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Good-bye Bradenton
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January 12th we departed Twin Dolphin
Marina headed for all points south! It
was sunny and clear, but as usual, cool!
(I promise, I won’t keep bringing this subject up anymore. Florida has and is experiencing unseasonably
cool temps for January. Enough
said!!!) Due to tides and winds, our
first stop was an anchorage just next to Tampa Bay by Snead Island. I’m not a big fan of anchorages since it is
very quiet and you stay put! In other
words, you need to make your own “fun”.
It’s great for reading, meditating and just talking! We did have a number of “neighbors” in other
boats to watch that evening. Our biggest
excitement was watching the sailboat races, with their course or route not far
from our boat.
On Monday, we sailed from Anna Maria Island down to
Venice, FL . It is amazing how that
whole trip along the shoreline is completely covered with high rises, homes,
resorts, etc and not one inch of undeveloped space. Those beautiful white sand beaches “call” to
everyone. We anchored in Venice at the
Crow’s Nest Marina right off of the Gulf.
For our Lake Michigan boater friends, I maintain that the entrance to
Venice is exactly like going into New Buffalo or other towns along the Michigan
boarder of the Lake. So, it kind of felt
like “home”. Just a note about Venice…it
is known as “Shark’s Tooth Capital of the World”. They even have a festival in April to
celebrate that fact. Our grandsons would love it here, since they are big fans
of the shark tooth necklaces we bought them on North Padre. We have friends who
live in a community not too far away, so they came over to give us
“wheels”. The Crow’s Nest Restaurant is
quite famous in the area and lived up to its fame. On Monday evening, it was packed. I might add a lot of the customers had white
hair, but it must be the place to eat good seafood! Augie and Rena gave us a tour of Venice and
you could tell the “snow birds” had arrived in town…busy, busy, busy!
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Venice Entrance from the Gulf
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Crow's Nest Restaurant
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Venice from the Water
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The seas and winds were calling us, so we were off
to Charlotte Harbor after two days in Venice.
The winds called a little too hard, because the Gulf was choppy, so my
sea sickness problem started to bother me a bit. Being the trooper I am ( he, he ), we made it
to Burnt Store Marina and Golf Community in about 6 ½ hours. Burnt Store is quite a name, right??? Well, I just had to find out the story behind
the name. It seems that this area (which
is very close to Punta Gorda, FL) was inhabited by Native Americans with a
chief called Billy Bow Legs. They were
quite happy and lived in peace with the other settlers. Soon, a trading post was established which
acted as the General Store. All was
peaceful until Lt. Gil Harstuff, the new commander, came to the area and was
not respectful of the Indians. One night
Billy Bowlegs and his men led an assault on the Trading Post burning it to the
ground. Both the settlers and the
Indians took heavy casualties in the attack and shortly afterwards the Indians
fled the area. The Trading Post was
never rebuilt, but from that day on, the surrounding area was known as Burnt
Store. Today the area has a 525 slip
marina, 27 hole golf course, athletic club and great restaurant! We are enjoying our time here and plan to
leave for Ft, Meyers Beach on Wednesday morning. Our above mentioned friends, have been over
to “pick us up” and give us tours of the surrounding areas. I just love watching the license plates on
the cars from Canada to Georgia that inhabit Florida in “the season” as they
call it here.
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Sailing to Charlotte Harbor
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Our Welcoming Committee at Burn Store Marina
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Augie & Rena Took Great Care of Us
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Pizza & Football at Burnt Store Bar
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The next blog will find us in Ft. Meyers Beach. You can tell this is an area that
tourists/boaters love, It’s very hard to find marina space! Steve is the master of the internet, etc. so
he has our next location all lined up and waiting for us to arrive. So long!!!!
