Thursday, June 25, 2020

Father's Day Weekend 2020

Celebrating Father's Day with the HISC

Father's Day fell on Sunday June 21st 2020 (last weekend) right in the middle of the Pandemic which has caused most of us to be in some form of quarantine since the middle of March.

We joined other club members at the Bahia Mar Marina in Fort Lauderdale, there were 6 boats in attendance from the club with a total of about 20+ crew.  The event was held after the Nederlanden Coastal Race from Hillsboro Inlet down to Port Everglades, but we (Eximius) did not race, we just went directly to the Bahia Mar from our Dock an hour away.

The Bahia Mar Crew were happy to see us, their business is picking up as Broward County Opens up, but they are still, correctly, practicing Social Distancing and every staff member that we interacted with were wearing Face Masks, both outside and inside their offices.

The Pool was open, and some of the HISC crew cooled off from the 90ยบ+F  Temperature and commented that it was not too crowded, compared to normally there being probably a hundred folks swimming and dining up there. Peggy & I did not go up to the Pool, we're being a bit more aggressive about maintaining Social Distancing - at least we're trying.

The Celebrations really consisted of the club members sharing Pizza, Fish, Water Melon, Klondike Bars while staying, mostly 6' apart and wearing Face masks when getting any closer. It sure was nice being able to chat and share stories with our friends after being away from club activities for so long. True, we've had Virtual meetings and Happy Hours online, but there's really nothing better than meeting with good people.

We stayed at Bahia Mar Saturday & Sunday, departing on Monday, Affection was there on Friday & Saturday nights, everyone else arrived on Saturday and departed on Sunday. Weather was glorious except for the storms on Friday Evening, the rest of the weekend we barely got wet - well, except for the results of the very high temperatures. Luckily, our AC on the boat worked just fine, we do need to consider a Sun Shade over part of the hull, the underside, in the cabin, gets surprisingly hot.

Sunday morning there was a huge boat parade on the ICW, we saw at least 50 boats dressed up and celebrating Gay Pride, they were certainly having fun. 

We departed Bahia Mar on Monday at about 10:30am just as the tide was reaching slack and had an easy motor up the New River, no crazies around, I guess most folks are getting back to work. A couple of big yachts were heading up river under their own power, in fact we didn't see a single boat under tow, a rarity. 

Because of the time we planned to leave Bahia Mar, we had plenty of time to prep the boat for unloading, it's surprising how much we take on the boat considering how much we keep onboard at all times. But preparing for the unload that way really reduces the time from arrival at the dock to being on the road for the drive home. We called the local Thai Restaurant and ordered take out so that we didn't have to prepare lunch. By 13:40 we were settled in at home eating Thai Chicken Red Curry and Chicken Lo Mein. 

Great weekend with some great people. 

Hope to see them again on the Independence Day.

See you on the water!

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