We left Heartbeat tied up in Fort Lauderdale before Christmas and headed for Arizona. As it turns out it was a good time to leave as it was a wet and windy week in SE Florida. The Ft Lauderdale airport even closed for a day due to flooding.  While in Arizona we split our […]

  As we learned more about The Great Loop we saw that you can actually take your boat right across Florida using the Okeechobee Waterway. Last year we wanted to visit the Keys so stayed on the west side of Florida and did not take this waterway. This year we wanted to do something different

   We had a great time in St Pete again this year. As we had done a lot of the museums and touristy things last year, this year's stop was a bit more relaxed.  We had hoped to have a Northern Lights mechanic out to look at our generator but he kept pushing us off

    Before I (Penny dog) left on The Great Loop I had no idea how many people did it so this graph was pretty cool to see. There are quite a few dogs on The Loop but I have no idea how many. Maybe one day they will count us. Hi. It is me

  We left Pensacola with Scaliwag heading for Destin which was 50 miles away. When we had covered just 35 miles we decided to stop at Spectre Island even though it was still early afternoon. After a week in Pensacola we were craving a quiet place and Spectre Island would deliver on that. We had

 We tied up to the wall in downtown Mobile with Scaliwag (Parker & Leslie) and sat there for 3 nights. Last year this would have been a free spot but the Mobile Convention Center that owns the wall got smart and started charging if you tie up and stay more than 12 hours. It happened

 Our stay in Grand Rivers at Green Turtle Bay Marina (GTB) was familiar as we had spent a month there last year getting Heartbeat ready. It was nice to be in a place that was familiar. We stayed an extra day to be sure we got in a visit with our favorite canvas guy Mark

  We spent several long travel days on the Mississippi River. Fortunately we were traveling with the current so we had an extra push in our favor. First day was 84 miles to a free lock wall where we reconnected with Parker & Leslie (Scaliwag).  Getting a nice push from the current on the Mississippi

  Our flight to Portland was out of Chicago giving us a chance to stay a few days in downtown Chicago to do and see a few places we had missed when we came through on Heartbeat.  Trying to get the skyline in The Bean.  he crowds of people made for some pretty cool reflections. 

  The red part is all we have left before we “cross our wake” where we started this adventure.  Sept 26 marked 365 days on The Great Loop and they have gone by in a bit of a blur. A lot of Loopers keep stats on all sorts of things. We are not ashamed to