I HEART sailing :-D

After 3 days of sailing, we are back in the land of cell phones and internet connections. We sailed along the southern border of the Everglades for the past 3 days and it was AMAZING. The wind did not do exactly what it was supposed to do but we made it work. We saw so many stars at night, did not see any other boats/humans for two days, and got to let the dogs run on a desserted island in the middle of nowhere all morning. Granted we had to motor all day the first day, we did not get the wind we wanted (it was opposite day at NOAA apparently), and we started and ended today aground (not enough water in the anchorage first thing this morning and Captain wasn't paying attention and completely missed our markers and ran hard aground this evening)...

Now the Bahamas prep begins! Wal-Mart, provision, provision, provision, more Wal-Mart and then we sail back to El Griffins and then we go!! YAY!

Until next time. XO Nicole and the crew

& Happy New Year!

Hola Peeps! Welcome to 2011!! We have been busy enjoy this holiday season. Christmas day our buddies the Griffins rolled (well sailed) into town and we had them over for dinner which was awesome! We spent Christmas week saying we were going to go sailing but never actually doing so. We mostly hung out, slept too late, and hung out with friends. What can I say, we are overachievers.

New Years Eve was a night of FUN! We had Mark and Beth over for dinner and MANY MANY drinks. 1 bottle of wine, 3 bottles of champagne, a six pack of beer... you get the picture.

After dinner we decided that Beth and I were going to put on some sexy shoes and find a place to dance. Before getting there my poor husband took a digger on the dock. Soaked his foot and hit his head on the dock. Anyway, we found a bar with this awesome one man show playing bluegrass music and danced our feet off. I decided to switch to water at this point because you know, yeah I had had enough to drink. My husband was not quite as smart and did a tequilla shot and had two more beers.

Walking home from said bar barefoot was interesting. We made it back to the dinghy and then back to the big boats without anyone drowning. Saturday was not a good day for 50% of the Starfish/Sea Zen crew. The other 50% were fine :-)

We are now preparing to go on a few days sail... we figure our first sail on Starfish should not be the crossing the gulf stream...

Happy New Year everyone! Hope you all have a great 2011!

XO Nicole and the crew

Where the wild things are...

Well today was certainly not the most productive day ever. Got the Christmas gifts out and I finished our animal print pillows! Yay! We are back in the land of where the wild things are... I love it!

XO Nicole

We be wrappin'....

That's my plan for this cold night, Christmas present wrapping. I am the ultimate procrastinator and the rest of my Christmas gifts for other people FINALLY arrived today so I am a wrappin' fool tonight so I can get the packages out before the end of the week so they have a prayer of making it to there destinations for Christmas...

I then intend to eat the apple crisp my Nanny sent me in the mail! She is the BEST! Thank you Nanny!! XOXO

One special note, to our dear friends on Sea Zen, be safe on your journey south! Can't wait to see you!!

HO HO HO! Nicole and crew

Hosting blog on new site

Hello Again!
This is a quick post as my fingers are pretty much frozen solid. The Starfish blog is going to be on this site now, here is the link: Starfish and her crazy crew!.

I lost patience with Sail Blogs as they were kind of ridiculous about pictures and being able to post a link to the actual blog page, they want money, money, money so I much prefer this website. Any questions for me and the crew can be sent to nicole.chambers at live dot com (in the correct format of course!!).

Stay Warm! Nicole

My poor little Dexter! (and actually me for that matter!)

 

14 December 2010 | South Pole

All I have to say is YUCK! I was sick all weekend with a nasty head cold. Thanks for that husband!! The cold weather is certainly not helping. The wind yesterday was out of control! It was a steady 25mph and it was gusting to 35mph!! Needless to say I did not sleep well last night.

Now on to poor Dexter. The humidty dropped so fast and it got so dry, the poor little guy is suffering from major dry skin and has scratched his neck and leg raw :-( He also has a nasty ear infection. So he is now hopped up on Benedryl, ear drops, and hydrocortisone. Good times. He is not thrilled.


Stay warm everyone!! XO Nicole

Baby it's cold outside!!

08 December 2010 | North Pole or South Florida??

Well hello there!

We are experiencing a bit of cold snap here in lovely South Florida. It got down to 49 degrees last night! I know, I know, my NH friends and my RI friends are telling my to F*CK off right now... up until last week I have not seen a temperature below 70 degrees in 9 NINE MONTHS so I my skin is not really thick enough for that anymore.

Living on a boat when it is cold can be challenging. We are not insulated in the same way a house or an apartment is and we don't have a "central" heating system. Our heat sources are our oven (my marina employee buddy affectionately calls that a redneck fireplace which I love!) and our small propane space heater. Part of the problem is also the persistent FREEZING NORTH WINDS blowing at 20-25 mph. It's like getting hit in the face with snowballs.

I certainly hope everyone else is staying warm, it's supposed to warm up again Friday and through the weekend and then we get another arctic blast Sunday night, thanks Canada!!!

Trying to stay warm, Nicole and the salty (icy?) crew

PS the image attached is not our boat or anything it is just how we feel right now