Life Aboard: March 2015

Fun in Marathon March 2015

Lovely full moon, Great night for an overnighter!

Silent Faith and a full moon

We keep having friends leave the harbor. Joe and Gina on Okemah Rose have been good neighbors but they are ready to leave BKH. We have enjoyed spending time with them and hope we see them again, as our travels continue.

Safe travels, Okemah Rose! We will miss having you as neighbors!

I had a craving for barbeque and cooked a Boston butt in the crockpot with Sweet Baby Ray’s Sauce and decided to invite a few friends over to sample. It was a last minute invite, since I wasn’t sure how it would taste. It was ok so Jim and Pam from Silent Faith, Jim and Belinda from Rickshaw, and Frank and Debbie from Heron, came over for dinner. We had a great time and enjoyed the time spent with friends.

Pam and Jim from Silent Faith

Frank and Debbie from Heron

Jim and Belinda from Rickshaw

Captain and 1st Mate from Escape

Roger and Lore on Reality, Charlie on Slow Flight, and Jim and Belinda on Rickshaw are all DeFevers that are planning on leaving soon. They are traveling together for a while; some of them are heading to the rendezvous, and then who knows where. We will miss them all and hope they have safe travels.

Safe travels Rickshaw!

This was a different looking boat that came into the mooring. He was single-handed, so he had a different technique when he picked up his mooring. He anchored near the mooring ball, then tied to the mooring and took up his anchor.

Different looking boat

I told Shay I might be in trouble. If he doesn’t need me to help with mooring, he might get rid of me! He said no, but he was pretty impressed with the guy’s technique.

The weather has been getting warmer with temperatures in the 80’s and light winds. So Shay decided to take a swim to cool off. He said the water was great, but couldn’t talk me into getting in.

Cool captain!

Our friends on Silent Faith invited us to go with them to Sombrero Reef and it was perfect. The winds were calm so the water was flat and clear. There were a lot of other boats at the moorings and we had to raft with another boat but it was still good.

I've said it before, Florida's lighthouses can't compete with NC.

See the other boats? Hope they don't scare off the fish!

We could see lots of fish swimming around even before we got in the water. As you can see from the pictures it was a perfect day. Lots of fish, clear water, and a sunny day.

I think these are yellow tailed snapper

What you looking at?

A very rare sighting. Me in the water.

Shay diving

Hey, Jim!

A parrotfish

Barracuda

Is he picking out his lunch?

You can see the other snorkelers

We have been here 3 winters and this is the first time we have snorkeled here. We are surrounded by all this beauty and unfortunately we take it for granted. There were several charter boats full of people snorkeling. I said they were very lucky to be here at the perfect time to go to the reef. Until the past 2 weeks, the winds made conditions not so good. We are blessed to be able to come out here when we want. We will be back!

Shay announced that he was starting a “Motorboat Monday”. A time for motorboats to let go of the mooring ball and get out there! Cause we all know “if it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen out there!” That’s a famous quote from the famous boating movie “Captain Ron”. Earlier this season, the sailboats had been having “Sailaway Thursday”, so Shay thought it was only appropriate that we motor boaters have our own day.

So, we dropped the mooring lines and headed for Bahia Honda, about 13 nm down the Keys toward Key West. We had a great trip down the coast to a beautiful harbor between two bridges. There is a beautiful island as you get there, a beautiful beach, and beautiful blue water.

Escape doing it's thing, escaping from the mooring field!

That's the Seven Mile Bridge in the distance.

Bahia Honda in the distance.

Beautiful island going toward the anchorage.

These colors remind me so much of the Bahamas!

This is the entrance to the anchorage. They removed a section of the old bridge, so boats could enter.

Beautiful beach.

Looking toward the old bridge.

Looking toward the new bridge.

What they don’t have is a good place to anchor. Remember, we have “Big Bruiser” our 177 lb. anchor. It took us 3 tries to get the anchor to hold. We would drop it and pull back and it would just keep on moving. Kinda like the energizer bunny, “it just kept going and going and going”. After the third time, it held. The weather was calling for very calm winds, and after much debate, we decided to stay. We had plenty of room and lots of line out, so we should be ok.

Here we are between the bridges.

We took the dinghy into the harbor and toured the marina. We thought about taking the big boat into the marina until we had a small fishing boat check the depths and found out it was only 3 feet. No way! We walked around and checked out the facilities. They have a nice harbor beach and a beautiful oceanside beach too. The water is so clear you could see the bottom where we anchored. We decided this would be a great daytrip to bring guests to.

Shay did say if we came back, we’d anchor outside on ocean or gulf, depending on the wind. If the weather wasn’t so calm for today, we would head back to Boot Key Harbor. We had 3 more boats anchored in the harbor before sunset. No problem.

Another great place to catch another beautiful sunset!

I just could not stop taking pictures. It just kept getting better and better!

We kept an eye on things when the current changed, to make sure the anchor stayed put. We had 2 kts of current coming thru the anchorage when the tides changed. That’s a lot of pressure on the anchor with not great holding. He woke up several times during the night to make sure things were ok.

When he got up at 4 am he couldn’t see the bridges, the boat anchored near us, the shore, nothing. It was so foggy that we could not see anything! We figured the fog would lift soon.

You can just barely see the shoreline, if you squint.

This was looking toward the new bridge.

Finally, around noon, we pulled up anchor and left the harbor. We decided we go back on the gulf side. My first time in the Gulf of Mexico! And I couldn’t see anything! Yep, the fog came back just after we went under the bridge heading back. We knew there were crab pots out there so we kept a close watch. Thank goodness, there weren’t any boats or at least we didn’t see any!

These pictures were taken around noon. Looks like me might be able to leave soon.

Finally, we can see the other boats!

Keeps getting better. Yeah!

The water was so clear, you could see the bottom.

Getting the anchor up.

We never saw any land for the entire trip, just fog. We knew we were near Marathon and the two bridges we had to go under, but we saw nothing. We could see them on the chart plotter but not when we looked in front of us. Finally, we could see them thru the fog. It was kinda scary. We knew they were there but couldn’t see them. Our boater friends from up north told us “welcome to boating in Maine!”

This was my first Gulf Crossing. And I couldn't see anything!

Finally. we could see the bridges at the Marathon end of the Seven Mile Bridge!

We still couldn't see the other bridge.

Finally! We can see them both!

Passing thru.

Looking back.

Going thru the second one! Glad that's over!

And now we still can't see what's in front of us!

When we got thru the bridges, it was foggy again. We could see boats on our radar but not in front of us. That’s not good. Finally saw the markers leading into the harbor. When we got inside it was clear as could be! What a difference a few hundred feet and make!

Finally, markers! Yeah!

We made it back and all is good in BKH!

FFF doing a harbor tour!

Sir David at the helm.

Then next morning, BKH was foggy. According to the locals, it’s very rare for this area to have much fog. Oh boy, aren’t we lucky!

A very unusual sight in Boot Key Harbor.

We have friends that are getting ready to leave the harbor, so we decided to have a “happy hour” on Escape. It’s the perfect boat for a get-to-gather. We have lots of space on several levels. So we rode around the harbor stopping at boats and inviting them to our boat. We didn’t get to invite everyone we wanted to; we’ll have another party before we leave!

Discussing important "boatie things"

More discussions.

And more

A birthday toast for Stel

Sue and Dan from Tranquility

Jerri and Drew from Li Lok

The famous or infamous, Leta and Rolland from Kokomo

Joe and Gina from Okemah Rose

The ever wonderful, Emma and David.

Stel and Burke from Estrellita

Belinda and Jim from Rickshaw

We’ve had great times with other boaters on their boats or going out to Happy Hours at local restaurants.

We went to a get-to-gather with John and Beth Groom and some of their friends at Marathon Marina. John and Beth came down for a short visit and we all met at their room. It was good seeing them and meeting new friends.

Rickshaw, Jim and Belinda Wolfe had us over for drinks while they were mooring in BKH. We went with a group of old and new friends to Sparky’s for their 25 cent wings and shrimp. They were delicious. We met Rolland and Leta from Kokomo at Marathon Ale House for their 25 cent wings. We took David and Emma from FFF to Sparky’s for the cheap food, too. Of course they loved it too! Are you seeing a pattern here? We like cheap!

Rolland and Leta had us over for a delicious meal of Shrimp etouffee. Silent Faith had us and FFF over for pasta and salad. Sea Wolfe had us over for seafood. Judy and Stan had us over to Folly for pasta and salad. Can you tell we have been eating well!

If I have left anyone out, please forgive me! We have been busy catching up with old friends and getting to know new ones.

David and Emma from FFF have been talking about leaving BKH and heading to Cuba and after much planning, shopping and repair work, they are leaving. We spent a great last day with them lunch, shopping, out to dinner, and back to Escape for ice cream dessert. They dropped the mooring 3-5-2015. Hope the trip is great. Tell Addison and Pat we said hello. Hurry back to the States. See you!