After playing around in the sun on the paddle boards we climbed back up on the boat, strapped the boards to the side of the lifelines, tied the dinghy back up on the swim platform and pulled up anchor. Our 30 pound Bruce anchor has been holding strong. We feel safe and secure at night. As a backup we have the Drag Queen app that we have used quite a bit over the last couple of years. It recognizes our GPS coordinates and we enter a distance for how far we allow us to swing or drag from anchoring before an alarm goes off. This way if we did drag we would know fairly quickly. Generally we enter 100 feet but we get woken up a couple of times because of our swing. But better safe than sorry.
We head out, sails raised, with Pumpkin Key to our left. It is a beautiful day. We go through Card Sound which is really a big Flathead Lake. But the surprising part is that it is all about 2 feet deep, except for the channel that we go through which is about 10 feet deep. I sail underneath a fixed bridge then head on through to Barnes Sound. After that we end up in a channel that is edged by mangroves. There are a couple of boats fishing catching black and white striped fish that are about a foot long.
Boats out fishing around the mangroves. That is where all of the fish like to hide out.
Love the family time on the water!
Lookin good Captn' Mark
We had under the next bridge that is near Manatee Bay. There are signs posted on the bridge beware of manatees. When we were back in Fort Lauderdale at the Las Olas Marina there were two manatees under the docks that we got to see up very close. They are what they say to be underwater cows. They are just huge. I would hate to hit them with the boat. Not only for our boat but for the manatees.
It's coming up about 5:30pm and we come in to Blackwater Sound. We are almost to our destination and decide to throw anchor in front of the Marriott hotel on the West side of Key Largo. We watch the sun as it sets and take a lot of photos. I'm testing out my new camera that Mark gave to me for Christmas. I haven't gotten used to the settings yet so it gives me an excuse to take even more pictures.
The Marriott where we were able to connect to their strong wi fi signal.
The nice bracelet Mark is wearing is made by Melody on s/v Vacilando.
Get yours in any color today!!
Beautiful sunset. Captured pretty nicely thanks to my new camera.
Seared Ahi Tuna For dinner. Just barely cooked and dipped in Braggs and wasabi. Mmmmm!
In the morning we decide to venture out. We need to go to the store and buy some more groceries. Lexmark would like to stop at West Marine and pick up some more parts for the engine. Its always good to have some extras along and if we need to replace this water pump it would be nice to have the parts. We found from Active Captain that we can take our dinghy up the canals and on the side of the wall at the end we can tie off and climb out and be less than 1 block from Marine West. After rowing down a lot of canals and hitting dead ends we finally found where we were supposed to be, tied off, and walked over to Marine West. On the way we stopped at a Cuban restaurant that had a walk up window and ordered some Cuban coffee. That was amazing. It comes in a shot glass sized glass. It is strong like espresso but sweet and frothy. It is so good. If you have the chance to try it do.
Marine West in Key Largo was terribly disappointing. Although Mark found four shirts to buy he found no engine parts available for the boat. We did meet a guy though from Wisconsin, really close to Mark's home town, and he drove us to Winn Dixie for groceries. On the way we had also stopped at a marine shop to find parts but they also carried nothing on hand.
Welcome to the Juice House. Great Cuban coffee.
After finding everything we needed in the store we started walking back. We found that it was a three mile walk back to the dinghy and in the sunshine it feels like quite a ways. We stopped at the Caribbean Club. It is a local bar that is very popular at night. It is where they filmed the movie Key Largo. We stopped and had a drink then saw another cruiser coming into shore with their dingy and asked for a ride back to our dinghy. They let us hop in the back of their pick up truck and I tipped them $5 for the trouble. We had lunch at a sushi bar called Num Thai. They were advertising $1 sushi. It was delicious.
102 miles to Key West. 420 to Jacksonville. I am glad we aren't going to Jacksonville!!
Blackwater Sound in the background
The famous Caribbean Club.
Cool seating but very hard to get in and out of!
Before sundown we got on our paddleboards and paddled through the canal that went to the other side of Key Largo. There was quite a current in there and it was becoming high tide. The current was taking heading out and if we waited a half hour on thr other side it changed and it would take us back in. That was a lot of fun and very different. We saw large iguanas crawling up the walls from the water. They're also very expensive houses along the way. It was fun to sightsee.
An Egret in flight in front of the mangroves.
Nice palm covered dock. I would like one of those with some lawn chairs there for
nights with friends.
Great zoom on my camera caught this Egret.
The canals here were a lot of fun to explore and just meet the local folk.
Jellyfish?
We understand that the snorkeling is pretty good around this area including diving. But the weather is getting windy and we are unable to go to the Atlantic side to be able to do this.
We have listened to the weather and found that there are northerlies coming. We will not be able to go further south because of our time frame and we need to find somewhere to tuck in out of the storm . Will plan to head back up through the ICW to Cape Florida and go into No Name Harbor.
We had hoped to get further south on this trip but sometimes it just doesn't work out the way we plan. Sailing and a schedule are a hard combination. We feel fortunate with what we get to do on the water.
What fun things have you done in Key Largo?
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