We concluded that they would be the fantastic people we have met, the huge numbers of Dolphin and the shallow waters inside the Barrier Islands along the Gulf Coast.
Yesterday coming from Panama City through the narrow channels to Apalachacola was one of the more nail-biting days we have spent.
This photo of the Chart on the chart plotter shows the channel in white that we had to travel along, and the numbers on each side in darker blue show the depth of the water around us.
On these channels you have to stay between the red and green markers (middle of the photo), but sometimes the channel is shallow towards the red, and sometimes towards the green, and sometimes it isn't very deep in the middle either.
This is how we traverse some of these channels.
Waz is steering, and I am concentrating on the chart plotter screen (as above) and calling the numbers that show on the depth sounder screen to the left of this picture (not shown here). So it will go like this...
Mon: OK, a little more to starb'd....but small...you are in 6ft of water here....
Waz: Ok!
Mon: SHIT! it's only 4.5ft!!!!!
Waz:..no answer, just throttled Riiiiight off and corrects whichever way he thinks might get us back into something deeper, which is anyone's guess at this stage.
Back into 6ft of water is relative safety. We draw 4.6ft (that is the depth from our water line to the bottom of the lowest point on the boat. That is how much water we need to float.
It makes me Very NERVOUS when we are going through a narrow channel and there is only 1 -2ft of water on either side of the channel and we can see waves breaking over the sand not far from the boat.
By the time we reached deeper water (it's relative) the knots in the back of my shoulders and neck needed readjusting. I did Waz's for him, and though he always appears cool as a cucumber, he had knots in his shoulders that needed work, believe me!
We got out of bed relatively early to leave Sun Harbor Marina, Panama City, because we wanted to be ON the fuel dock for 8am when the Marina office opened.
We managed a Yoghurt, banana and muesli breakfast along with the obligatory tea, and our usual morning routine which is always helpful, before making our girl ready to leave the poles.
Waz expertly got us from our dock to the fuel dock and we were ready for Monika, when she came back to the boat with Waz to start fuelling. One problem..she had forgotten to turn the pump on in the office. Being a bitterly cold morning, this meant she had a long walk along the dock back to the office, then back to the fuel dock for us to start the process.
Leaving behind the Sun Harbor Marina. I cant say it is a sad leaving, as we didn't have much interaction with the staff or other boaters in this marina, the way we have in other marinas. Still, it was a good safe harbor when we needed it for three weeks, and we have enjoyed our tiki tours.
I had heard on the radio, while waiting for fuel, that a ship was entering the channel to make it's way up to Panama City...so I knew we would encounter it before long...perhaps not quite as close as we did!
I didn't open the plastics to take a photo, as this was 8.30am and freezing cold, so some of these pics you will have to bear with me and accept the interference of the plastic in the view.
This tug was parked right alongside of us for a few days, at the entry to the marina. This is where the Osprey was perched:)
Down the West Bay is a Paper Mill. Warren says it smells just like Kawerau, in the middle of the Nth Island, NZ...like old cabbage! We were often downwind of the smell!
Boat building at the eastern end of East Bay
Saying goodbye to East Bay and into the Wetappo Creek. The creek went on forever, seemingly and was fine for the most part, but we had to be careful in places, especially crossing lake Wimico.
We are actually on the Jackson River which morphs into the Apalachacola River just past Lake Wimico. The Lake was a very stressful place, due to the shallow waters.
Along the way we passed the entry to Port St Joe Canal, which takes you off the ICW and down the canal to Port St Joe, strangely enough:) We had gone to Port St Joe on our tiki-tour to Apalachacola in the car. Not much there, but we knew there would be a dock for the night should we ever need it. This is a bit of a back stop.
Lots of fishermen at the confluence of the ICW and the canal, and we were forced to drop our 9.4knots down to no wake. We notice that the fishermen themselves appear to have no qualms about sloshing their own kind around in their wakes as they speed everywhere to get to the next fishing spot. What were we worrying about then? It is called Common Courtesy, we believe.
Waz kept trying to give Dave and Robyn a call...these folks had talked to us on the Loopers site about joining forces to cross the gulf together. We had no cell phone coverage at all at this stage.
It is a gorgeous day, the light is pretty winter light, the water sparkles and it is a 'good to be alive' kind of day...but then, isn't every day?:)
I love the marshes and the surprises they show...like a walkway!
Nothing like pulling your boat up into a marsh...well, not quite...there was a dock there, it just doesn't look like it from here.
Signs of civilization! Im not sure why we call it that??
Yes, that is a fisherman in a canoe....and here he is up close and personal. We did slow down so that he didn't fall off his perch.
He was casting, Fly Fishing-style onto the very edges of the marsh. I wonder what his target fish was? We were a bit afraid his line would catch the boat as we went by,
We spent some considerable time going slow. Even though we had a distinct time frame from Panama City to Apalachacola, you cannot go fast when it says go slow.
Here we are on the chart (middle) going through the Creek. This, below is what the creek actually looks like!
Fishermen everywhere in some places, then we wont see them for another 10 miles, then we know we are near a town again by the number of fishermen.
The light is soft and the water is gorgeous. It looks blue, but is very brown and full of tanins.
The winter skeletons along the bank.
Our wake can be quite picturesque
This is an Eagle nest, high up in a dead looking tree. Their nests are relatively compact in comparison to the Osprey nests.
These ducks could hardly fly, so they were literally flapping their wings and running across the surface of the water. They were so fat, I wonder if that was the reason?
This little 'Island' in the middle of Lake Wimico had a flock of birds on it's outer eastern side. Rather pretty in the light.
Waz has hurt his forehead AGAIN. There is another wound up in the hair line...and here, below, is the culprit. 
The aerial for the AIS (Automatic Identification System).This tells other boats who we are and US who they are. It works really well when you cant see the other boat with your own eyes, but you can see them on the chartplotter.
I could bore you with these kinds of photos for a long time. The still air, winter light, etc etc..:)
Going through yet another shallow lake
The light on our wake is lovely.
An Osprey nest on one of the green markers. Their nests are distinctive in that they are very messy and usually much lower than Eagle nests.
Green is always on our right or starb'd side going out. It is only on our port or left side coming in, which means that the red marker will be on our left normally, but right coming back in...the saying goes...Red Right Returning, in order to remind you. That is for the USA. NZ is different again. However, when we were travelling up East Bay, the definition of when you were coming into and going out of the bay, changed at a bridge, and was initially a little confusing.
Another 'oxbow' (loop) at the confluence of the Jackson and Apalachacola Rivers...and more super shallow canal to follow through the red and green.
This now disused Rail bridge had nice deep water (more than 20ft) through the pass and on either side of it, soon going back to shallow of 8-10ft.
Just to be equal, this Osprey nest is on a red marker:)
This is the end of our voyage to Apalachacola. We parked behind our Gulf crossing buddies, Dave and Robyn, in their gorgeous 50ft Spanish boat at the town dock at just before 3pm, as you can see on the chart. Our timing was perfect, even though we had to throttle back so many times for No Wake zones. Well done!
Robyn and Dave were eventually contacted and bless them, they were there at the Dock waiting for us, to help with the ropes. Always nice to have a hand. The wind was blowing us onto the dock, so we had few problems.
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