St. Petersburg Yacht Club
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St. Pete beach, photo courtesy of John Gottwald!
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March 27, 2015
Music at Farmers Market
St. Petersburg has become one of our favorite ports. The city is vibrant and beautiful, we have enjoyed good restaurants, theater, cultural, arts and music events. One Saturday, we attended a chili cook off at a bar a mile and a half from the marina near Tropicana Field, home of the Tampa Rays. There were 40 different types of chili and the proceeds went to send kids to band camp.
St. Petersburg has bike paths everywhere including the Pinellas Trail that runs for miles. Mike has been exploring many of them. Every Saturday we walk or ride our bikes to a huge farmers’ market. Not only is there food, arts and crafts, there are several different music venues. It is the largest farmers’ market that we have attended.
St. Petersburg has bike paths everywhere including the Pinellas Trail that runs for miles. Mike has been exploring many of them. Every Saturday we walk or ride our bikes to a huge farmers’ market. Not only is there food, arts and crafts, there are several different music venues. It is the largest farmers’ market that we have attended.
Red Baron Regatta 2015.
We were pleased to be a part of the annual get together of MORF racers, held at Jane and John Gottwald's beautiful home in Pass-A-Grille, St. Pete's Beach.
On St. Patrick’s Day, we attended a Block Party hosted by a local Irish Pub. We had a little trouble getting there because many of the roads have been altered to accommodate the Grand Prix race that runs through part of the town. For the past several weeks, the barriers for the track are being erected. It has been amazing to watch the streets we normally rode our bikes on turned into a race track. The race is held the last weekend of the month. Mike was given tickets for the race while he was talking to a man about one of the race cars on display.
Of course the main reason we come to Florida is the weather. All winter we watched storm after storm sweep across the county. Our hearts went out to our friends who live on their boats in Washington DC and in the Carolinas as the temperatures plunged and snow covered the ground. We did hunker down a few days as our temperatures hovered in the high 30’s, but mostly refrained from mentioning our cold to our northern family and friends. Mike complained briefly about our weather to his mother in Michigan, who then called him a wimp.
Harborage Marina, our temporary home, is on the outer edge of downtown. Across a small cove in front of us is the University of South Florida St. Petersburg; we can watch the sailing team practice in the cove and an occasional sailboat will anchor there as well. We have seen a school of dolphin on a feeding frenzy in the cove as well as many birds. We have a heron that patrols our dock. Several evenings we have been startled when he noisily makes us aware of his presence. Despite the snobbery of our heron, we have enjoyed the friendly atmosphere of the marina. There is a core of people who live on their boats, some for the winter season, while others are here all year long. We have enjoyed making new friends. Francie and Marta, a fellow boater, decided to have a party for Fat Tuesday. The management was very supportive and has instituted Friendly Friday, a monthly party for the marina residents. Volunteers are being recruited to continue the parties after we leave.
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New shades for our new windows!
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Early in our stay in St. Petersburg, we had two major events to celebrate. The first was Mike becoming part of the “47%” when he signed up for Medicare. People have told him it is one of life’s milestones like getting a driver’s license at 16. Our second big event was celebrating Francie’s 60th birthday. The celebrating started in Ft. Lauderdale with good friends Kathy, Aldona and Bob and finally concluded in March when Francie’s sisters Margaret and Ellen visited for a long weekend. It was a milestone event for her, but since most of our friends are older, they were just happy welcoming her to the “old people’s club.” We also became “great” uncle and aunt when Mike’s niece Danielle became a mom to Hayden.
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Sisters!
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Our mascot until we delivered it to Pat & Kristine in Brookfield as a thank you for being our post office for the last 4 years!
Speaking of the elderly, we are now official residents of Florida, the state whose major import is old people. We have lamented several times about leaving one state with governor issues (how many Illinois governors have spend time in prison) to another state where the governor has reportedly prohibited government employees from mentioning the words “Climate Change.” Francie refuses to call our governor by his last name and refers to him as “He Who Cannot Have My Name” or Lord Voldemort from Harry Potter. She ruminates about finally changing her name from Scott to Sheridan.
Not sure how this picture fits any narrative, but it is something you don't see everyday!
Our original plan for spring was to travel to New Orleans. After multiple phone calls with agents and insurance companies, we decided the insurance would be too expensive to stay in the Gulf and Florida because of the hurricane season. Now we are going to take the intercostal waterway down the coast and visit places we have never been. By May we hope to be in St. Augustine and spend a month before traveling back to Beaufort, SC for the summer.