Final Day in Marathon

Monday, April 13th

I didn't sleep well last night from thinking about things we still needed to do and what I was missing.  When I finally got back to sleep around 5am I slept until almost 10:30.  Whoa!  That makes your day go fast!  My biggest decision was to eat lunch or breakfast.  I decided on lunch of leftover chicken a la king from dinner last night.

Laura went to Publix with a huge list of final groceries (and a little booze of course) while I started a good wash-down of the boat.  This might be our last "free" water for the next month or more so I took advantage and spent almost 2 hours cleaning the decks, dinghy, solar panels and cockpit with a scrub brush and soft-scrub.

In the middle of my cleaning, Laura came back with a full trunk of groceries.  I helped unload everything into our salon then went back to cleaning.

Since I had been running the hose for quite a while, I filled up our water tank with fresh water.  We will need to top it off tomorrow morning before we leave but the 180 gallons I put in the tank today was very fresh.

Our $400 of groceries are all put away after we vacuum-sealed the last of our fresh meat.  Storage shelves, fridge and both freezers are stacked to the top.  Here is a happy Laura (everything is put away) with our full big freezer.  Our smaller freezer (70 liter) is also full to the top.

Now to get the boat ready for leaving our slip and tieing up at the marina fuel dock.  We don't need fuel but it will make everything much easier when leaving tomorrow morning.

It is now 7:30pm and we're sitting in the salon after dinner.  I've had two glasses of tequila during our going-away party so am not typing very well right now but need to get this on-line before we leave tomorrow. 'nuff said....

Just before 4pm we got the boat ready to leave the dock.  I walked to our neighbors and asked them to help us leave as we were facing east in our dock and the winds were 10-15 from the SE so would be blowing us sideways a bit.  Here is the picture of the stern of our boat from the slip we've been in for the past 2 months.  See how close the boats are behind us?  It is only about 50 feet between the boats of our marina and the marina on the other side of the canal.  Second Wind is 48 feet length-over-all so we have to be very careful.

With everyone in place, we untied our lines and power cord and backed out of the slip.  Just at that moment, the wind died and the boat handled very nicely as we backed to the north and motored forward out of the canal.  5 minutes later we tied up at the end of Burdines fuel dock so we could leave easily tomorrow morning.  Here is the picture off our stern where we are now.  That's the ocean directly behind the boat and about 150 feet between us and the dock behind us.  Quite a difference!

After we docked, I brought the car back to Willem and he drove me back to the marina where we had a cocktail (6 feet apart of course) and talked for awhile as we said our goodbyes and had a fun with our ad-hock going-away party.  Sorry.  No pics as I was having fun.

Later in the evening we decided to have take-out from the marina restaurant on our last night here.  We ordered their huge blackened-fish sandwich and mega-fries (they don't have a small version) which we split between us.  Laura cooked some bacon which we always add to the fish sandwich.  For some reason, I can't convince the restaurant to do this on their own.

We are both looking forward to leaving tomorrow and have talked several times about the pros and cons of leaving or staying.  Randy, the marina manager, made it easier on us when he said tonight, "Feel free to come back anytime.  We will always have a slip for you."

Preparations For Trip North

Sunday, April 12th

The last few days we seriously started preparations for our trip north to the Hudson River from our Winter home in the Florida Keys.  It is quite different this year with the COVID-19 lock-down as we try to limit trips to stores.  We try to make good lists so we get everything we need in as few trips as possible.

For about 6 weeks in February and March I kept close track of weather windows for sailing to The Bahamas.  I was looking for good sailing longer than a day that would let us get east at least to Nassau.  If we took a short window to Bimini, we could be there for weeks waiting for the trade winds to die or clock.  So, we stayed at our dock in Burdines having fun with our friends and hanging out.

That all changed near the end of March when COVID-19 spread to Europe then to the U.S.  All vacationers to The Keys were told to leave and we worried that we would be told to go also.  To prepare, I jugged diesel and gas from the marina fuel dock to fill up our diesel tank (about 32 gallons) and filled our gas jugs (20 gallons) for generator and outboard.  Laura also stocked up our freezers and food storage which we've kept full.  But, it turns out that we were allowed to stay because we were long-term renters.  We had been here since December 5th.

Laura and I walk about every other day on the walking-path along US1.  Our main topic of conversation has been "Do we stay here or head north?".  Up until now, states along the coast were changing their marina rules daily so we were not sure if we could get fuel, water and groceries along the way.  That all seems to have settled out now with only a few places we typically stop being closed.  Of course everyone is social-isolating and basically self-service plus stay on the boat.  That's OK with us as we prefer to anchor out most of the time anyway.

Another part of the "stay or leave" equation has been the Florida Keys seem pretty safe right now.  But, with the exception of New York, states up the coast don't seem to have many hot-spots worse than here so that somewhat levels out.  If we stayed here past April, we know from experience that it starts getting hot.  Daily highs in the 90s with high humidity.  Later in the summer we would need to start worrying about hurricanes and associated boat insurance issues.  Time to go...

My current long-term plan is to take a month or so and travel up the coast to Chesapeake Bay.  There are several isolated anchorages where we could stay there for several months with only periodic trips to grocery stores nearby.  We won't go from there into NY until it's safe.

I've been running our main engine and Honda generator every week or so to make sure everything is in working order.  Laura has also been stocking up (hoarding?) on many staples which would allow us to stay isolated at anchor for probably close to two months if we had to.  We do have a watermaker on the boat that we haven't used in several years but it worked fine back then.  This time of year our solar panels and wind generator would just about supply all of our daily power requirements with the exception of a couple cloudy and calm days in a row.  Then we would have to run our Honda generator for a few hours but we keep 20 gallons of gasoline in jugs which would run it about  80-100 hours in battery-charging mode.

Other than stocking up and preparing the boat, we only had a few projects that we wanted to finish before we left.  One was to put new soundproofing on two of our engine room doors to quiet down the engine noise while underway.  There was some sound insulation on the doors but it was looking pretty bad.  After much research, I purchased two sheets of 1 inch composite foam insulation from Jamestown Distributors that was highly recommended for engine rooms.  Last Friday, Laura and I started by stripping the old insulation off the first door then drawing a line on the door when it was closed so we could bring the new insulation right to the edges of the opening.  Here is Laura using Acetone to remove all the old glue after we scraped off the insulation.  Sorry it's a little fuzzy.  I guess she was working!

Next we took the door outside to the marina tiki-hut, measured the new insulation, cut it out and used Gorilla spray adhesive on the door and foam.  After pressing it down well, we used Aluminum tape to seal around all the edges.  Here I am on the salon table finishing up the tape.

Surprisingly, the door fit excellent when we put it back on.  Here is the finished first door back on the engine room.

Saturday, we made quick work of the second door which leads to the engine room from our stand-up shower.  Everything fit on that one too!

I then took the left-over soundproofing and re-insulated around our freezer compressor box which is also in the engine room.  After we installed the new refrigeration 3 years ago, the engine seemed much louder in the galley.  I can't wait to see how much difference it all makes.  Cost of the two 1" X 32" X 54" sheets was $230 including shipping.  Not cheap!

For the past couple weeks, Laura has been working on making new hatch covers for our main deck hatches.  The old covers were over 10 years old and falling apart.  She purchased the material and hardware from Salrite and worked on them every few days.  On Friday I installed them all by pressing in new snaps to hold down the 4 corners on each one.  Here I am installing the last snap.

My last boat project before leaving was to wash and put preservative on our cockpit bimini.  I try to do this twice a year and it was overdue.  I needed to do this before we left because it uses a lot of water.  Today, while Laura was cleaning and packing away her inflatable kayak, I scrubbed all the bird-poop off the bimini then washed and dried it well.  I then put a heavy coat of 303 Aerospace Protectant which I spread with a clean cloth.  It usually makes the bimini look like new again but now it it getting pretty old.  We're planning on making a new one this summer at the marina where we can use the picnic tables to lay everything out.  It does look much better!

Now there are only a few items on our list before we leave.  Tuesday seems like the best day to sail north with 2 days of predicted southeast winds which will get us to Miami or Biscayne Bay.  Then everything calms down on Thursday so we can run off-shore to Lake Worth.  But...  Thursday starts the Spring string of daily thunderstorms which we'll be playing with for the next several weeks.  Wish us luck!

Last Days in Hurricane Hole Then Back to Marathon

Sunday, February 2nd

Not much going on today but we're looking forward to the winds finally dying down in the afternoon.

I missed a few things from the past few days because I've been writing the blog in the afternoon so miss writing about the night fun...  Friday night we had John and Alexis from Ashling over for cocktails.  Their boat is anchored right behind us.  They are new to cruising on a beautiful 47' catamaran with all the trimmings.  We had lots of fun getting to know each other and John took this picture of the group.

Last night, we were invited over to dinner on their boat along with Phillip and Betsy from Nova Status (another catamaran anchored near us).  They are new to cruising too so we answered tons of questions from our 13 years living on Second Wind.  John grilled chicken and there was plenty of wine to make the party lively.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of us all.  Bummer.  Nova Status is a "Kid boat" - they have two boys on board ages 8 and 11 who they home-school.  It's unusual to see children on cruising boats but I think it's great.  What a life!

Back to Sunday ...

Later in the morning, several small boats came into the harbor (from Miami?) and anchored around us for their weekend party.  They came into the calm harbor because the wind and waves were still up a bit around the sandbar in Key Biscayne where they normally party on weekends.  It was fun to watch the crazy "kids" on the power boats dancing to the loud music and playing in the water.  A short time later the Key Biscayne police boat came through and told several of them to turn down the music or leave.  Several homeowners had complained about the music.  Most complied but several left to anchor outside the harbor in the windy bay.

After lunch, Laura and I decided to take the dingy around to No Name Harbor again for a walk around the park.  When we motored out onto Biscayne Bay, the waves were still 1-2 feet which made for a sloppy ride.  We decided to turn around and on the way back, we were flagged down by an anchored powerboat and asked to retrieve an air pump that had fallen in the water.  No problem as Laura picked up the pump and I motored back to their boat.  We were invited to stay and party but it seemed a little loud and crazy for us (read: lots of alcohol).  Plus, we were about 40 years older than everyone on their boat.  What would we talk about?

We instead motored back into the protected harbor and slowly made the rounds checking out the weekend party boats (and young ladies with skimpy bikini's...).  As we were passing Nova Status, Phillip waved us over and invited us aboard for a visit.  We chatted for awhile and we introduced to the two young boys.  One was named Ky and the other .....  (old brains suck!).  We had a nice visit then left about an hour later and decided to try Biscayne Bay again for a ride to the park.

This ride was much better and we zoomed the 2 miles down to No Name harbor.  After tying up and locking the dinghy, we walked all the way to the lighthouse - about 3 miles round trip.  We were pretty tired as we untied the dinghy and motored away from the wall.

On the way out of the harbor, we saw another dinghy zoom in and stop a short distance away from us.  The guy driving started pulling on the outboard starter and looked like he was having problems.  I motored over and was surprised to see Phillip and one of the boys.  We stuck around for awhile then decided the tow them back to Hurricane Hole as their motor would not keep running.  It was a much slower ride back but the waves were pretty calm so no worries.  Here is a different sunset picture of me driving the tow-boat.

I dropped the guys off at Nova Status where Betsy was very thankful.  I was just happy we were there to help.

Laura and I made plans to leave here tomorrow.  Since the winds will not be south enough to sail from here east to the Bahamas, we decided to head south to Key Largo area on Monday.  If the winds look better tomorrow, we can sail to Bimini or other Bahama destination from there.  If not, we will sail back to Marathon and re-visit our friends.

Monday, February 3rd

This morning we hauled the outboard off the dinghy and stowed it on the aft rail.  We then slowly motored out of Hurricane Hole where I slowly ran aground right in the middle of the entrance and right over our GPS track line from coming into the harbor a week ago.  I was motoring really slow so easily backed off the sandbar and tried about 10-15 feet to the right.  No problems there with about 2 extra feet under us.  I set a waypoint on my GPS to mark the deeper water for next time.

Not enough wind to sail today if we wanted to make Key Largo or Rodriguez Cay so I kept the engine running and we had a calm trip down to Pumpkin Cay.  Now the choice was to anchor here with protection from the east winds tonight or to continue through Anglefish Creek to Rodriguez.  The forecast called for winds under 10 so I decided to keep going for another 20 miles and make tomorrow a shorter day.  If we anchored here, we would not get to Marathon tomorrow before dark.

On the sail down Biscayne Bay, I checked the weather forecast several times on Chris Parker's emails, Windy.com, PredictWind.com and WindFinder.com.  All pretty much agreed now that the trip east of Bimini would be tough for the next week or so.  If we sailed to Bimini tomorrow, we would be there for a week or more.  We decided to made the decision and sail back to Burdines in Marathon.  I called them and formalized the slip reservation. 

It was a calm motor-sail down the Hawk Channel with the winds mostly from the N - NE.  The winds were supposed to clock to the SE later in the night but stay low.  Rodriguez Cay has really no protection from any east winds but I figured it wouldn't be too bumpy a night with winds under 10 knots.

Turns out the winds did die during the night and we had a peaceful night even though we were open to wind off the ocean from our anchorage.

Tuesday, February 4th

Very calm this morning as we get the boat ready to leave the anchorage and proceed 45 miles to Marathon.  Anchor up around 8am and breakfast a short time later motoring down the Hawk Channel.  About an hour later the winds picked up from the SE (as predicted) and we were able to turn the engine off for almost the whole trip with full Jib and Mainsail out.  The boat sailed nicely at 6-6.5 knots all the way to Marathon.

Only problem was for some reason the seas really picked up and were much higher than they should have been with only 10-12 knot winds.  My only justification was the tide was going out (west to east) while the east wind was blowing in.  Tide against wind usually create higher waves but these were uncomfortable all afternoon.  The boat was bouncing around pretty good in the 2-3 foot close-period waves on the beam.  Once in a while a larger wave (4-5 foot?) would come and slap the boat sideways a couple feet.  We had to hold on for those.

A little after 4pm we were motoring into Boot Key Harbor.  I called Burdines on the phone and Shorty met us at our slip when we tied up.  Several of our friends were at the dock to welcome us and we spent a quiet night on the boat.

So....  what now?

The 10-day forecast calls for a front the next couple days (high winds and rain) then the eastern trades settling in for the following week.  No window to the Bahamas in the forecast that we can see.  Sometimes, boats sit here a month or more waiting for crossing weather so we'll just settle in, enjoy shore life and work on the boat (as usual).

Oh.  Our friends Jeff and Alison on Serena (former dock-mates at Burdines) had left Marathon Tuesday morning for Bimini.  They had a fairly good ride in that direction and arrived Wednesday morning.  They only had crew help for a couple days on their boat so decided to take this weather window even though they will be at the dock in Bimini for a week or so.  We are in their old slip at Burdines.

I'll stop the blog until we leave Burdines again - hopefully for a couple months in the Bahamas.  Hope you enjoyed our little 11-day sail-a-bout in the Florida Keys.  We did!

Growing roots in Hurricane Harbor...

Saturday, February 1st (Wow!  February all ready!)

The past few days have been fairly quiet on Second Wind as we are still anchored in Key Biscayne for the 5th straight day.  Yesterday (Friday) the winds were light and Biscayne Bay looked very glassy so we decided to take our dinghy across the bay to Dinner Key and do some shopping.  Winds were supposed to pick up in the afternoon so we decided to go in the morning.

There is a Winn Dixie on Key Biscayne but getting there is a little sketchy from here.  Our neighbors John and Alexis on Ashling told us they had made it there a few times.  You have to drop a person at the bridge on the far end of the harbor.  Then they have to climb over a 3-4 foot fence onto the road.  It's only about 1/2 mile to Winn Dixie but you have to walk passed a security station and hope they don't see you.  We decided to try Dinner Key instead.  Maybe we'll leave fence jumping for tomorrow.

Around 9:30am we had the dinghy packed including an empty 5-gallon gasoline jug that I had poured into the dinghy tank and our Honda generator.  The 4-mile ride across Biscayne Bay was very cool.  We zoomed at close to 20 knots which seems like flying in a 11 1/2 foot boat.  The new outboard was really showing it's strength as I kept it around 3/4 throttle for most of the trip.

We slowly motored around Dinner Key checking out the (4 or 5) marinas and looking for a good place to tie up the dink.  I saw a couple out on the deck of their trimaran so motored over.  They told us Dinner Key Marina was the best place to tie up as they have about 100 moorings and all the dinghy's tie up there.  They also said a closer marina sometimes lets people tie up but motored over there and the workers said no.

It was a 15 minute trip back to Dinner Key Marina and we found the dinghy dock pretty full.  There was a sign that said, "For paying customers only.  Others should use the public dock" with an arrow pointing toward the road.  We motored in that direction past several commercial boats and found what we thought might be the public dock.  It was pretty well destroyed and didn't even connect to shore.  We motored back to the marina dinghy dock and tied up.

We had our luggage wheelie and fold-up crate so I carried them about 1/2 mile to The Fresh Market.  This was a pretty high-end market with almost everything organic (read "expensive") but the fresh veggies looked very nice and they had everything we were looking for.  We left a short while later with 8 small grocery bags for $107.  Not too bad.

I drove the dink around the harbor to the fuel dock about 1/4 mile away.  No problems filling up the 5-gallon jug with $4 / gallon gasoline.

The dinghy was pretty loaded now but it didn't seem to make any difference to our new 20hp outboard.  Still right up on plane as we left the harbor for our trip back to Key Biscayne.  It was a little more exciting than the trip over.  The winds had picked up to about 10 knots which blew a little 1 foot chop into Biscayne Bay from the ocean - almost the exact direction we were heading.  I took it easy for the first 1/2 of the trip and headed a little more north to get into the lee of Key Biscayne and cut down the waves.  The last 1/2 of the trip was zooming along again at 20 knots with a fully loaded dinghy.  Nice!  Back at the boat we unloaded and stored the groceries and gasoline.

Here was the sunset last night.  Very colorful with wispy clouds and calm waters.

Before crossing over, we had stopped at John and Alexis' where they gave us the information about getting to the Winn Dixie.  Before leaving, we made plans for cocktails together that evening.  Around 5:30pm they came over on their dinghy and we had a nice evening together.  Their boat is a 45' (?), fairly new catamaran.  There is another catamaran anchored in the harbor (Betsy and Philip) who John and Alexis had met that day too.  Betsy and Philip had taken their dinghy around to No Name Harbor (where we went on Thursday) and walked to a local hardware store for something they needed.  They were coming back into the harbor as John and Alexis were getting ready to leave so we waved them over and said hello.  We made tentative plans for dinner together Saturday if the weather allowed.

Last night around 11pm the winds really picked up and the rain started.  By midnight I was sitting in the cockpit watching natures fireworks all around us.  Sometimes it seemed like a solid sheet of rain falling on us.  Laura found a few more leaks in the boat that we'll try to work on over the next few days.  Here is the doppler radar from my iPhone during the worst of it.  We are at the blue dot in the middle.  Red stuff is BAD!

I still spend about an hour each morning agonizing over the weather forecasts.  Monday / Tuesday look possible for a crossing to the Bahamas if the winds go SE to S.  Windfinder and PredictWind show winds staying from the east on Monday and Tuesday so that would not be good for us.  I'm really hoping that tomorrow everything will start to agree.  Just in case, I made "pencil us in" reservations back at Burdines in Marathon for Tuesday.  Our old slip is available until Feb 15th which should put us into some better weather patterns.  If the winds do stay east on Monday, we'll use them to sail back down into the keys.

This morning our neighbor John texted me and asked if I would look at an engine problem he's been having.  I dinghy'd over a little while ago and was able to help him narrow down a problem where he is getting air in his fuel lines causing a problem with that engine (on a Catamaran they have two engines - one in each hull).  Good news was I helped troubleshoot to the cause.  Bad news is the cause is the steel pipe coming out of his fuel tank.  He's going to have to get it fixed in a welding shop somewhere.  Now he had to decide if they are going to stay around here for a couple weeks to fix that or go to the Bahamas (maybe Monday / Tuesday) and wait to get it worked on over there.  I recommended getting it fixed here since he's more likely to find a good welding shop around the Miami area.

We had a little rain this afternoon but another storm with high winds is supposed to blow through around 3-4 with the high winds lasting until tomorrow afternoon.  Hopefully, we will have a window to dinghy over to John and Alexis' for dinner tonight.  I'll let you know.

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.