This time we were traveling to Fisherman’s Village which is located in Punta Gorda on the north end of Charlotte Harbor.  It is about a 50 mile trip from our place.  Fisherman’s Village is also a good destination by car, if you like to shop.  There are also 5 different water side restaurants to go to.

So we start our travels to the marina early.  The weather is pretty nice, not too much wind. We pass a couple of big boats.   this guy was anchored for the night.  I suppose it is pretty spendy to pull that thing into a marina.

Then this one passed us

Koochie mama!

Oooooouuuu! Pretty!  Nice name too

Drinkability

One thing boaters everywhere do ;).  Docktails!

The water was a little rough in Charlotte Harbor for a while.  I apparently drank too much coffee cause I could feel that sloshing around in my stomach with every wave we hit. 

Luckily that didn’t last too long and we finally arrived at the marina.  There were a few boats in front of us (we all seem to arrive at the same time even though we all leave from our home ports at different times), so we waited outside of the maria for our turn

Entrance to the marina

When it was our turn, Captain Gary was at the helm and I was managing the lines.  After a few lassos of the pilings, we were……

Snug as a bug

They did have quite a tide here which caused our boat to rise and lower with the tide.  When we got back to our boat at night, it was quite the jump down to get on the boat.  That’s what you get for having a small boat I guess.  Better fuel consumption but not too good for low tides.

After we got all tied up, we made our way to the marina office to pay.  We passed the dingy dock (in case you don’t know what a dingy dock is, the dock is for people who anchor out in the bay and then take their small boat into the maria to get provisions, eat out, grocery shop etc.).  I think this boat has been at this dock way too long

Boat at dingy dock

And I mean waaaay to long.  Look….

Eeeeuuuw!

all that mud in the bottom of the boat.  Nasty!

Here is another one

Life Jacket

This one appears to be in better shape and even has a life jacket in it.  But what is that?

Stow away

Whoops, there is a stow away in that one.  So did he jump in there and couldn’t get out or was he too small to bother with and was just left there?  Either way, after sitting out in the hot sun I am sure no one is going to want to eat that thing.

Fisherman’s Village not only has a marina but each little colorful building, which are all connected by a roof between them, have hotel rooms on the top and shopping below.

Marina and Shops

So if you’re bored, and you don’t feel like swimming in the pool, you can always entertain yourself by checking out all the shops.

Anyway, while we were there, it was reeeaaaally hot.  There was a pool, but not much shade for lit’l ol’ me, so I found this nice little spot at the end of the dock

Very colorful

Nice big shady spot and super windy, which kept it nice and cool.

One of the morning, while we still had a little more shade in the boat, I was sitting on the back deck of the boat when I saw this little stow away

Another stow away

Thankfully he wasn’t stowing away on our boat.  Cute little guy though.

Of course we always have to take a picture of our boat at every marina we stay at

Lookin good

We wouldn’t want to break tradition.

Can you see that guy on the dock behind our boat with the salmon colored shirt and the lady that is with him?  The lady is totally blind.  She has a degenerative what ever it is called to her eyes.  She could see before but then her vision got smaller and smaller until she finally can’t see at all.  Impressive that she can still boat.  She even throw the lines.  Her sense of hearing is great as she recognized Gary and I by our voice, after only one meeting.

This lady here, she is a good friend of mine

Gimpy

and some of you people from Sunnyside might recognize her.  She cracked a bone in her foot and is wearing one of those boots.  Remember that low tide I was telling you about?  She had some problems getting on and off her boat too.  See what troopers we have in our boat club?  They go boating no matter what ;).

Well, another marina checked off our list.  We have another new one next month so TTFN 😉