A beautiful day in the neighborhood yesterday! Woke up to wonderful sunshine and blue skies. Still cold but shining sun is good.  We’re still at Pensacola Yacht Club and our slip is right on Bayou Chico and gives us a great view of the comings an goings of tug/barges and lots of “pleasure craft”, power and sail, all right off our bow. The view off our stern is of the rolling lawn up to the Clubhouse and pool. To our port are more slips with a few power but mostly sailboats. Directly to our starboard is a boat ramp but on the other side “The Blue Ghost” is docked – almost a mirror image of our boat. We look out our window and see ourselves(?). Beyond The Blue Ghost are a few more slips with mostly sailboats. What a nice facility this is. Everything here is in great condition and the people are very friendly. We are thoroughly enjoying our stay.

I did a load of laundry today in their laundry room and there was no charge. It’s the little things that cause you do the happy dance. Michael continued to work on our boat problem. He Uber’d to a consignment marine store looking for a volt meter which is no longer being made. I tidied the boat. When Michael came back he was panting and looked pale as though he had just suffered a heart attack. When I questioned his condition he said they didn’t have a volt meter at the consignment store but he bought a used folding bike like the ones they sell at West Marine. He got a good deal on it because it needed some fixing. The brakes dragged a little when he tried it out. He had to walk it over a bridge to get back to the boat and he said they dragged a whole lot more when walking it. He was totally wasted when he limped aboard the boat. It’s adorable and should come in handy once repaired. He fixed it, put a basket on the back with bungie cords, and rode off to the store for wine, beer and stuff for poo-poo’s since we’re having guests tonight. This time he came back smiling saying it worked great.

At around 6:00 pm our friends Bayley Olds and Gail and Houston Jones came by. We had a drink aboard before going just down the street to The Oar House for dinner. When we arrived at the restaurant we discovered we couldn’t eat outside because they didn’t have heaters and it was too cold. We had the doggies with us and we offered to take them back to the boat so we could eat inside but our wonderful friends said “absolutely not, we’ll order food to go and take it to the boat”. Snooki and Duke have new life-long friends. Woof, Woof…… Gail, Houston and Bayley.

A bit about our wonderful friends: We’ve known Bayley literally all his life. Michael was actually the first person, other than his mom and dad, to see Bayley when he was born. He is now an ensign in the Coast Guard and is in flight school here in Pensacola. He is absolutely a delightful and handsome young man. Gail and Houston are good friends of the Olds family and we met them several times over the years a parties in San Diego. They are avid sailors and have sailed all over the world. They lived in Panama City Florida and unfortunately went through the recent hurricane there and lost their beautiful sailboat so they sold their condo and moved to Pensacola in December. It was great getting together with them we had an awesome time and interesting conversation.

Today was cloudy and cold all day. Gail picked me up this morning and took me to Wally-Mart for provisions. Michael continued to work on the boat and finally diagnosed the problem as a bad alternator. When we got back from Wally-Mart Gail took Michael and the alternator to the auto supply store for repair. What a wonderful friend she is!!!!

Good news is alternator is fixed and weather permitting we will leave for Fort Walton Yacht Club tomorrow morning.