Daytona, FL

Yup, still here. At least we're back on the boat, which is progress. It feels good to be home, although it's going to take a while to have it feel like home again. Little things like having the coffee where it's supposed to be, putting the life jackets away, getting all the sand off the floor. It feels great to be back, but I'm still frustrated and stir-crazy. I want to be on the way to the Bahamas, not still stuck in this same old harbor!!

So the update is this: I flew back to Orlando and we got back to the boat the next day. We're still in touch with our friends in Deland and I hope we can use their car if we end up needing to, but as of now I hope we can keep staying on the boat until we can leave. The problem is still, as always, the computer.

We keep debating just buying paper charts and keeping on going, but it would cost us $60 in paper charts just to get to our next contact, in Port Ste. Lucie. It would cost us at least $600 in paper charts to get to Trinidad, our original hurricane season goal. The Bahamas alone are covered in four chartbooks, which each cost $150. That's just to give you an idea of how expensive they are. We've known all along that being reliant on electronic charts exclusively was a bad idea, but, then again, cruising with our miniscule budget was always a bad idea.

Karl's done a temporary fix on our computer, and we may just get it working, if we spend another week here in Daytona. Now our problem is that we don't have the original software that came with the computer. The software for our old computer is too old, and the updated operating system that we bought is on a DVD, and guess what? The new computer, unbeknownst to us, is DVD-drive-less. Argh. If it ain't one thing, it's another, right?

So our options are:
1. Buy paper charts.
2. Fix the computer, at unknown cost in time and money.
3. Buy another computer, and resell this one as-is. But dare we trust eBay again, once burned?

I guess nebulous option four, hovering on the horizon, is to haul the boat, or rent a mooring ball somewhere, and actually--heaven forbid--get jobs and work and live for a while, without moving. Fate worse than death, right? Maybe I should start an online poll. I have no idea what to do. I guess right now we're leaning towards option 2. We've already been here a month and a half, what's another week? Karl's a little more antsy than I am. I feel refreshed and rejuvenated after my two weeks with my family. Ready to go, yes, but a lot more at peace than I was before.

I am still frustrated with this blog thing, though. Without the computer, my only journalling time is snatched from library sessions. The Daytona library charges you five dollars--five dollars!!--for two hours of daily internet access. Ludicrous. Libraries have become a lot more exclusive since those young, dewy days at the dawn of the information age. I understand, though, what with funding shortages and everything. Still, though, at five dollars a day, that's one expensive website. I've even found some blog entries from before the Big Disaster that I thought were lost, but I don't know how I'm going to ever find time to post them. At least not until we get this computer thing straightened out. So bear with me.

On the plus side, it's beautiful here. Eighty degrees, sunny. I'm wearing a tee-shirt and sunglasses, and a dolphin greeted us this morning, not ten feet from the boat. Life is still good. And we finally saw our Canadian friends on Sea Belle again the other day. They stopped by to visit us, and we had a great night revisiting old times. It's good to know that they're just as bewildered about what to do as we are. Hurricane season is throwing everyone for a loop. Chances are, we'd be in the same boat (ha ha) even if we hadn't had this computer problem.