Let the Journey Begin

     We are finally on our way!  We said goodbye to the Marriott (and our friends Robin and Bill who took this photo) on Easter morning and headed North on the Intracoastal Waterway (which from now on, I will call the ICW ).  We planned to make it a short day, our "shakedown" cruise, but everything went so well, we just kept going and spent our first night out in Melbourne, about 67 nautical miles from our start.  After docking, we walked around the area and waterfront. There were birds everywhere (the usual collection of pelicans, egrets, ibises and even a few herons).  And as we walked through the park, we encountered a raccoon stalking a duck, of all things (a raccoon, for crying out loud, in a public park in Florida--I thought that rather odd).  Here's a photo of the waterfront:

 Anyway, it was great evening, but we headed to bed early as we planned to watch the space shuttle launch the next morning (blast off at 6:21 am!)  It was well worth getting up at that ungodly hour--photo below is the contrail.

Then, as we finished oohing and aahing at the launch, a platoon of Marines came trotting by on their morning run, singing jodies (military call-and-response cadences; you know, Sound off 1 - 2, Sound off 3 - 4, etc.)) as they went and that really got  us going--God bless those guys.

Day 2
     Once again, we had beautiful weather and smooth cruising. We traveled from Melbourne to Daytona Beach (too bad the 500 was last month) and we will probably hang out here a day or two.  The photos below will tell you more about our day that all my chatter, so here's what our day was like in photos:

Captain Art at the helm

Approaching the Haulover Canal bridge which connects the Indian River to Mosquito Lagoon.  This is not too far north of the Kennedy Space Center complex (site of the launch). That is the front of our boat with our AGLCA flag (America's Great Loop Cruisers' Association) flying up front.

A couple of manatees (barnacles on their backs) hanging around the canal as we passed.  In addition, we saw a lot of dolphins along the way, but of course, I forgot to take photos.  I won't forget again.