HAVE STOMACH......MUST WALK

We are now into this daily routine of long walks in new 'burbs' and finding new sights to behold like this glorious mailbox. Walking is good..... right? This two or more, mile walk is really much longer because we stop so often to check things out, like house designs, trees and shrubs, all the things you normally drive past and never really see. The beach walks are the most interesting and it still takes some getting used to, for here in Florida, the whole of the broad Atlantic Ocean washes ashore, sometimes with no more than a ripple on the sand and then again with a hurricane's push, the surge can be phenomenal and devastating with a tidal surge some twenty feet above normal.

We have finally completed our list of repairs resulting from the lightning strike. A very expensive exercise which could well have been offset by our insurance cover. The fact that much of the instrumentation that was "fried" was more than 10 years old, would have meant that the insurer would consider only the 'depreciated value' of the items. They do that....... you know. Thus, instead of only a marginal refund, it was better to bite the bullet ourselves, pay for it all, replace with NEW and save ourselves the deductable. So what you see below on the cockpit instrument panel is, from left to right, a new wind indicator unit,(the new whirly-bird on top of the mast is shown in the photo on the right), the new VHF radio, the new chartplotter, the new depth sounder, the new auto-pilot control unit. Oh.......and on top of the mast is the replacement navigation/strobe/anchor light combo thing that retails for $US 550.00. There are people who still persist in saying that sailing is much cheaper because the wind is free..................... Down below is a new stereo unit, new alternators, three new bulldozer-type batteries and two new depth sounder units and one new VHF radio unit. Whenever we anchor we now dangle this piece of chain over the side attached to the rigging. People look at it and you can see that look on their faces................. "Why do they do that?".........



Early one morning when we hit a new beach, we were sure that the "ALIENS" had landed. From a distance the spacecraft was surreal.

Cautiously we approached in the morning light, only to discover that the structure had a 'lifesaver' in it, reading a comic book. Personally, I wanted the "Queen of Florida" to get up there to do that Pamela Anderson 'BAYWATCH' thing, but she was worried the lifesaver might not understand if she posed, faced the Sun and breathed in ..............(you know what I mean). Laurie also said she would need a full-length red bathing suit, which I said is just too bad............................. He might still not understand.



Vero Beach, Florida and its "furry" trees. (As my grandson Zac, calls them)

Never can get enough of them, not even the stands of bamboo. Do a double-click on the Spanish moss-covered oak trees above and see the range of ferns and orchids. We also found a place that had these sculptures of more historical "Spanish" times. A sort of "La plaza del Conquistadores". Sword in one hand, Scriptures in the other and strings of rosary beads to tie it all up. Not that today's conflicts are any different, after all, the so-called PEACE-KEEPING forces use tanks and guns................to keep the peace, right? SPITE versus MIGHT versus RIGHT versus NIGHT and in the darkness, so we stumble on.................... All conflicts at some point are resolved with just plain dialogue. 90 miles South-East of Florida is Cuba that is open to the citizens of every country in the World with one exception. How sad is that, and all because somebody declared "War" on the United States in the last generation, without ever firing a single bullet.

Talk about burying your head in the sand,................. well, that's exactly what these blue land crabs do. We still haven't been able to get a photo of them. The same goes for the little 'straight out of the egg-shell' sea-turtles. All that we have found are the flipper marks in the sand. They go in circles until the GPS 'kicks in' and then they head for the Ocean. Good luck.... buddies, hope you make it!................... and come back and see us.

SURVIVAL AND SURVIVING ............................

DARWIN WOULD DIE IF HE KNEW............. Clearly when the sea-turtles move inland like these, some 32 miles(50km) from the shore, serious mutations take place. Not only that, but the hind flippers seem to have become legs with boots that would make any football player ask for more money. Don't free Willie, we need some "FREE FLIPPIE".........



We drove to Jacksonville to spend time with friends and family and to share the magic moments of Pat Hinton's birthday, the "big one plus ten". Now Pat is big time executive who in his other pursuits maintains seversl hives of bees although in truth, it is his wife Judy, who is the "honey". After dinner they showed us a spider web in the dark, the kind that make you want to grab a broom and WACK it, not that we did. Judy took these incredible pictures of a golden silk spider, and if you have never double-clicked, then do it now, on these awesome spider pics.



The male and female spiders are visible on the right. When an insect flies into the web, the female promptly grabs it, wraps it up in spider's silk and dangles it down on a single strand, for future relaxed consumption. The male came in to get a quick munch and got chased away just as promptly. Clearly the female's large abdomen not only has eggs but "some serious muscle" as well. The exactitude of the web design and its mathematical precision speaks for itself.

Judy Hinton's brother Rick came to visit us on board "ARITA" at Vero Beach, Florida, with his friend Ken. Both had taken a nostalgic drive along Florida's coast to Ft. Pierce where they had spent their childhood. They were bosom buddies then, and remain so now. Ken is going through some serious chemo treatment and what was so very inspirational for us, was the love being shared one for the other. A love and care you can see and feel and goes way beyond words............ Here's to honouring you both..........



We fear the worst when we saw these dolphins leaping out of the bushes in the dunes. They were still close enough to leap back in the water.



Reality speaks to all of us to let us know that health and life is precious ( so eat your veggies).

We visited Laurie's mother who is well cared for in a Nursing Home
for Alzheimer patients. As much for the spider as it is for all of us, it is surviving and survival......................



And alongside "SVEA", our other yacht at Vero Beach, which needs a brand new owner, is a powerboat with another senior citizen on board, doing his thing in fixing his boat, his joy, and the thing that keeps him going.............

REMEMBER, THERE IS NO LUGGAGE ON THE LAST TRIP

NOT SAILING.......JUST WALKING FASTER......

The weather continues to be near perfect. The breeze a steady 10 to 20 knots on the Ocean when we take our morning walks, with not a hurricane anywhere on the horizon, and we patiently wait out the season in Florida. Bit by bit we are getting minor repairs done. In fact I called out to Laurie this morning to give me a hand with something and back came the reply....... "I'M BUSY,....... I'M ON THE PHONE......", O.K. I got that.........

Big walks are a big thing in the mornings, to exercise those wayward muscles and in the process we manage to capture the unusual, like people in PJs and large blue crabs near mud holes that never hang around for long enough to have their picture taken.

The uniqueness of Florida is brought home continuously by beautiful majestic oak trees covered in Spanish moss as in this arch-way to the right, and the lushness of the plant life is nothing short of magnificent. A tropical paradise. This more than anything is " THE SOUTH ", and with it goes the southern hospitality. We have made wonderful friends in the short time, since our return to Vero Beach.

Found these huge stalks on some cacti with bunches of yellow fowers and on the stalks below there were flower-like new plants ready to drop to the ground and start all over again. The things you see when you walk...................



Had this great urge to go and do some more diamond mining........... The urge may pass, hasn't yet. The Queen caught me on the beach grabbing a handful of wet sand that showed streaks of black minerals. Just have to do some testing on a theory of mine................all about gravity separation and looking for things I never lost. Diamonds are forever, so they say.................
You see, walking makes you think and thinking leads to a whole bunch of stuff......



Have you ever seen a cactus bloom like this one on the right that has produced a whole arrangement of 'newbies' ready to go................ Well, we hadn't.
And on the left and below is the Schefflera tree with its magnificent red flower prongs pointing skyward, like radial arms reaching for the sun. Up close they are like raspberries on a stick. Then further below are the downward hanging curtains of grey-green Spanish moss, with lace-like fibres, moisture fed by Florida's humidity. Almost supernatural, almost surreal....... Do a double-click if you really want to see another world...........



And on this oak tree are the dried-up remains of fern moss which, with the slightest moisture comes alive to flourish again.


Enough about FLORA,(FLORIDA), nice and beautiful as it is,........... now for some local FAUNA found inhabiting a pool. Resplendant with captivating drinks and surrounded by floating trays of cheese and strawberries, these are rare specimens of former " YACHTIES", whose habitat is blue water and a little wind and normally found wearing very casual clothing and on occassions, as little as possible.....................

YES, WE WOULD RATHER BE SAILING....................

By now you must be thinking........ what's this thing they've got about mailboxes and sea-turtles. Were they deprived of 'ninja turtles' as kids.........No, not really. When we do our beach walks along an incredibly still Ocean edge, you can't help but wonder how the turtles go all the way around the Atlantic basin, as far Europe, only to return to the same beaches in Florida, to lay their eggs. We met another "Sea-turtle Conservationist" on his ATV who enlightened us no end. Too many facts to remember but some things stood out. The female sea-turtles are able to lay a number of clutches of eggs in the same season, by retaining sperm from different males.............who knew?..... Drop a load, swim some more and let the next batch develop, then drop some more. Quite a factory............. Some sea-turtle species do this from 5 to 7 times, a season. The survival rate of the eggs is small, even within the sand. That dedicated conservationist on the right is Mr. Rick Herren, whose research group "www.inwater.org", provided some of the sea-turtle photographs below. After each hatching, he excavates the nest to count the eggs and determine the survival rate. In this nest of some 120 eggs, 70 made it, though not neccesarily to the sea. By law, all beach-front homes are prevented from having bright white lights showing at night. Nevertheless some young-uns still go in that direction......(perhaps, someone was playing really great music)................ The nest has to receive oxygen through the sand. If the waves stay over the sand for an extended period, the eggs all die from oxygen deprivation. Even if you make it to the water as a female, you have to make it for about thirty years before you are mature enough to do the egg-laying thing.......... That's a long time to remember how to get back to that beach....... Sea turtles, depending on species, live to be 80 years or more and by then you've eaten a lot of jelly-fish, crustaceans or sea-weed, their main diet, depending on species. Thanks to people like Rick, we get to understand their fragile existence................and the need to be careful. This month (September 2009) marks the passing of a new law in the Bahamas which makes it illegal to catch or kill a sea-turtle. by the way, Laurie is holding a golf-ball she found, not a sea-turtle egg.................



O.K................ These people are the researchers, doing investigative stuff and tagging, including catching one in a net to bring him/her on board, only temporarily. Their findings help communities develop sensible strategies for protecting shorelines and habitats. For those of us fortunate enough to see the little ones emerging from the sand, after midnight and struggle to the Ocean, it is a life-long memory. ........... "So, tell me again Junior, you say you're off to find your Dad?"..................,



We have enough drag when just a few barnacles grow on "ARITA's" hull. You have to feel sorry for this global traveller seeing what he/she is carrying.



We passed these two palm trees on our walks. Who knew, that when those prong-like things explode, they would reveal such intricate lattice work, leading to the mass of date-like seed pods. Our motto of "IN SEARCH OF PALMS" continues.



Saw this little sea-side shack as we walked along the beach (do a double-click)....................Wonder who does the window cleaning?



Found this volcanic rock that really looked like a piece of worm-eaten driftwood, whose gaseous inclusions have been removed by years in the ocean. Being volcanic, we can only guess where it came from. Definitely not Florida or the Bahamas. Nice rock, nice hand....... great leg.............




I have a daughter, Celia, living in Darwin at "THE TOP END" of Australia, whose fascination and hobby has always been BEADS. Couldn't help but take this picture as we walked through the department store "Michaels". That's like being in a gigantic candy store..........We were there to get some necklace material for converting the lava stone to something to hang on your neck and stay "Ocean-connected". Of course, someone is bound to ask "What the heck is that?"......... What a wonderful way to start a conversation........................ about endangered sea-turtles and the dedicated researchers, like Rick Herren and his buddies..........................and the wonders of sea-turtle migration........................