Sunday, February 17, 2013 – Captiva:

            We never did eat any dinner last night.  We had a little bowl of cottage cheese and fruit, watched a little television, then went to bed.  And I’m telling you the wind howled, the boat rocked around in the slip, and the temperature dropped to 38°.  Where the heck is Florida?  The wind was howling so loud, we woke up around 2:30 a.m., decided we were finally hungry, ate a bowl of cereal, and checked out what weird stuff was on the TV at that time of the morning, then went back to bed.  Woke up again around 7:30 a.m., the wind was still blowing “like stink” (about 30 knots!), and we turned on the heat! 

            We thought about going up to the restaurant for breakfast, and decided to call our friends (who don’t have heat on their boat) to suggest either they join us up there or come over here to our boat for coffee and English muffins.  They opted to come over to our boat, and we sat around and talked about the weather.  We are all wearing turtleneck shirts, sweatshirts, long pants, socks, and sweaters!  I sort of feel sorry for the people who paid a lot of money to come here to this resort expecting warm, summer-like temperatures to escape the colder temperatures up north.  For this, we could all have stayed home!

            After breakfast, Bonnie and I decided to walk to the little Chapel by the Sea for their morning church service.  We couldn’t convince the guys to go with us, so I guess they just did guy things on the boats while we were attending church.  I put on a jacket over my sweatshirt and heavy sweater, plus a hat and off we went.  It was only about a 10-minute walk, and we arrived early enough to walk around the cemetery before finding a seat inside.  This is really a lovely little church, and it was packed.  The inside of the church was full, and they had set up chairs outside for those church-goers who wanted to sit out in the sun.  Bonnie and I decided it was way too cold to sit outside in spite of the sun, and luckily found a seat inside.  There were people from all over (they had name tags if you so chose).  I saw name tags from Vermont and Maine, and some people were dressed up and some in “boat” clothes.

            The outside of the little church is white and the inside is white also with white linoleum tile and white wooden pews.  It’s very small with just enough room for an organist and maybe a small choir although they didn’t have a choir on this Sunday. The minister gave a nice sermon about “being prepared,” and I couldn’t help but compare it to how “prepared” you must be on a boat!

            After the service, there was a local art exhibit at the community center, and we walked over and admired the art work.  Most of it was actually very nice – mostly local scenes painted by the artists who were in attendance and eager to tell you all about their work. 

            Then we walked back to our boats and parted company for the afternoon to do respective chores.

            Bob and I did the usual of playing cards, reading, naps, and whatever else.  I found out later that our friends hit the pool and found a wonderful sunny spot out of the wind and spent the afternoon there even if they did have to wash clothes in between relaxing by the pool.

            We promised to meet up again at 5:30 for a drink and then go to dinner at the Crow’s Nest.  We solved all the world’s problems again and swapped boat stories again.  They are wonderful friends and we really enjoy being with them and are grateful that we were able to spend time with them at this marina.

Our friends - on their sailboat

            It is still cold, but the wind has, thankfully, died down, and we anticipate leaving tomorrow sometime before noon.  We’ve had a memorable time in Captiva.  Our destination is either Cabbage Key or Pelican Bay – it seems like the plans change from weather forecast to weather forecast, but that’s boating.  It also looks like we may be hanging out with our friends again for a couple of anchorages until we, each, have to turn around.  Wow!  Those are unusual words, but they are coming closer and closer!

            One more word about phone addiction.  As we were all huddled together in our boat this morning with the heat on, it seems as though at one particular time we each happened to be glued to our cell phones!  What did we ever do without them, and how would we ever be able to get along without them?? 

Cell-phone addiction!