Finally Looping!!
Today we travelled from Biloxi, MS to Orange Beach, AL. As you can see above we left at first light (6:15am) so we could maximize our available daylight. We had to go 70+ miles, which to date was our longest journey. As you can also see it was a beautiful morning with very calm seas which is what we all prayed for.
My pelican pics will have to be replaced with dolphin photos today because there were so many that entertained us all day long. Many mammas with their babies.
We continued in the Mississippi Sound and had to cross Mobile Bay which was where we could officially say we are now "looping". We are now on the official path of the American Great Loop (it only took us 3 weeks to get here!)
There was very little traffic and we got into The Wharf Marina around 4:00, well ahead of sunset at 5:30.
The Wharf Marina is a beautiful facility that offers a variety of things to do immediately behind it. These pics are looking down the main street that is lined with retail shops and boutiques, restaurants, a movie theatre, miniature golf, a farmer's market and an amphitheater.
We'll likely be here for a few days waiting for better weather to travel. Better weather for us means less than a 25% chance of rain, winds not greater than 15 mph and seas less than 2 feet if we're off shore (less than 1 is much preferred after we experienced Lake Pontchartrain).
We had dinner at Ginny Lane's at the marina. This is their chicken fried steak ($8.00). It was so good we decided to come back the next night!
Our alternator began to fail during our trip up the Mississippi River and would not maintain a proper charge on our House batteries. Second Wave has 4 separate battery banks. The alternator charges the House bank that powers all of our lights, electronics, bilge pumps, toilet, and most importantly our bow thruster. We also have a bank of batteries for our Inverter, a bank of batteries for our stern thruster (24 volt), and a separate battery for our generator.
As a workaround for the alternator, we've had to run our generator in order to power our battery charger to keep the House battery bank fully charged while we've been underway. When at a marina, we can plug into shore power to run the battery charger.
The photos above show Brent in the engine room switching out our old alternator for a new one. You can also see a side-by-side of the old part and the new one.
It was a good trade! We're now getting 13.76 volts and climbing on the meter at the batteries and over 14 volts from the new alternator with the engine running. We're back to normal.
Look at this big boy, 10 months old and 200 pounds!! He lays by the door of a children's boutique in the retail area of the marina and greets each guest. His name is POTUS.
A wonderful Farmer's Market on property is open everyday.
We can vouch for the availability of dolphins in the area. We've seen them everywhere - even in the marina.
I said that we'd go back to Ginny Lane's again. The meatloaf was just as great as the CFS. Check out the cost of the 2 Cosmos on the Rocks!!
Entertainment at Ginny Lane's.
Dinner with our new friends from the sailing catamaran Randy Jo - Ken and Lori. What a wonderful experience and unexpected surprise to have been able to cruise with them for the last few weeks! From here they are likely headed off shore thru Pensacola Bay directly to Florida before sailing on to the Bahamas. Brent and I plan to be in the Bahamas later this spring. But, we'll stay in the GICW until we reach Carrabelle FL and then make a "short" leap across the armpit of Florida to Tarpon Springs before heading to Ft. Meyers and then to the Florida Keys.
Speaking of Florida, we're less than 10 miles away now. Can't believe that. It took almost 2 weeks to get through Louisiana. We'll cruise through MS and AL in half that time. Don't really care where we are at the moment, we just want to find warmer weather! We haven't worn shorts in months - that's not boating.
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