Adios Panama---Hello USA!!.......Serena Ray's Delivery, Orlando and Haulout

We have been on Serena Ray since April, 2009 leaving from Seattle,  traveling North to Alaska, turning around and cruising back to Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica and on to Panama through the canal last April, 2011.  It was time for us to move on after staying at Shelter Bay Marina much longer than expected due to John's surgery.  So it was very strange to watch Serena Ray leave us under the command of Captain Jim Mobley and First Mate Jeff Winter.  It wasn’t that we had any reservations about who was doing the delivery, as they came highly recommended as more than capable and had delivered numerous Nordhavns along with other motor and sailing vessels.  It was just a bit difficult to realize that even though we had taken Serena Ray 9,000+ nm., we would not get to take her ourselves to Florida, and also the fact that we had so looked forward to stopping in Providencia, Columbia; Roatan, Honduras; Belize and Isla Mujeres, MX along the way.   But, circumstances changed and with John’s rotator cuff surgery and not wanting to spend another hurricane season in Panama, coupled with the fact that we really wanted to cruise the East Coast of the USA.

Sunset we missed

Captain Jim landed a big Wahoo!

US Warship off of Nicaragua

We kept in contact with Serena Ray via Satellite phone while she was underway and all went well. They had a few rough days at first but otherwise a fine passage and were able to catch some fish along the way (some of which they froze for us) J They arrived in Palm Beach a short 11 days after they left Shelter Bay. We were there to greet them and they had a “WELCOME HOME” sign along with appetizers for us. Great guys and we add our names to the list of of very satisfied customers!

While they were slogging their way to Florida (24/7) on 4 hour shifts, we took the opportunity to spend a couple of days in Orlando, visiting Epcot and Universal Studios. We especially had a fantastic time at the new Harry Potter feature at Universal.   

 

Entering the land of Potter!!

The ride inside the mountain is absolutely fantastic!!

Epcot - America

Making it look easy!!

China's acrobats....Great!

Rosie's audition with the Blues Brothers at Universal

The Roller Coaster was stuck in this position for an hour!!

                                                            

Serena Ray was hauled at Seminole Marina in Palm Beach Gardens, FLs, shortly after arrival.  New bottom paint, preventive maintenance and new floor covering were added.   Also, while we are on the hard, we had fuel delivered to the yard (we wanted to hurry, as these #!*>:+### fuel prices are escalating!) Talk about pain at the pump....1,200 gallons....painful  (What else is new?).

The Intra-Coastal Waterway

To get to the boatyard, we had our first experience on the Intracoastal Waterway going under two of the MANY bridges we will encounter. There are set times that the bridges open either on the quarter hour, half hour, three quarter or on the hour.  Our cruising guides have the schedule and as we approach we radio the bridge to let them know we’ll be coming through.This will be quite a change from cruising the Pacific side.    AH…..yet another new adventure.

We are enjoying the cuisine (as usual).  We are back in Lobsterland.  We have been to a local restaurant 3 times so far called the Juno Beach Fish House on Highway 1.  Tuesday nights are their special lobster night and we are definitely taking advantage of that!

We look forward to cruising the Intracoastal Waterway, which parallels the Atlantic Ocean and we are told there is so much to see and numerous cool stopovers. We hope to anchor most of the time like we used to in the Pacific Northwest….

Tiger Wood's Boat (m/v Privacy) is at the end of our dock!

Sunrise on the ICW!!

We will leave Palm Beach in a few days and plan to head south on the ICW to Key Largo and Key West while the weather up north warms. We'll then turn and head north..........

Until next update.........