Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Christmas video

The original non-plan was to do New Year's Day in the Keys but Christmas Eve in St. Augustine isn't bad. With Daughters 3 and Families far away this is a kind of non-Christmas to go with our non-plans. There will be some holiday Skyping going on for sure, but it isn't quite the same. This is a part of cruising that will probably never feel "okay" to me. On the other hand being on the boat means we have avoided a whole lot of the Christmas Time stuff that about drives me up a wall, endless commercialism, old movies that were never that good to start with, music that (let's face it) is sticky sweet enough to make one's teeth hurt, and the constant claim that I should be giving something to somebody or I'm not a good person. (I may or may not be a good person, but giving stuff or not has nothing to do with it.)

Another cold front rolled though last night. Being the first try at a mooring ball we had the lines set up in such a way as they creaked and groaned all night long ... loudly, very very loudly. We tried something different come morning and it seems to be better. The sun is shining now and the temps are near 70, but it will be a rolly Christmas Eve with the winds still gusting out of the north. Santa will have to be careful if he drops by any of the boats around here else Rudolf might get skewered on a swinging mast.

We are not sure what we are doing next. Ideally we would like to hang around until the next weather window and head offshore once again. But St. Augustine, for all of its good qualities, has pretty much filled up all the water around here with mooring balls that cost. Anchored in one of the few places left to anchor and parking one's dink to go into town costs the same as the mooring ball. All a bit of a scam if you ask me. Anyway, waiting on a weather window means paying the man. Heading down the ICW means anchoring for free. I'm not a big fan of the ICW, but paying the Man to park on Mother Earth's moving waters when my anchor works just fine and the Man isn't providing me with anything I need? Not much of a fan of that either.

But I am a big fan of Christmas video ...



1 comment:

S/V Veranda said...

A lot of the ICW south of there is sailable. If you go inside, at least you're moving. Merry Christmas.