Still in Hurricane Harbor, Key Biscayne

Thursday, January 30th

This is a really sweet anchorage.  I can't believe the place was empty when we pulled in here 2 days ago. There were thunderstorms marching by last night with high winds and some rain but we barely moved in this very protected cove.  It was quite the lightning show and we were dramatically woken up with a very loud "CRACK!" of lightning somewhere very near us.  We are about 1/2 mile from where we were anchored when struck by lightning in 2012 which took us over a month and $19,000 (thank you insurance) to repair so we don't like lightning around the boat. 

Today, the winds are 12-20 knots right from the opening in the harbor and we still only have a light swell coming in.  The winds should die today and be calmer tomorrow before the big storm predicted for Saturday and Sunday.

Yesterday, we dropped the dinghy, lowered the new outboard onto it and ran about 2 miles to No Name Harbor which is in a state park ("Billy Bags State Park" I think).  It was a little bumpy and wet as we were motoring into a light swell with about a 1 foot wind-chop off the ocean.  But, after a little sightseeing with the dinghy, we stopped for lunch at the Boaters Grill restaurant in the park before taking walk down toward the lighthouse.  Lunch was on the expensive side but very good - $40 for the shrimp ceviche appetizer, caesar salad with Mahi-Mahi (which we split) and one sangria.

The state park has an $8 tie up fee which is on the "honor" system.  There is a dropbox with envelopes near the seawall.  No problem as we paid the money and dropped off our garbage.  Even though we are pretty independent for 2-3 weeks on the boat while away from the dock, the major problem is garbage.   If we are anchored near open water, we don't have a problem throwing organics in the water ("fish food") but we don't toss anything else.  It all gets bagged for shore.

We only made about 1/2 mile into our walk before dark clouds came over so we headed back to the boat where we had left windows open.  It was clear skies when we left...

The downwind ride back was a little nicer and we never did get any rain the rest of the afternoon.

Every morning we listen to Chris Parker's boaters forecast and still don't see a good window for crossing to the Bahamas.  This batch of "impulses" coming from the Gulf of Mexico will finally end with a large front on Saturday / Sunday.  After that, the winds settle down a bit but are mostly from the east - where we want to go.  Laura and I have pretty much decided that if we don't see weather for a crossing by early next week, we will probably go back to Burdines in Marathon for a couple weeks (at least).  The long range weather forecast calls for more moderating weather mid-February.

The past year or so I have been using a new marine navigation app called AquaMaps.  It has a pretty neat anchor watch function which let's me relax a bit at night or during storms.  It does a great job of watching where the boat is compared to where we dropped the anchor so I don't have to sit in the cockpit when the wind picks up.  Check out this screenshot from just a few minutes ago.

The dark circle with the yellow outline is the section we should be staying in based on how much anchor chain we have out.  Notice the black anchor icon in the middle of the circle.  That is where we dropped our anchor on Tuesday.  The box at the top of the screen says we are 75 feet from the anchor right now - I have the alarm set at 140 feet.  I can walk from the bow to the stern with the iPhone and watch this number change.  It's very accurate!

AquaMaps is constantly watching our position based on my iPhone GPS.  If we drift outside of the yellow line it lets me know with a loud siren.  I know because I forgot to turn it off when we went on our dinghy ride yesterday and could hear it even way down in our backback.

We've decided to stay here over the stormy weekend instead of heading back to Key Largo for a more open anchorage.  The anchor is holding well and we're very protected.  We may dinghy back to the state park tomorrow for a walk-a-bout.  Only problem with this anchorage is sometimes a powerboat comes in from Miami then anchors and blasts music all over the harbor for a couple hours.  What's up with that?

Rodriguez Key to Card Sound then Key Biscayne

Sunday, January 26th

This morning we spent a couple hours checking all the weather forecasts for crossing to the Bahamas.  Windfinder.com and PredictWind.com looked pretty good for tonight (Sunday), Monday and Tuesday.  But...  One of the most revered forcasters, Chris Parker, gave the next couple days poor marks because of "inclement weather" including thunderstorms and seas in the 4-7' range.   He mentioned a few short windows but nothing that would let us get to protected anchorages or marinas in Chub Key or Nassau.

If we were going this afternoon or tonight, we should stay at our Rodriquez anchorage and leave from there.  If not, we should sail up to Anglefish Creek and cross into Card Sound for a more protected anchorage.  After 2 hours, we couldn't decide.  One of the problems was Chris Parker doesn't work on Sundays so the latest forecast from him was Saturday afternoon.

We finally decided to not go (we were in no hurry and didn't want to get caught in a big squall) and head up to Anglefish Creek.  Turns out we left a little late to make it there before low tide at 3:30pm so, after a nice motor-sail for 21 miles, we dropped anchor in the Hawk Channel just south of the Anglefish Creek entrance.  In hindsight, I probably anchored a little close to the entrance because we were rocked all afternoon by the powerboats coming in and out of the creek.  We only need about 1/2 foot of tide to make it though the ocean side channel without hitting bottom so have to wait until almost 5:30pm to enter.

Since we had 3 hours to kill, I broke out my guitar and played for awhile to try and build back up my finger calluses which had gone away in the past few weeks from not playing enough.  It was fun playing in the cockpit with the beautiful scenery of the ocean-side of Key Largo.

By 5:15pm the tide was up enough for us to make it through the creek with no problems.  In fact, if I could follow this same track next time, we could have made it at low tide with about 1/2 foot to spare.

We motored to the SE corner of Card Sound and anchored just before dark.  It was a beautiful sunset that we watched motoring the last couple miles.  Laura had been baking ribs in the oven for the past couple hours and, after we anchored and put the boat to bed, I threw them on the BBQ grill for a couple minutes.  They were yummy.

Day 2 - 27nm, 72nm since Marathon

Monday, January 27th

We were up this morning early to listen to Chris Parker's forecast.  It seems that there are several small weather systems (impulses) ridding a front across Florida and the western Bahamas which makes the next few days a little unpredictable but there will be storms and squalls with winds into the 30s.  The long range forecast shows better weather early next week so we might need to hang here for another 6-7 days before crossing.  No problem as we are pretty well stocked.  Only issue might be fresh veggies that we can maybe get at Key Biscayne in a couple days.  It would only take us 6-7 hours to sail there with good winds.

We had blown out a zipper on our canvas the past few days so we took it down and I helped Laura replace it.  Here she is working in the cockpit taking off the old zipper.

The weather has been very comfortable for us with warm days and cool nights.  Saturday night surprised us with temps down in the 50s.  When I woke up at 5am I closed all the windows and pulled a second blanked on the bed.  Today is a little cloudy and we see storms going north and south of us on the Internet.  But, it's mid-70s and comfortable with open windows on the boat.

We'll be moving the boat around a few anchorages here for protection from the winds coming from different directions.  Next decision is when to move from this little corner which is protected from the east to south.  This afternoon winds are supposed to clock to west and north so we'll probably move to Little Card Sound and anchor near the north side.

Subdued but retty sunset tonight.  Very calm here.

Day 3 - Didn't move the boat today.


Tuesday, January 28th

We both slept well last night with the boat rock-solid at this anchorage.  No wind to speak of and it was cool, but not cold, in the boat.

After I got up, I checked the weather forecasts and it looked very nice for the next few days.  There were still two "impulses" that Chris Parker had described heading our way - one tomorrow (Wednesday) and one Saturday.  After that, everything is supposed to calm down to more normal weather patterns.

I had been reading the ActiveCaptain reviews on our charts about Hurricane Harbor in Key Biscayne and it seemed pretty nice.  Back in 1994 I had anchored my trawler there and remembered it being very nice.  We decided to haul up our anchor and move the 25 (or so) miles to Key Biscayne and check it out.

We arrived around 1pm and crossed the shallow entrance into the harbor.  It is almost fully enclosed with huge mansions all around.  After slowly motoring around the harbor we anchored in the middle of the biggest part and set our anchor alarm.  Here is our view off the bow.  I thought this would be a popular anchorage but we were all alone.  How nice!  But, a few hours later, there were 4 other boats anchored but nobody too close so I was happy.

Our main purpose for anchoring here is so we have (somewhat limited) access to a grocery store and maybe walk around the state park on the island.  If we finally get a window to the Bahamas next Monday, that will be 10 days since our last fresh veggies.  But, after anchoring here, neither Laura nor I wanted to drop the dinghy and put the motor on.  Instead we decided to leave that for tomorrow and just relaxed on the boat (for our 4th day).

Laura got this picture of the sunset behind this tiny house.

Day 4 - Another 27 miles, 99 miles total

Marathon to Rodriguez Key

We departed Marathon at 7am this morning for the first day of our winter cruising.  Laura and I have been working and shopping hard the past several days to fully stock and prepare the boat for extended travels.

Last week, we had Laura's grandson Issac on the boat for a vacation from cold Seattle to the warm Florida Keys.  I think he had a great time (you're never sure with 14 year-olds) but I'm sure he made many good memories.

Even before he departed on the 21st, I started looking for good weather to sail to the Bahamas for the next 2-3 months.  It seemed like the next weekend would see calming and clocking winds that might make for a good passage.  This was the first break in the higher-than-normal tradewinds for the past month.  We started making plans for leaving on Friday or Saturday.

On the way back from dropping Issac at the Ft. Lauderdale airport, we stopped at Walmart in Homestead for a big paper / baking / canned goods grocery.  We've learned in the past that items like toothpaste, shampoo, toilet paper, etc., are very expensive in the Bahamas.  There are no manufacturing or farming in the Bahamas - everything is brought in by boats from the U.S..  So, figure 20-50% higher prices on just about everything.

We filled up a grocery cart to overflowing and spent $410 at the check-out. After filling up the trunk we drove the remaining 90 miles to Marathon and unpacked everything.  Oh, we stopped at the Whale Harbor Seafood Buffet for dinner.  It was one of the best buffet's I ever had.  There was all-you-can-eat snow crab and raw oysters.

Wednesday morning I ran the main engine for 1/2 hour then drained the oil.  Also changed the oil filter, refilled the oil and changed all three fuel filters (main Racor, on-engine filter and 70 micron pre-filter).  Afterwards I ran the engine for about 10 minutes to make sure it was Ok.

After checking Chris Parker (Caribbean weather guru), Windfinder.com and PredictWind.com we decided to leave Saturday morning for the two day trip to Key Biscayne then jump to the Bahamas on Monday-Tuesday.

On Thursday, Laura went to Winn Dixie, K-Mart and Publix for everything left on her list except for fresh stuff.  We finished up on Friday with another $240 at Publix.  Our fridge, freezers and pantry are full to the brim.  Typical full stock-up at around $800.  But, we have food on the boat for almost 2 months not counting fresh veggies that we'll find along the way.

Friday afternoon we made plans with the marina to move the boat to the fuel dock, fill up our tank then leave the boat there overnight for a quick getaway Saturday morning.  At 4pm we were ready to leave our slip but when I turned the key to start our engine it just turned over and didn't start.  This never happens!

I figured there might be an air bubble from the fuel filter changes so bled the fuel lines to the injectors.  The engine started up 10 minutes later and we backed out of the slip to the fuel dock after running down the channel a bit to run some fuel through the engine.  Here we were backing out of our slip (taken by our neighbor Jeff).

No problems as we tied up and filled our fuel tank with 50 gallons of diesel - our usage from Ft. Pierce in November.  We had happy-hour with our marina friends at the Tiki hut and I played Uke and Guitar for a bit with Sal playing along with his harmonica.  It was lots of fun for our last night at Burdines.

After a quiet dinner on the boat we both showered up then I filled our water tank and (2) 6 1/2 gallon drinking water jugs. I stowed the boat hose and cleaned up the decks.  We had a nice night on the fuel dock.

Up early I was at the fuel dock office when they opened at 7am because I forgot to fill up an empty 5 gallon gas jug (dinghy and Honda generator).  We were off the dock at 7:05am with all our friends waving good-bye.  Here was the colorful sunrise as we motored past the Boot Key anchorage.

We motored out of the harbor then south to the Hawk Channel.  It was a quiet day on the water with the wind helping our speed through most of the day.  We even got to sail with the engine off for about 1/2 hour before the wind died and our speed dropped in to the 4's. It was a beautiful day on the Hawk Channel.

During the afternoon we saw our first dolphins of the trip and they played around at the bow for a short time with Laura up there talking to them.  At 3pm we anchored on the south side of Rodriquez Key off Key Largo.  We needed protection from the north winds that were supposed to build tonight.

The wind died after we anchored and we just drifted around.  A while later, Laura looked down in the water and saw our anchor right next to us.  This was a first!  In the middle of the picture you can see our anchor set in the bottom with the chain leading to the lower left.