Move to Siesta Key

We’re afloat.

Bucher’s first move was to construct a gangplant…two 2 x 6’s, a long one and a short, extending from the boat to the shore, meeting in shallow water on Alex’s little sawhorse. After the first frightened crossing, it got easier and easier to navigate, no matter what size suitcase or what wiggling child I carried.

 

The most pleasant note of the day was to learn that the electric company wouldn’t connect our line, even though all the equipment was here. Holiday…today, Sunday, and, of course, Labor Day. That leaves us without lights or cooking facilities. We have solved it for the present by Bucher’s borrowing a Coleman stove from his friend at the Mercury Motor Proving Ground. (We have an old alcohol stove aboard, but the Coleman is much easier to use and gives a hotter flame.) There are two good kerosene lanterns, a large battery lantern, and a flashlight aboard, so we can handle the lighting all right.

 

Alex has fallen overboard twice already.

The first time, he was walking down the gangplank, watching a pelican circling overhead, and walked into the water. I heard the splash, and when I got out, there he was hanging onto the rudder, treading water, and looking rather unhappy about the whole experience. I waded out and retrieved him, and he decided the fall was funny rather than serious. Not an hour later, he started around the deckhouse on the outside of the boat (there’s a little catwalk about four inches wide) with Bucher watching him. Alex didn’t watch where he was putting his feet and fell overboard amidships. He came up swimming. Bucher was so pleased about that, he hasn’t been able to talk about anything else since. Bucher is convinced that if he hadn’t been there, Alex would have swum back to shore by himself. We are glad he has found out early how easy it is to fall in because already he is being much more cautious.

 

Bucher went to the Pass (Midnight Pass…Mercury Proving Grounds) but forgot to get the stove. We are having a cold supper…which is much easier on me after the mess of trying to get settled.