How We Wasted Away a Month in Titusville

How We Wasted Away a Month in Titusville

O.K., so truthfully most of it wasn’t wasted time…we just couldn’t believe we ended up staying docked at a marina there for an entire month! That was the longest Radio Waves had sat still since being on the hard over the winter back in Michigan! The folks at Titusville Municipal Marina sure made it hard for us to leave! We had planned on staying on a mooring ball to save money, but they offered us a dock at a rate we couldn’t refuse, and boy were we glad we did. It made life sooo much easier! They had nice clean restrooms, with nice hot water for showers (something we may have actually wasted a bit of…), a huge laundry room and great staff.

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Aerial view of Titusville Municipal Marina
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And an aerial view of Radio Waves at the dock! Every now and then one of us needs to be hoisted up the mast to work on something. It was Jim’s turn this time as he worked on adding an antenna for our ham radio.

So anyhow, what did we do for an entire month? Well, our biggest reason for the stop was so we could visit with family. A few days before Christmas we rented a car and drove to the Orlando airport where our boys were flying in from Detroit and Los Angeles. We were so excited to see them and grateful that we could spend Christmas together! Once we wrangled our way through airport traffic and picked them up, we headed to Fruitland Park, Florida where my parents, Jim’s mom, my sister and two nieces all live, and had a great time visiting with everyone over the next several days!

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A little Christmas cheer inside Radio Waves!
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In keeping with tradition, Kevin cooks up our chili con queso for Christmas Eve!
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Enjoying Christmas Eve with our families!
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Making Christmas dinner with Jim’s mom
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Christmas dinner
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Homemade eggnog and pies for dessert!
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Decorating sugar cookies…another long standing tradition!
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Eating cookies…MY holiday tradition! LOL!
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Miss our boys so much already!
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There’s one in every crowd!
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We had a very minimalist Christmas this year, but both the boys share our love of good craft brews, so we all got beer for Christmas this year. And no, we hadn’t already drank them all…the beer was in the fridge staying cold for later.
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Santa brought us a rod and reel for Christmas. Hope we get a chance to put it to use soon!
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Christmas present from my mom. I love my new mermaid and she is happy in her new home on Radio Waves.
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A little post Christmas shuffle board
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The rest of the shuffleboard players
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Oh yeah…Jim also picked papayas from my mom’s tree so we could take a few back to the boat with us.

We spent New Year’s Eve with friends from Daytona who had invited us to their home for a small New Year’s Eve get together. We were docked about 45 minutes from where they live, so once again we had friends spending their precious time driving around to pick us up. We have some of the best friends! Thanks Mike and Janet!

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NYE gang!
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Somehow we never managed to get everyone in one picture and it just didn’t feel right leaving out the hostess!

And then of course there was the Fiesta Bowl on New Year’s Day and there was no way we were gonna miss watching the Buckeyes beat Notre Dame! Unfortunately it was on ESPN, so we weren’t able to watch it on the boat. The marina has a small lounge with a TV that has cable, so we made sure to get there before the game started so we’d have dibs on which Bowl game to watch! We were a bit worried because the Citrus Bowl was on at the same time, and Florida was playing Michigan. Unbelieveably, no one else came by the entire time we were watching the game…except for two guys from Ohio!

At one point during our stay we decided that we could really use some exercise, and Canaveral National Seashore was only about 15 miles away….so….we did what any beach loving, boat living folks would do and rode our bikes. There and back. Over 30 miles total. OMG. Fortunately for me, but unfortunately for Jim’s bike, one of his tires developed a leak and we had to stop every few miles to pump some air back into it. Jim wasn’t thrilled, but I was happy to have the mini rest breaks.

We also patronized the local brewery, the Playalinda Brewing Company. But you all probably already knew we’d do that, right?!? I mean it was within walking distance and they had some really good beer. We even met some folks there one night that let us crash their Cards Against Humanity game. Turns out one of the couples are kindred spirits. They sold their house in Utah, as well as all their possessions to travel the United States in an RV with their two teenage daughters. After a year of traveling they decided they liked this area and now own The Wayward Traveler’s Inn in Mims, FL. We are looking forward to checking it out when we return to Florida this summer…assuming we ever make it out of here!

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Believe it or not, this is the ONLY picture we got at the Playalinda Brewing Company…a picture of the men’s urinal made from a keg!

Probably the biggest single reason we were glad that we ended up at a dock and not on a mooring ball was the amount of provisioning that we did while we were in Titusville. Holy smokes! You’d think we were planning for an apocolypse, instead of several months in the Bahamas! We hit up Sam’s Club, Costco, and Wal-mart…as well as a few others. The intent was to stock up on whatever we could fit in the boat (without sinking it!) that either isn’t going to be available once we reach the Bahamas, or else would just be too expensive there. Beer. Take beer as an example. It is certainly available in the Bahamas…if you’re willing to pay $50 to $60 for a case for plain ol’ beer! Yikes! So, yes, we have several cases of beer stashed wherever we could fit them. We also have food stuffs stored ALL OVER the boat. We used a spreadsheet (started with one created by The Boat Galley) to keep track of where we put everything, or otherwise we’d never be able to find anything when we need it!

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‘Cause doesn’t everyone need a pyramid of beer?!?

And then, finally, we could find no more excuses to stay. We pulled away from the dock in thick fog on January 9th and continued our trek south.

8 Comments

  • Kurt

    January 24, 2016 at 1:50 pm Reply

    I know some of those people! šŸ˜€
    Nice that you got to see family for Christmas. Hardly a waste.

  • Kevin Walden

    January 24, 2016 at 2:52 pm Reply

    Umm Budweiser??? Haha

    • Chris

      January 24, 2016 at 5:47 pm Reply

      Yup! LOL!They don’t have Labatt in Florida and we can’t drink IPAs all the time!

  • Sharon Holbrook

    January 24, 2016 at 3:46 pm Reply

    Love the family pictures, everyone looked so good. Chuckle at your provisions stash, priorities are apparent!

    • Chris

      January 24, 2016 at 6:52 pm Reply

      Thanks!

  • Angela Thomas

    January 24, 2016 at 4:03 pm Reply

    Why is beer so expensive? That is crazy! Loved this update – thanks!!

    • Chris

      January 24, 2016 at 6:53 pm Reply

      Hi! I’m not totally sure on the beer, but it may just be because it’s heavy and has to be shipped over?

  • Evan Davila

    January 25, 2016 at 7:43 am Reply

    We’re glad you got time to spend with family, sounds like you guys are stocked and ready for the rest of your adventure.

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