Fort Lauderdale

Our friends Vince and Debbie R. from Marco Island drove over to meet us at Port Everglades. They are good friends we met though Race Committee work in Florida. They arrived at 9 AM which gave us time to call the girls in the morning and catch up with the news.

Our first order of business was to go to Wal-Mart and buy the drawers etc. We bought a lot of things to make the cabin the best it can be. Next stop was Costco to lay in some more Champagne. The final stop was the storage locker to pick up the stored luggage. This was the point where we realized we had forgotten the key to the lock on the ship.

It seemed like a good time for lunch and Bloody Marys! We had a great lunch and view of the beach.
We went back to the ship and got the key and unloaded the stuff we had bought. As we carried on drawers, everyone was saying what a good idea it was. (Ellen asked me if the drawers were really that big a deal. The answer is yes. We are all set now though. )

Jeff and Vince went back to storage to pick up all the luggage while Debbie and I waited at the port. I made some more phone calls. It was the last time with a phone until January 30 in LA.

We boarded and went to the cabin. What a lot of luggage! I was in shock looking at all of the stuff we needed to store. I didn't even have the heart to take a picture of it. It was overwhelming. (It took until Thursday afternoon the 17th to get it all put away. All systems are now go on the cabin. Everything put away and the luggage stored. No more tales about the luggage. )

We went to join our friends Stirling and Clare from Naples, Florida for sail away. Here is Stirling with an extra bubbly bottle of champagne. We were escorted out of the harbor by 3 fire boats. The QE2 led. We won't see the QE2 again until February 24 in Sydney.

Next stop is Aruba on Saturday. We will have a beach day on our own.