Monday, January 11, 2010 Vero Beach

Well, I notice that each of my blog entries for a week have started out with cold weather. Well guess what? It’s still COLD I’m not sure about wanting to take the boat to Antarctica any more. Florida is appearing to be cold enough at this point. Several boats have taken to getting a hotel room for this cold snap in Florida. How cold is it? Parts of the ICW are freezing over with thin layers of ice.

I can’t believe all the dead fish we’ve seen floating and on the bottom (in the shallows) in the ICW. I’ve been told it’s because the temperatures have dropped so low for so long now that it’s killing the fish. Someone was lamenting that you can’t even take the fish because you’ll end up paying big fines if you’re caught taking them – even if they’re dead! Does that make sense?

Now, how cold is it? Some boaters have reported ice on the ICW south of Jacksonville! ICE! While we’ve had it on the boat, the thought of playing icebreaker along the waterway is not appealing. At ALL… I guess when I see “flat water” I’d better start listening for that crunch crunching. I’ve not confirmed it but also heard that Jacksonville, FL also got snow. Maybe we should start heading north again for warmer temperatures LOL. 2009/2010 – the winter that Florida froze over… hope everyone stocked up on their Florida orange juice – don’t know if the crops can survive these consistent freezings.

The bread that I started making had a dickens of a time rising in this cold weather. I finally shifted the bread dough to the oven and turned the oven on periodically to let the dough rise. It still did not rise to my expectations but I did manage to get some bread made. We took a loaf over to Winfield Lash and then joined them and C:/ for happy hour at the Dockside Grill on the other side of the ICW. Drinks were half off and the appetizers they had were cheap and good. Delicious even. We’re talking a pound of bbq baby back ribs for $5 (1/2 pound for $3), 3 crab cakes for $3 (NO filler – awesome) 3 beef sliders with onion straws (3/3 again) and, well you get the picture. Mussels, coconut shrimp, cold shrimp, tuna (just seared)… Needless to say their appetizers were our dinner and I’d do it again and again and again in a heartbeat. The Bartender has a heavy hand with the drinks. You know me – last of the big time drinkers. I asked for a gin and tonic – short on the gin, tall on the tonic – and I watched as my glass got ¾ full of gin with a splash of tonic. What the heck? Am I in the Bahamas??? Maybe there’s a shortage of tonic… Anyhow I had to ask for a large side of tonic, then didn’t feel much pain after that. The place was packed by 5pm and you could watch rack after rack of ribs coming out of the kitchen. On our walk back to the boat, as we walked the bridge that crosses the ICW, the water looked flat with a nice shine to it in several places. I hope it’s not icing up around us here. Wendell – I think THIS is the year you were forecasting - not next year. Ron – you might consider bringing your snuggies with you in February (seriously)!

We checked with the marina before heading back to the boat and our grill was there. Holy smokes it’s bigger than our other one. Hope it fits on the mount… uhm, hope it fits on the stern railing. Time to hunker in for the night. The temps are dropping again.