We did it! We got out of the vortex of Boot Key Harbor! AND, we gathered a wee armada of 27 foot sailboats to go with us. 4 sailboats total, all 27 footers….We all had a few things in common: we are on 27 foot sailboats and we are not retired. We made our way downwind together to the famed Bahia Honda Beach. An epically beautiful day.
There is a phenomenon that tends to happen in Boot Key Harbor that causes people to stay in the harbor for longer than anticipated and they stop going out sailing. We noticed the pull ourselves, and we have also been surprised to see it in others even more than us. People come long distances in their boats to spend time in one of the best sailing grounds in North America, only to just sit in the harbor and stop sailing. We discovered that it was not uncommon for people to be there for months and not go out at all in their boats. We have also discovered that the bigger the boat, the more reasons there are to not go out sailing. There are more things to break and need repaired, there is more expense to buy and maintain the boat, therefore more time that needs to be spent working and not sailing. And, when you live aboard, it’s easier to fill a large deck up with stuff that needs to be moved in order to go out sailing and just getting the boat ready to go out becomes a major task. So there is a plug for the benefit of a simpler, wee boat!

So we managed to break the inertia and convinced our friends aboard 27 footers to sail with us the whopping 10 miles to Bahia Honda. Whoo Hoo!

Sara and Trevor led the pack in Earendil, a 27 foot Hunter, leading the way with their glorious rainbow colored genoa sail. Our friend Wes, in his Albin Vega just like ours (only a bit more spiffy with a new coat of hull paint) joined the pack. And our friends Dave and Janae went on their first solo sail ever in their new boat, Wave Dancer, a 27 foot Erickson. We became the Wee Armada!

The Wee Armada needed to eat once we got all anchored safely in harbor. How many people can you fit onto a 27 foot boat? 7 is the maximum number any of us had hosted on any of our 27 foot boats, and we boat hopped for dinner. First it was drinks, chips, and salsa aboard Wee Happy.

Then, we discovered a new version of a potluck aboard Earendil. Everyone went back to their respective boats to make their contribution to our one-dish potluck meal: Wave Dancer cooked pasta, Gemini Dreams made sauce, Wee Happy sauteed peppers and mushrooms, and Earendil cooked sausages. Everyone brought their food over to Earendil’s boat (because they had the big table on their boat!), and we ended up with one delicious pasta dish!!
Conversation about issues particular to wee boats went on late into the evening, when we finally decided to play cards. We played a game of “Bullshit” and Cap’t. K and I failed miserably in the skill of lying.

Then, everyone aboard the wee boats in the Wee Armada went to sleep, hoping to not drag their anchors between the two tall bridges. We all dreamed some version of waking up dangerously close to a bridge…..

Today we hung out on various parts of the long Bahia Honda Beach. We even went out to a small island with our friends cat and our kite. The cat freaked out. The kite flew high. Our friends Kurt and Christina arrived, (on a 35 footer. but still honorary members of the Wee Armada), Dave and Janae left, and all who were present had grilled shrimp kabobs on the beach at sunset. The Wee Armada Rules!

This morning we woke up extra early, thanks to our cat SlowMo who puked up a hairball 5 inches from my head. Although it was a REALLY gross way to wake up, it’s been lovely having these early morning hours to get extra stuff done. And we got to see a very special visitor who came to our boat to say hello.

We are calling this lovely creature a spotted ray, although it may have another more official name. What a peaceful, serene creature! It moved gracefully through the water like it was flying. It flew over to our boat, circled slowly a few times, and went off into the turquoise blue water. We’ve never seen one up close before, although I have seen other types of rays that I heard were called Eagle Rays, jump VERY high out of the water, and they make an impressively huge splash.

This morning Cap’t K. tackled the last stage of installing the wind generator. He had to contort himself into crazy and dangerous positions to install this heavy piece of equipment up on a pole that is mounted on the stern of Wee Happy. Here he is putting the last propeller blade up:

The wind generator is now spinning in the wind beautifully and K. is doing the final install of attaching the cables to the batteries as I write. This will be a major improvement in our power situation, as we only had a very wee 20 watt solar panel before. We were extremely blessed in getting this used wind generator for a mere $35 plus the cost of a few nuts and bolts and the cables….normally these things cost THOUSANDS of dollars, so we got the deal of a lifetime!

Who knew that when we moved onto a sailboat we would end up having the most active social lives we have ever had? I certainly wouldn’t have guessed it. I imagined myself having lots of time to read books, meditate, etc, and I guess I could be doing those things, but more often than not hanging out with other interesting sailors wins out.
Just as we are getting ready to leave Marathon, we have been having increasingly good times with the friends we have been making here. This weekend was packed full of outings and gatherings, starting with going out with a crew of people on Thursday night to a local bar where we ended up knowing a dozen other people there. The next night we went to see our friends Kurt and Christina at their first local music gig. Half of Boot Key harbor came out to support them and it was quite the night. Dancing, sing alongs, and wonderful music all night long. K. even got to drum with them for most of their set.

The next day was a great wind day for flying K.’s big kites, and our new friends Dave and Ginnea came along to the beach, where K. and Dave succeeded in getting up on the kite board for the first time! We had such a nice time hanging out with them we ended up going back to their boat for a tasty shrimp pasta dinner. Then live music at the tiki hut….the fun just never ends!
And to top it all off, Sunday night we were invited to our new friend Jamison’s boat, Baby Blue. He is a generous man who is constantly with a drink in hand, and he has a wonderful big boat that is perfect for entertaining. 5 other people came over for dinner and drinks, including our new friends Ricki and Sophia. Ricki is Irish and has THE most charming Irish accent ever. He’s a fabulous musician and can play the guitar like nobody’s business. Sophia is from Sweden and her parents used to have the same boat as us! They are a sweet couple we’d like to hang out with more. We had a super fun night with lots of wine, great fish, and even dancing! (his boat is big enough for dancing!!!)
In the midst of all this socializing, we are TRYING to get some projects done on the boat, and K. has been installing the bargain wind generator we got awhile back. Of course it is taking longer than expected, and our boat is a big mess with tools and parts everywhere. I’ve also been continuing to weave, and here is a little photo of my latest experimentation in card weaving, a portable form of weaving that I just discovered.
I got to weave on the beach! There will be a series of bracelets available for purchase soon.

So we had an idyllic weekend at the beach. We even had a day working in our island office. K. found an electric outlet next to a picnic table and worked his computer job all day while I was weaving and going for a little swim every so often.

That night we were both up half the night checking on the boat, which was rocking and moving quite a lot with the strong current in the anchorage. Cap’t K. had even tried the new ” rocker stoppers” that we just got, which cut our rocking down remarkably. Our new friend Wes, who also has an Albin Vega called Gemini Dreams, came and anchored right next to us, and he was rocking about 10 times more than we were! (without rocker stoppers) It has been fun seeing another Vega, and comparing notes on all the details of the boat. Here is a photo of the twins in the Bahia Honda Harbor.

The next day was one of those days where nothing goes right. It all started first thing in the morning when a motor boat sped by us very fast while I was making coffee, causing the boat to rock so hard that the coffee spilled ALL OVER EVERYTHING! The entire floor, the cushions, pillows, clothes, my yarn, and more were all covered in coffee and coffee grounds. A total disgusting mess!

Then we decided to pack up and leave because the winds were forecasted to shift in an unfavorable direction for that harbor.  Our entire getting the boat ready to sail process was frustrating and not smooth.  The GPS, depth sounder, and auto pilot were all either not working or acting funny.  Then as soon as we lifted the anchor and started out the harbor, a giant rain cloud came overhead and so we decided to turn back and wait for it to pass.  Then, as we were re-anchoring, the tow line for the dinghy got caught in the propeller of the boat’s motor.  Arrrrgggh!  We managed to get it off relatively easily, and thank goodness there was no damage to the motor.   We finally set sail an hour later and sailed slowly in light winds all the way back to Boot Key harbor.  We got to use our “happy” rainbow colored spinnaker sail, which helped to lift our spirits!

Returning back to Marathon left me with mixed feelings.  It was lovely to come into the marina after we returned and have people exclaim how much they missed us and inquire about our trip.  We felt so loved!  But truthfully, aside from our friends here I am really over this place and am looking forward to moving on.  K. is going to finish this computer job and we have a few more boat projects to do, and then we’re outta here!

Today the wind has shifted and is blowing really strong.  This afternoon I had the horrific and stressful experience of returning to the boat after running some errands to discover that our anchor was dragging and we were headed straight for a huge catamaran next to us!  K. was working on the computer in the marina, and so I was alone to deal with it.  We have worked out an excellent routine for anchoring as a duo, with one person on the motor and the other person up front dealing with the anchor.  But I had never had to do it alone before and had no idea how to handle the situation all by myself.  I was panicking!!!!  I started the motor and tried to keep at least from hitting the other boat, when an angel named Dave came over in his dinghy and offered to help me.  THANK GOD!   He pulled up the anchor and I motored us to a better spot, where we re-anchored with no damage done to anyone.  Now the wind continues to howl and we are checking often to make sure we aren’t moving.  We are missing that safe, easy mooring ball we were on right about now!

We’ve spent the last few days at the beach.  Yep, we just want to reiterate, that after months of traveling through brutal cold, we are now livin’ it up on the BEACH in the SUNSHINE, while most of the rest of you freeze your butts off in the cold winter.  And we are loving it! 

Believe it or not, we haven’t really had that many “beach” days since we got down to Florida.  We’ve mostly hung out on the beach when we had visitors, so we could show them a “real” Florida vacation, but we haven’t done much of the beach thing ourselves.  But here we are, on one of the nicest beaches in the Keys, and we don’t feel like leaving anytime too soon. 

We anchored on the far end of the point, where there is a small anchorage between two bridges that has a reputation of being difficult holding in a strong current.  We had to try 7 times to get our anchor set!  That was an all time record for us!  Cap’t K. built up some muscles pulling that anchor chain in 7 times!!  Once we got set, the current and waves didn’t roll us too badly, although we have gotten spoiled being in the ultra calm Boot Key Harbor for so long. 

Yesterday and today we took our dinghy over to the far side of the beach and got K.’s kites set up to try kiteboarding.  We set up “camp” (hammock, picnic food, shade, etc) in our favorite magic spot that we found a month ago when my sister Stephanie was visiting. 

The water here is really shallow and extremely warm.  You can walk WAY out and still have the water only be thigh deep.  It’s delightful!  I enjoyed watching the pelicans practice their “syncronized diving” techniques.  They float aimlessly in small groups, and then they will simultaneously start flying around, then they dive into the water at exactly the same moment. There didn’t seem to be any fish where they were diving, so I couldn’t help but wonder if they were just practicing diving for the fun of it or what. Maybe no one else cares about this, but I love pelicans dearly and so here is a little video of them diving. I think it’s quite amazing.

Well the wind is out of the southeast and east for the next few days. Temps are forecast to be in the upper 70’s and mostly sunny. We’re planning to go to Bahia Honda State Park for the weekend.

It should be a two to three hour sail from where we are currently anchored in Boot Key Harbor. The park has good facilities and cell-phone signal (e.g. internet access), so we will be all set.

Our friends on s/v Major Change say that they plan to come and join us, which would be the first time their boat has been off the mooring ball in Boot Key Harbor since they tied up to it months ago. Other friends may take the bbus or drive cars down to the park to join us and fly some kites and try some kite boarding if the winds are right.

The anchorage at the park is only “protected” from East to South winds, and there is a decent tidal current that runs through the channel. Also the anchorage is between an old railroad bridge (see photo above) and the highway (route 1), so there isn’t too much room if you drag anchor.

The benefits of dealing with the difficulties are that you get access to the beautiful beaches, tiki huts, picnic tables, bathrooms, and showers. If the winds are good, we might even get to try kite-surfing!

Well, we thought we would be heading to the Dry Tortugas by now, and the weather has been mighty fine for it, but we are learning that plans are “fluid” when you are living on a boat. Cap’t K. has had the good fortune to get some consulting work that he is doing on the computer, and the job is extending into next week, so we decided to postpone our trip so he can focus on the job in a place with a reliable internet connection. So we are still in Marathon. I’m getting a bit ansy here and needed a little change of scenery, so when my friends Hilary and Charles invited me to go with them to the Miami boat show, I decided to hop in their car and go with them to the big city.

For those readers who are not boaters, let me explain what a boat show is. Once a year several major boating cities around the country host boat shows, where the latest and greatest boats and products relating to boats come together in a huge boat shopping party. Boat people from around the world come to gawk at boats, talk about boats, and spend money on boat stuff. I had never been to a boat show before, so I thought it would be a learning experience to check it out. At the Miami boat show the entire downtown marina is devoted as the “Strictly Sail” section, and is the exclusive domain of sailors. Powerboats and fishing boats are in another part of town. Of course we are strictly sailors and went to stroll the docks, which were mostly full of very large and very fancy sailboats that K. and I can only dream about. So I went on all the dreamiest sailboats there — 60 foot sailboats with pristine teak decks, 3 bathrooms, and enough room for me to have an entire weaving studio on board. Sailboats so big our cats would get lost for days exploring them. Sailboats with million dollar price tags.
And then there was all the high end, high tech stuff to put on these huge sailboats. Complicated gadgets galore. Winches that are bigger than our galley. The newest innovations on anchors and life jackets and ropes. It was all pretty overwhelming.
It was an interesting contrast to the book I’ve been reading: Cruising in Seraffyn by Lin and Larry Pardey. This couple has been cruising the world for 40 years in very small and simple sailboats. Their motto is “Go small, go simple, go now”. Their first boat Seraffyn, was a 24 foot handmade wooden boat without an engine, and they sailed very happily around the world in it for years. Not only did they sail successfully without an engine, they also did not have any electronic equipment other than a radio. Again and again they emphasized that all the extra equipment and gadgets cost money upfront and down the road for maintenance that could be better spent traveling. Of course it must also be mentioned that they are excellent sailors with amazing navigational skills which allowed them to travel this way. Their story has inspired me to pursue more aggressively a better knowledge of navigation and sailing, and I have now begun to work my way through the American Sailing Association’s “Coastal Navigation and Piloting” Course. So far on our trip it has been too easy to rely on the GPS.

Anyway, back to Miami.
After the boat show we went back to our 5 STAR HOTEL ROOM at the Doral Resort and Golf Club to relax in the hot tub. What was I, an unemployed budget conscious sailor, doing at an exclusive, fancy 5 star hotel, might you ask? Well, the other reason I decided to jump ship and go to Miami is that my friends had managed to score a free hotel room at this resort through a business deal with their company, and so I got to enjoy it as well. And enjoy it we did! The hot tub and pool were AMAZING, with giant waterfalls cascading over fake but very convincingly real looking cliffs into both the swimming pool and hot tub. The waterfall over the hot tub was positioned so you could sit under it and enjoy the pounding hot water on your shoulders as a massage. Excellent!! Oh, and a real bed and a TV and a bathroom! After living aboard Wee Happy, I’m easy to please and this was pure luxury!
And all this time that I was partying it up in Miami, my poor sweet husband was home on the boat recovering from having a tooth pulled. It obviously hasn’t been a fun experience, so send some healing wishes his way.

Oh, and one more thing! Some of you know that my camera has been broken for awhile now. Maybe you’ve noticed we’ve had less pictures lately…that’s why. Super K. miraculously fixed it and it’s back in action again! Here is the first picture I took with the newly resurrected camera:

We’re free for the next two to three weeks. We’re starting to plan a trip to the Dry Tortugas via Boca Grande key in the Marquesas Keys (not to be confused with the Marquesas Islands in the south Pacific. We have one potential buddy boat for the trip (RJ & Mel on Kinfolk), and are open to others also (in case you or a friend may be interested).

We have significant coastal cruising experience, but this will really be one of our few times out on open water with no protection from the reef. We’ve done the New Jersey coast and northern Florida coast outside before, but that’s all for open ocean sailing. Bite sized pieces are right for us at this point.

Here’s what I’m thinking so far:
50 gallons of water
30 gallons of gas (for our 8hp 4-stroke Honda outboard)
Tethers, harnesses, jacklines, foul weather gear, etc
Dramamine (started 24-48 hours before the trip, along with no alcohol for 2 days prior)
Collapse our inflatable dinghy and outboard and store in the v berth
Have our compass calibrated before the trip
Plot and track our gps coordinates on paper charts every 10 minutes
Consider renting a satellite phone or getting a SPOT gps tracker

Our primary instrumentation is a bulkhead compass and garmin self-contained bulkhead mounted small color gps. We have a digital depth sounder also.
Our radio is a good old VHF that has good signal.
Backup gps navigation on a laptop with gps receiver and also on iPad.

I have not yet had the chance to talk to any local charter captains or fisherman about the Marquesas Keys and the currents and shallows, etc. This is a top priority before we leave. I especially want to ask about uncharted shallows and the entrance to Mooney harbor in the Marquesas Keys!

Concerns:
Being out of communication in case of emergency
Unexpected current from north or south when beyond the reef’s protection, which might push us off course
Running aground when trying to anchor in the Marquesas
Unexpected storms of course
We do not have a life raft (our boat is our life raft!)
The east winds that are prevalent this time of year. It would suck to get stuck out in the Tortugas for a few weeks of nonstop heavy east winds or storms!!!

Maybe we should head to the Tortugas at the tail end of an easterly and then hang in the Tortugas while the winds are south, and then return to Key West when they clock around to the west. That’s been the dominant weather pattern here for the last month, but still you never know!

I don’t want to have to reply on communication and the coast guard in case of emergency, but I’d like to be able to contact someone if something huge happens like losing our rudder or running hard aground, etc.

I suppose we could leave the dinghy behind, but it could come in handy to have it in case we ran aground and need to kedge off or if we want to dinghy over to loggerhead key, etc.

Capt’n K