Well here I am in lovely Cocoa, Florida. It's near Cocoa Beach, about 10 miles from Cape Canaveral - where Columbia was due to land last Sunday. I would have seen it overhead and heard the sonic boom  but of course ...
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We all timed it nicely: Lee being at Cocoa when Marc and Al arrived
for the Midwinters, only an hour's drive away in Tavares (upper left) .
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After that, they checked into their motel and then came back to meet me and we went to dinner in a pub called - Murdocks! It was great, too - nice band and good food. Unusually, I had seafood - well, a catfish sandwich actually and it was great, though the grits that accompanied it were like umm... bland hash browns or maybe sago? The beer was good and we went to a little jazz club afterwards for a bit and then I boarded the boat (tied up at the Cocoa Town free dock) and puttered out into the anchorage, set up my boom tent and slept soundly till about 4.30 am when the wind changed and Wanderer rolled and I started to feel queasy. By dawn though I was OK-ish and after coming ashore, I found Al and Marc waiting to take me to breakfast. We got to Denny's and the food smelled great so I had bacon and eggs and toast and felt much better. Then they took me to a supermarket. and before they headed off to sightsee, they dropped me at the dentist.

Al and Marc decided to stay an extra day today but we'll meet again this evening to go for a meal (and I might even sneak a shower and shave at their flash motel at Cocoa Beach. My track record of paying for the food I eat in the company of all my new friends (Brian and Doris, Geoff and Sandy, Phil and Bernard, Al and Marc, etc) is as poor as it is when I try and pay for meals with Stan and Madeleine. That is to say I ain't done it yet. But tonight I shall ambush Al and pay the tab by the use of a plan too cunning to describe here. If it works, I shall use it in future on Stan.

For myself, I went to the dentist today to get a filling replaced that had fallen out . However, it turns out there was more to it than that - it needed a root canal. Sadly, while travelling, the month I would need to spend in one place to get a root canal repair to that tooth just isn't available so I elected to have it taken out and I guess I'll fix it with a bridge when I get home. Much the same thing happened when I broke my arm riding across America years ago - I didn't have the option of staying in one place while they pinned and rodded and wired it all up, so I got a short term fix and kept riding.

Anyway, now I have to see if insurance will pay for this tooth. Luckily it didn't cost much and hasn't hurt even the tiniest bit. But I can't drink fizzy drinks for a few days - and that includes BEER!

The weather is cool and breezy so I don't mind staying here for a day longer and tomorrow I'll pop back to the dentist to get a complete checkup done as well.

Tomorrow I'll also try a few modifications to the rigging that Al has suggested. He knows more about this than I do, so I shall give his ideas a whirl. And that's all for now folks.

Toodle oo

Lee