Mutineers

After our rollicking adventure in the Gulf, we headed into Port St. Joe Sunday morning and stayed at one of the nicest marinas we've experienced. The Port St. Joe Marina was not only sheltered, the staff and fellow boaters were incredibly helpful and very friendly. We had several nice meals at the Dockside Raw Bar at the end of the dock and some good Mexican food at Peppers.

After the rough ride over the weekend, we wanted to make sure Nyla, Sea Dog 3rd Class, got a chance to stretch her legs and do her business on real turf for a change. I made a concerted effort to be sure I had a good hold of her harness so that I could assist her in making the leap from the deck to the dock and vice versa. After a good thorough walk, I headed for the showers at the marina. Guess who was following and who had no trouble making the leap?! After a few minutes I concocted a good tether that allowed her to have free rein of the cockpit and access to food and water without enough lead to hang herself trying to get off the boat. Throughout the rest of our stay, we made sure to take her off the boat at every opportunity, but to hear her the times we left her behind you would think she'd been left in the middle of the Sahara.

The bigger surprise was the smaller mutineer. Koki, our calico who had to be carried out of the interior against her will, surprised us by being on the dock when we returned from a walk into town on the second day. We were tied up at the end of the dock with just the bow visible from the top of the dock. We saw a brown and white flash zip from our view and meet us back on the boat. She'd been busted and she knew it! Not long after, she again started to jump ship when Morgan strongly advised her against it. She ran from the cockpit to the bow and was about to jump to the dock when I channeled Cartman from SouthPark and yelled, "Bad kitty!!!" She did an about face and returned to the cockpit.

Tuesday we headed to Apalachicola via the ICW and Lake Wimico, a nice relaxing motor down the river, although we had gusts up to 25 knots on the Lake. We arrived about 4:30 Eastern and got the boat tied up at Scipio Creek Marina (overpriced and underwhelming, but convienient with the best seafood restaurant in town). Again, I underestimated Nyla's reluctance to be left behind and she quickly jumped ship when we started down the dock for dinner. Tethered again. We had a fabulous dinner at Papa Joe's, Apalachicola oysters on the half shell and a broiled seafood combo platter to die for!

The docking configuration had us far enough off the dock that I didn't think we'd have to worry about the cat. Give me another demerit! Though we have not personally witnessed Koki's forays off the boat in Apalachicola, Morgan ran into another boater this afternoon who asked if we knew that our cat was getting off the boat. She said she was walking down the dock and spied Koki on the dock. According to our fellow boater, Koki acted like a busted teenager and hightailed it back on board!

Fortunately, we had both mutineers microchipped before we left Pensacola. We didn't anticipate problems with Koki, but we bought her a collar today for an ID tag. Both of them have a tag that came with the chip and we plan to add our boat name and cell number.

Wednesday saw near gale force winds in Apalachicola, we watched the instruments hit 36kts before heading out to dinner! Hopefully things will subside on Thursday for our crossing of the "Big Bend." Once we hit the west coast of FL, it should only be a week until we're enjoying warmer weather in the Keys. If either Nyla or Koki jump ship during the crossing, we'll be having "man overboard" drills!