Greater Tampa Bay... 4-1-11

Leaving Venice...  This morning was peaceful and a little damp from last nights lightening filled rain.  (No they don't fill the drops with lightening they sandwich it in between).  I cleared out of the Fisherman's Wharf Marina early trying to get past the Sunshine Skyway Bridge for the night.  Today was back to the fairly uneventful motor cruising I so don't really care for in the inter coastal.  One thing I did notice is the amount of fully laden boats.  Almost all had rental signs for CB's or Siesta Key.  They also had from 1-4 Adults and the remaining portion of the sardine can stuffed with 6-487 children!  Biggest "Family" boating area of the trip.  Why not, you can rent a boat for 12 or more days a year with no worries and still be cheaper than buying one.

Somewhere along this route the camera's settings were changed and I have a lot of solid white photos.  Must have been a privacy clause I missed when getting into Sarasota.

Of course there were Jets kies and did ask one of them to help out a 40 foot powerboat.  Seems this captain had lost his way and found one of those shoals near Little Sarasota Bay.   When I passed he was trying to wade the chest deep water with a 35 pound anchor over his head.  They were trying to flag other small power boats to help without any response.  With a 4 foot keel on the bottom of my boat, in the narrow channel, I would have had to anchor in the channel with an anchor in front and behind.  Then prep Boo Boo Tin Tin for the trip to their boat.  Not very safe with the amount of activity going on with all the rentals.  The least I could do was try to flag someone down for them.  LOL  Right!  Everyone was so into their own thing all they could do was wave back and smile (We on a boat! We on a boat! We goin' to the beach! you got a saiboat! Bye!).  I finally had one jet ski family come close enough that I asked the "dad" to see if they could help the stranded boat!  I don't think he understood until they were next to the guy with an anchor over his head!  As the "anchor man" went out of site the jet ski was stopped.  Hopefully they carried his anchor out to the channel or even on the other side.  This would allow the power boat to pull itself free!

About an hour later the power boat passed me.  The captain still had the "deer in headlights" expression!

This land mark is visible well off shore!

Further up the ICW you come into the Greater Tampa Bay area.  With the focal point in Tampa Bay the Sunshine Skyway Bridge.  Remember the 88mph blast from yesterday?  That was at the bridge.  Checking the time I decided making it all the way across the bay and up the somewhat narrow Sunshine Parkway channel would be okay. There is an anchorage at the north end of the bridge but I chose to continue on into the channel for a protected anchorage.  When I arrived I could see one fishing boat a little high on a shoal (grounded), actually about a foot above where it should be in the water, perfectly balanced.  I saw two sailboats on the beach both on their sides!  There was a little fishing marina here so when I rowed in for some sodas and a sandwich I asked if the storm did it.  What sailboat on the beach was their response.  So to make my trip more interesting I have decided they were trashed by the storm from yesterday!  Glad to be a day late!  If I didn't have the issues with the crab pot I would have been here for the storm. 

I started to take a picture of the one nearest to me since it had a bright blue bottom, the same color as mine.  I was going to post it on the blog and with a note under it like "Boat pulled anchor in the storm last night! Now what do I do?"  I figured with just a photo and two lines of text I could have a really good 4111.  You know 4-1-11, you know April Fool's Day!  But the daylight was going away for the shot and who needs to temp Poseidon any more than I already do!  

This is not the boat I found beached but you get the idea!  From this point of view the other boat could have easily been mistaken for s/v Gemini Dreams!

I was expecting to spend a couple days here in Tampa and wait out another cold front coming through.  About 8pm I decided at sunlight I was going to make the cut across to the panhandle.

wes