Tarpon Springs to Gulfport

Hi All,
Since last I posted we have gone from Tarpon Springs to Three Rooker Bar, from there to Clearwater Beach and now on to Gulfport. Here is a picture of our track from when we came out of Anclote River at Tarpon Springs all the way to Clearwater Beach. Starting at the top, the third icon with a little bit of a purple dot next to it is where we anchored at Three Rooker Bar. I think it's time to rename Three Rooker Bar to the Three Rooker Island as it is now a full fledged island, not just a sandbar. The beaches here are beautiful, with lots of different birds and more shells than you can imagine.

We stayed at Three Rooker Bar Friday night. Saturday morning we took the dinghy over to the island to walk around. It was the last weekend before school starts here and the island was jam packed with people. After our walk on the beach we raised the anchor and headed to Clearwater Beach. That's the rest of the track on the map. We had to do some zigging and zagging to get back up into the spot we wanted to anchor.

Saturday night we had dinner with Lynn and Tom Swanson, friends of Susan's. Happy Birthday Lynn! Monday morning we stopped by Frenchy's Fish House and watched them filet a red grouper they caught that morning. We had some of it for dinner Monday night, it was excellent. Monday afternoon we spent some time on the beach and in the water. No surfing here, the water is almost as flat as your bath tub water.

Tuesday we picked up the anchor again and headed to Gulfport. Here's a picture of part of that trip. I've been disappointed in the gaps in the coverage at MarineTraffic.com. This picture stops as we entered what is called "The Narrows." It's called that because...uh...it's narrow.

Just after we came out of The Narrows (about where you see the highway 699 icon to the left of Seminole) we saw eight or ten Manatees playing in the shallow water. We slowed to a crawl and watched them for 10 or 15 minutes. It was my first time to see a Manatee and to see that many with that much activity was really neat.

Tonight we're anchored pretty much where the next highway 699 icon is across the bay from Gulfport. Tomorrow there will be a short hop to St Petersburg where we will catch a mooring ball at the municipal marina and once again catch up with Another Life.

I apologize for the lack of pictures. I have taken far to few. There has been some beautiful scenery along the way and I wish I had taken time to get pictures. It's not like we go flying past at 80 MPH. I will try to do better.

Hurricane Danny is no more and Tropical Storm Erika is being reported as "not well organized" at the moment. Trust that we are keeping our eyes on all those developments.

Take care.
Brian