Mon, March 8, 2010 - Miami, FL at Sunset Lake

It looked like it was going to be a terrific day for an adventure. As we were working around the boat, the man who lived in the house across the canal from where we were anchored approached us in his fishing boat. He was accompanied by another man who appeared to be his employee. We had seen him at various times over the last couple of days “patrolling” the water in front of his home and large yacht. It seemed to us that he was directing folks away from his front yard. Evidently, we were now the object of his attention and had overstayed our welcome. He inquired as to when we might be leaving and informed us that it made his wife “crazy” to have boats parked in front of their home. “After all,” he said, “how would you like it if somebody parked a motor home in front of your house for days??”

Anyway, there were various responses to this man’s inquiry, most of which we did not voice. There was a local ordinance that made it clear you could not anchor in the same spot for more than a week, but we were still well within that time frame. Gale told the man that we would be staying another night or so, and left it at that. It takes all kinds . . .

Around 11 am, Jim and Deb in their dinghy and Fred in his came by to let us know they were on their way. We had already lowered our own dinghy and were ready to join them for the afternoon. The five of us set out to find our bus stop and figure out the public transit system. Our destination for the day was Bayside, a “touristy” shopping area on the water in Miami Beach. We were all hungry for lunch by the time we arrived at Bayside. Jim and Deb suggested Hooters – not for the food or the servers, but for the view of the Bay. After lunch, we wandered through the shops and stopped for a drink at the Hard Rock Café. Towards late afternoon, we caught the bus back to where we had left the dinghies. From there, we traveled by dinghy to the tie up just across the street from Publix and loaded up on provisions. After loading up the dinghy with our groceries, we made it home before sunset and settled in for a nice evening.