In our Marina ~ on our dock ~ in the slip right next to us! Gold Loopers Mark and Maridee aboard Folie a Deux just returned from their seven year Loop Adventure. They invited us aboard their lovely yacht for docktails and were kind enough to share a “boat load” of information. Are we lucky, or what???

Needless to say, our first Looper encounter was of the fabulous kind! Thank you Mark and Maridee!

New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day provided more of the same….. getting things ready to leave. My sister Sandy who lives in Katy, Texas, outside of Houston, came to help as she has several times over the past month. We spent most of the day shopping and provisioning. Thank you, AGAIN, Sandy.

New Year’s Eve day we took a short trip to Nassau Bay Anchorage to “swing” the compass, check AIS and the VHF. All worked. A beautiful short ride and a beautiful evening.

On New Year’s Day we took another short cruise to Nassau Bay Anchorage. Even though we’ve owned SCOUT for a little over two months, we have not had much cruising-on-the-water time. So we went to Nassau Bay to test the windless and the anchor – both worked! We anchored out, enjoyed the view, and had dinner aboard. Very nice – I think I could get used to this.