows.

Florida Grand Canyon

St. Andrews Marina has very little protection from a north wind, just the shore that is a half mile away. We are a bit exposed but safely tied to a floating concrete pier, we celebrated with a fine meal at Uncle Earnie's Restaurant, "Where the locals go", near the marina, my chargrilled grouper was wonderful and Carol enjoyed her shrimp and scallops with white wine sauce, Key Lime Pie topped off the meal.

Extra sand for Florida Beaches

Pine trees tenaciously hanging on to the bank