Past Events 2016

Over the past couple of months I have had the opportunity to visit with some of our MBYC members who have recently move to the Bentley Community in North Naples. I received a call from Sydney Mellinger in early November in response to our mailing regarding updating her contact information and photo. I offered to drop by her condo and snap an image for the 2017 roster. Deb and I decided that since Iguana Mia, our favorite mexican restaurant in SW Florida, was nearby we’d make an adventure of it. We shared a table with the Mellingers at the Commodore’s Ball one year but didn’t know them well. We had a delightful visit and a great meal on our way home.

About a week later John Kernan suggested that a group of us go and visit the Hennings who just recently moved into a unit in the building adjacent to Sydney’s. Jack Barter and I rode along with John after our men’s Thursday morning breakfast at the Sand Bar. Owen welcomed us at the elevator in his usual jovial manner. Juanita had just made a batch of cookies that we enjoyed with a cup of coffee. Yet another delightful visit. One can’t help but feel great when you realize that your efforts are truly appreciated.

Please consider contacting and visiting these wonderful MBYC members if you plan to be up in their area. Visits of small groups mean a lot and will help maintain ties with the club.

Dan & Deb Lowell.

They say that a boater’s two happiest days are when he/she buys the boat and when it gets sold. That’s not true for Wanderer V. We are truly sorry to say “Goodbye,” but we have literally gone every place we can think of going, several times. Before we purchased her new from Grand Banks in Ft Lauderdale on November 17, 2007 we had never owned (or even driven) a larger powerboat. All the other Wanderers were sail boats from 30 up to 63 feet. We hired a powerboat consultant to help us pick the right vessel.

That was nine years ago and when we docked her in Ft Lauderdale on November 15, 2016 we could look back on these memories from our log. We cruised Wanderer V for a total of 15,646 nautical miles including 3 trips to the Chesapeake Bay, 8 passages to the Bahamas and even one voyage to New Orleans, plus many great MBYC extended cruises. Our dog, Bob, usually traveled with us. We visited 268 ports and anchorages (many several times), welcomed 40 guests for stays of a week or more and burned 34,178 gallons of diesel fuel. Now this is scary, we spent the equivalent of two years aboard, and we “almost” never had an argument. And we never ran aground. The props have never been off the boat. We ran our sailboats aground on a regular basis.

Now we are going back to sailing in the South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand, which we loved before we bought Wanderer V. But, Lil Wanderer is still on our boat lift and ready for MBYC short cruises.

John and Dianne Kernan, and Bob the dog.