So, what have we been doing. On our arrival at Galati back in mid December we unloaded the motorcycle before we moved to our slip and made use of it almost everyday. I'm so glad I decided to bring it as it makes life so much easier having wheels.
 |
| Debbie was hard at work again and made this much needed cover for the BMW, and I helped! |
For the first week we were pretty much alone here and the weather was great so we rode the bike down to St Armand's Circle on Longboat Key and Debbie toured the expensive shops and came back empty handed!!
 |
| Having ice cream at Ben and Jerry's on St Armand's Circle. That's Ben & Jerry in the picture over my shoulder. |
We did the usual's like cruising the beachfront and West Marine too. We found a local flea-market produce place called Red Barn that has multiple fruit and veggie stands to keep us nourished. It's huge and well stocked with many different vendors and lots of people especially leading up to the Holidays. Brenda and Russ Cluett arrived on our second week and we had lots of fun dinners together both at their place and on the boat and went out to lots of local joints for live music and food, maybe a beer or three... This area has to be the King of Happy Hours. Cortez is where they stay and it has many very reasonable bars and restaurants from the Cortez Kitchen to Fire and Stone Pizza, Skinny's, Habatchi Super Buffet and Island Times. We covered many of them over the next three weeks, and didn't get to them all. As Russ says "Cortez is a small drinking village with a fishing problem"! We enjoyed it a lot.
Brenda, Russ and I went out on a charter fishing boat for a day excursion and we all caught enough fish to feed us during the day. Nothing very big but lots of fun with non stop action and great mates on the boat who took care of everything from supplying bait and tackle to advise and then cleaning and filleting everyone's catch at the end of the day. It inspired me enough that I bought a rod that Galati had in the Marina store and Chris Galati had his mate rig the rod and help me pick out appropriate tackle and gear to get me started fishing. Chris even gave me some trolling rigs as they had hundreds for their own sports fishing boats. Galati specializes in Sports Fishing boats and there was a 90 foot Viking on our dock and many other 60-80 foot Sportsfishes. I watched one day as they hauled oil down to Mr Grinch the 90 footer. It seemed that almost everyday there was someone or many people working on it. Anyways it takes 90 gallons of oil to do a complete oil change on that boat!! Well Debbie, Russ and I were out fishing Debbie made friends with the mate on Mr Grinch and scored a few pounds of Mahi Mahi, and black Grouper that they had frozen from their last trip. See she is a better fisherman than me! and it was all vacuum sealed and frozen too!
 |
| Our Fishing Charter crew |
 |
| Mr Grinch 90 foot Viking sports fish. Nice Graphics |
Debbie decorated the salon for Christmas and it looked great as always. We had a quite Christmas eve dinner with just Debbie and I and she made a fabulous tortiere pie with carrot cake for dessert. Yum yum. We even had chow chow made by Les Seguins to go along with the tortiere pie. On Christmas day Russ and Brenda joined us for Roast Beast dinner and carrot cake for dessert. It was nice to spend an important holiday with such good friends.
 |
| Tortiere Pie and Chowchow |
 |
| Debbie's Christmas decorations |
 |
| Debbie's son Kris and daughter in law Angela sent a Christmas care package that had a rough ride getting here. |
 |
| Abby got a new toy in the care package |
 |
| And then all of these goodies. Thanks Chris and Angela |
 |
| My sister Angela sent more goodies. Excellent fudge which we are still eating. Goes really well with red wine! |
I had a tooth aching and found a local dentist who diagnosed that I had a minor gum infection and that I need a deep cleaning and some antibiotics placed under the gums. I knew that the cleaning job I had done in Fairhope wasn't up to the usual standards and ended up paying the price. Anyways its all taken care of and feels much better. Surprisingly Yelp has worked very well for finding local Doctors and Dentists, at least most of them.
On New Years Eve Russ and Brenda came and picked us up at the boat for a cruise over to their place and then a fantastic Shrimp, crab. lobster, scallop boil out on the patio at their place with Jim and Miranda their friends and neighbors at the development they stay in. Debbie made a beautiful Cherry Pie with lattice crust for dessert that was enjoyed by all. An enjoyable evening but we didn't even get close to midnight. In bed by eleven I think. Brenda kindly drove us home so no drinking and driving.
 |
| Debbie's Cherry Pie |
 |
| Brenda is making lobster bibs for us all. |
 |
| New Years Eve dinner and celebration |
 |
| Russ' chopper. All 50ccs of it |
On another day Russ called and asked us if we wanted to join them for fishing on the Rod and Reel Pier. Its about a mile away from our boat so we headed over and tried our luck at the fishing. For $2 they give you a rod and reel and bait. The beer is dirt cheap but alas there were no fish biting. Good thing the beer was cheap.
 |
| Russ and I at the Rod and Reel |
 |
| Abby is popular wherever she goes and here was no exception. Helping us fish and looking cute |
Debbie and I made a day of a visit to the Mote Marine Aquarium and Research Center at New Pass on Longboat Key. Alligators, Turtles, Sharks, Coral and lots of fish. They had playful Sea Otters and there were many (I mean lots) of volunteers who helped to interpret all of the things there were to see. We had a late lunch at the New Pass Grill after our visit, lime beers and cheeseburgers in our own paradise.
 |
| One of the sea turtles |
 |
| Sardines in the shark tank. They swim fast! |
 |
| Lunch after the Mote Marine visit |
The motorcycle has been very well behaved but Kelly one of the dock workers at Galati asked me about the rear tire and what I had done to wear all of the tread off of one side of the rear tire. That got my attention and when I looked sure enough worn right down to the threads but not on the bottom of the tire but on the side. I think this was probably caused by under-inflation and too much wine. Too much wine? Well I have taken the motorcycle to Total Wine quite often and I can carry over 24 bottles of wine and 6 or so half gallons of liqueur so that weighs quite a lot and with the under-inflated tire probably that's what did it in. I found a BMW dealer in Sarasota and scheduled a tire change with them for the next day, Saturday just before Christmas. The fuel gauge had stopped working a while ago and I was relying on the odometer to tell me when to fill up. I asked them about it and when they checked the warranty info they found it was covered for 12 years and we scheduled taking care of that the following week. That's on a 2008 BMW almost 10 years old. Otherwise it was over $500.00 to fix it. Lucky :) They also lent me a BMW 1200 scrambler to take out for a test drive and breakfast. I went to the downtown area of Sarasota and had a nice breakfast and when I got back my bike was ready to go. Hap's Cycles in Sarasota, great guys. Thanks.
On one particularly nice day Debbie and I rode the BMW down for a tour of Siesta Key and Casey Key. We stopped at two marinas in Venice and made our choice to book at the Crow's nest in Venice for our next stop. We will be there for a week until my niece and her boyfriend Greg arrive for 7-10 days as we cruise further south in a few weeks. We stopped at the north Jetty Fish Camp on the south end of Casey Key for a beer at the Camp. This place has been here forever and the structure they are in was once a streetcar in Tampa. Its really old and you can still see the wood interior of the streetcar on the ceiling. Our family started coming to Casey in 1966 so I have many fond memories of this area and it always feels like coming home.
 |
| North Jetty Fish Camp. I've been coming here for 52 years. Wow!! |
 |
| Best Wishes for a Happy New Year to All |
 |
| Our last evening on Anna Maria Island at the Waterfront Restaurant Excellent place and we bicycled over and back. |
Well after a month of enjoying Anna Maria Island we are underway again but not going far. We said our goodbyes to all the great people at Galati and thanked them for their hospitality. I tried to give Miren the dockmaster (dockmistress) $20 for helping us over the past month but she would have nothing to do with it. I told her I might want to come back next year and wanted to make sure I was still welcome. We got pumped out on our departure and are now ready to move to the Crow's Nest in Venice.
