We saw a manatee!!!

January 26, 2010
Hi 70 Lo 56
Lat/Lon 28 5.0 N, 80 36.5 W

We saw a manatee this morning! He was sunning himself inside one of the slips right beside us at the Titusville Marina. There was a big shadow from one of the pilings across his back, so the pics didn’t turn out too great.

There are signs every place that the water is shallow,(which is almost everywhere), reminding boaters to watch for them. I was really hoping to see one, but kind of doubted I would because they are usually in really shallow water, and being on a sailboat, we can't get into most of those places.

The first ph0to is his back, in the second pic, you can see him sticking his nose above the surface to breath. I think if you click on the pic, it will get bigger.

Boats are the biggest reason for the huge decline in manatee numbers, so GA and FL have sunk a bunch of money into educating the public about watching for them. Dolphins are fast and smart and stay out of the way of boats, but manatees are slow and not very bright, so it’s up to the boaters to save them. Gee, that’s a scary thought.

Bless their little endangered hearts, but they aren't very cute, are they???

Oh, and we were moored right beside Santa Claus! In fact, when we say the manatee, Santa filled us in about a bunch of manatee info.
For example: There were 40 resident manatees in that general area.
And that they can be indentified by the marks and scars on their tails, similar to the dorsal fins on orcas.




We didn’t get to go to the Kennedy Space Center. It was $40 each to go, plus there was no bus out there, so we would have had to rent a car which is another $40, but the real clincher was that there was no Enterprise RentACar in town, and they are the only one’s that would come to a marina to pick you up. So we gave up. We were both disappointed. But we did go right past the launch pads as we headed south on the ICW, so we still got to see it. It was a good view, an awesome sight. But I didn’t think to take a photo… duh!

The ICW is wider and deeper in this area, so we got to actually sail most of the day. We were doing about 7.5 knots, and passed a few other sailboats that were motoring. It was a nice day.

We reached Melborne, FL at 5:30 pm and dropped anchore. We took the dingy to shore to give Bo is ‘shore leave’ and because we wanted to find a marine store to buy some charts for the areas farther south. Bo LOVES to ride in the dingy! Plus he knows it means shore leave!

We ask someone at the boat dock about buying charts. He said there was a West Marine store about a mile and a half that way à. So we started walking, and walking, and,… After a while we stopped and asked at a 7-11, “Oh yea, it’s just up a couple more lights.”

So we walked, and walked, and walked. I had to pee like crazy and was sure I wasn’t gonna make it much further. By now it was 7pm and quite dark. I was about to go use a bush beside a business when we spotted the familiar blue and white sign, but still about 3 blocks away. We were both tuckered out, Bo however was having a wonderful time. Spurred by the call of nature however, I increased my speed, ran through the doors and made a bee-line for the restroom. “How do you spell relief?”

We called a cab to take us back. Bo enjoyed that too! At the end of the ride, the cab driver told us we’d gone over 3 and half miles! It was 9pm by the time we got back to the boat. The whole evening pretty well shot! Yeah,… nice little jaunt to the marine store!
huff, huff, huff,…


Wow, what a full busy day!