Hi. I bet you thought you had lost the author :-)  Sorry about that. I will get to that later. First I need to do a little catching up. I left on the trip south as planned. this first picture is about how far I made it last year before I had the show stopping engine trouble.

All is well. I finally get to cross under the bridge I have stared at for two summers. I knew I would eventually get to it. However, as I have learned. You can plan all you want with boating but it better be a loose plan. Maybe that is just how I have to do it but either way. I am now boating, not working on one hoping to go boating.

My first sunrise underway on Mary Lee. I thought this looked nice.

Then it turned into this. I had forgot that outdoor shots did this. Especially sunrises and sunsets. All you can do is take a bunch of pictures and keep the best. At this point I am pleased the engine is doing so well but still not sold on the rebuild I did. I know it would not be running this long if I had screwed up but I have done this worry thing on every engine I have ever worked on. It just takes time.

Pretty soon get to go under the next bridge. Starting to relax with the engine build. It is fine.

We are not alone out here.

Except for a few ships and other smaller boats. there is not a lot to see out here. We are shooting for Solomons island. Seems as good a place as any to wrap up the first day.

We anchored out the first night. We were pushing it and not sure where we would find a slip before dark we opted for the first protected spot. Like we did for the trip, we weighed anchor at the earliest possible minute and anchored just about dark. The only exceptions being when we "had" to tie up earlier.  I need to look at the camera to see if I have a picture of first nights anchorage. The next morning when we weighed anchor , I hurt my back lifting anchor.  We got out of protected waters and found after  two hours of fighting rough water that we had made almost no ground at all. Back to port. That was ok, I was really hurting. This time we opted to stay dockside. I need to download pictures from camera before I continue. See you soon.