We have a few more days left to get chores and errands done here.  We are at the marina through Tuesday morning, when we turn in the rental car and enjoy our last day at a marina for awhile.  We really like our slip at New River.  The view is beautiful and it’s very quiet here, except on Friday night, apparently.  We can hear music from the bars and restaurants on the other side of the river tonight.    A few people from the neighborhood come to sit on the benches in the mini-park next to us, and sometimes people fish on nearby steps.  Quite a few residents of the high rise condo building next to us, Esplanade on New River,  walk their dogs on the sidewalk.  Other than that, no one comes around.  We rarely see people from the other boats near us.  There is a Manta Powercat next to us, and then three megayachts and a large houseboat.  On the other side of the river, the River Walk is located, lined with restaurants, bars, condos, parks, etc.  That is very busy, and the yachts docked there are mostly mega.   There is quite a bit of river traffic. All week long, we’ve had a parade of megayachts and smaller yachts coming from the boat show to a boat yard on the river. 

Since we arrived here last Sunday, we went to the boat show on Monday, on Tuesday we picked up a rental car and ran a few errands, Wednesday I drove to West Palm Beach to pick up Jennifer for a visit, Thursday, I took her to see This is It  (the Michael Jackson movie) and today we went to the beach.  Unfortunately, I forgot my camera today as the photos would have been great.  The wind was about 20 kts and the waves were huge for this beach.  There was an undertow, so I wouldn’t let Jen swim out  very far.  She always swims “laps” which on the ocean amounts to swimming out a little bit and then back.  She always swims about 40 laps in her pool, so that’s what she wanted to do today in the Atlantic.  I convinced her to cut it to 20 “laps.”  It took a great deal of effort, even though she is a good swimmer, to get through the waves. 

In between the above activities, I have been getting Daisy ready to cross over to the Bahamas with us.  Yesterday she went to the vet to get her Health Certificate.  For a mere $42, the vet will sign a form stating she is healthy and up-to-date on her shots, especially rabies.  It must be dated less than 30 days from the arrival in the Bahamas, so the vet will sign it and send it to me in a few weeks.  Since rabies is the big concern and she needs a new shot next June, I got her one yesterday.  Then I got back to the boat and read the requirements which stated the shot must be given over one month from the arrival in the Bahamas.  Oops.  Well, we aren’t leaving until early December anyway. I had to go somewhere else to pay for and pick up the tag and a Broward County dog license.   I also had to send away to Nassau for a permission certificate to allow her to enter the Bahamas.  That was $10 with an additional $5 to fax it sent in cash or a money order.  Uh....I don’t think I’d send cash.   We now have all the paperwork in the works to allow us to “import” Daisy.

As I was running around Fort Lauderdale, Mark was on the boat with Scott, the hybrid tech guy from CatCo, who is replacing some fans in the hybrid system.  While he was here, Mark showed him a screw which had broken off in the mast.  A couple of other guys came over to look at it and will be back on Monday to fix it and the rigging.  All of the above are under warranty.  We also discussed having the mast and sail cut down, and will plan to have that done next June before we try to go north again.  We’ll get it down to about 63 feet, allowing us to easily pass under the 65 foot bridges.  Right now it is supposedly 64 1/2 feet, plus instruments above that.  We think it comes close to 70 feet.

We have an appointment tomorrow to have a Direct TV repairman here to fix or replace our satellite dish which fell over in a wind gust.  Also, a guy is coming over to demonstrate an extended wifi device which we need to get.  It will allow us to receive wifi signals up to about four miles.  This is necessary in order to have an Internet connection in the Bahamas, as we won’t be able to use our Sprint aircard there.

Finally, we purchased our charts and cruising guides from Bluewater Books in Fort Lauderdale.  This has to be one of the largest marine book stores in the country, so we waited until we got here to choose the books.  Perhaps we should have gotten some of them earlier, as I learned a great deal about the Bahamas in just the first 20 pages I read in Skipper Bob’s Bahamas Bound.  The other books we bought were The Yachtsman’s Guide to the Bahamas and The Cruising Guide to Abaco.  Skipper Bob’s could also be called a Dummy’s Guide to the Bahamas, as it is very basic and written in an easy to understand style.  We also purchased three different sets of the Explorer Charts for the Bahamas.  We already had the chip for our chart plotter for that area.   We are discovering that getting ready to leave is quite expensive, and we also have to buy provisions for 3-6 months, as food in the Bahamas is double to triple the price here and sometimes difficult to find when outside the large cities.