Return to Last Boat Jan.12, 2012

We departed Rocky Mount on Thursday, Jan. 5th headed for Morehead City, NC to say our goodbyes to Will, Stacey, and Jackson . We had a good overnight visit with them and headed the following day to Wilmington, NC to do the same to Justin, Lindsey, and Mya. It is difficult to leave them knowing it will be April before we see them again. We had a great visit with both our sons and their wonderful families. On Monday morning, we headed over to Hamlet to see our parents. They are doing great thus far and we pray and hope that they will continue to have good health while we are away. My Dad, has been short of breath and had to have fluid taken from his right lung after we left on Tuesday but is now doing much better. We left hamlet on Tuesday and drove to Jacksonville, FL where we visited Nelson's sister, Loretta and her husband, Mac. until Thursday, Jan. 12th. We drove on down to Cape Coral, FL, which is Nelson's brother, Ike and his wife, Babs house and where we left our boat docked during our holiday home visits. Nelson was like a little boy as he was so excited to see his boat again. We stayed at their house for several days and Nelson completed several projects while we were there. Ondra's job was to prevision the groceries that were needed for our continued trip south. On Sunday, Ike carried Nelson to Punta Gorda where he got on the sailboat, Suzy-Q, our friends, Robert and Susan Cole, who traveled from Wilmington, NC to Titusville, FL on our way south in November. He rode with them back to Ike's house and his neighbors let them tie upto their dock until we departed on Wednesday, January 18th for Ft Myers Beach. It only took us 3 hours to get here. We love it here and stayed much longer than we intended because of the wonderful 80 degree weather and their beautiful beaches. The sand on the beach is snow white and feels like baby powder. We have stayed on the beach for the last three days. Yes, we are getting a great tan. We are departing here tomorrow, Jan. 24 and are going south to the Keys. It will take us at least three days to get there, but as we say, we are retired and it does not matter when we get there. We might find another place we might want to visit. It is great to be back on the boat and on the gulf waters. Hope you are doing well and you are enjoying life as we are at this time.