On Friday morning we went ashore to dump rubbish and give pretzel a walk. We spotted the Manatee foraging at the dock wall so we stood and watched for a few minutes. A small power boat arrived in the harbor and dropped anchor a short distance away. The kids on board immediately jumped into the water for a swim. The Manatee hearing the splash swam over to the boat and frolicked around looking for a hand out. We decided to go back to the boat and get some lettuce which the manatee love. We drifted over to where he was and soon he swam up to us and let us hand feed him the lettuce. Unbelievable experience. We patted him on the head and he looked to enjoy the experience as much as we did. We had one major problem, we forgot the camera in all the excitement so no pictures for the blog. They are really gentle giants. This one was as big as our dingy and probably as heavy as it and us on board. This is a picture from the net, not one of mine!
The one sad thing about the whole experience was observing all the injuries to the poor creature. He had some scars on his back and several chunks taken out of his tail. Today it is easy to see why this happens. The quiet anchorage of the past few days is chuck-a-block full of all kinds of boats with all kinds of people enjoying the sun and surf. Some don't heed the signs at the entrance of the harbor and go too fast to avoid the manatee. It is rare for them to be hit but all it takes is one bad collision and they suffer a lot.
By the way they are not the only inhabitants of the harbor. Almost every day we see one or two large Dolphins chasing fish and popping up and down around the boats.
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Captain Ed with his FECKIN IRISH WHISKEY!!!!!!
As happens on a frequent basis we had cocktails on board our neighbors boat yesterday afternoon and as you can see he produced a tasteful treat, what a great name!!! |
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