Wednesday- October 8, 2014
Slipped the lines in drizzling rain a little after 8 AM on Wednesday morning, 10/8. By the time we fueled up and closed out at the dock office, it was about 10...but we are on our way. Decided to run about 30-40 miles today which puts us south of Stuart. Dropped anchor around 4 PM just off the intercostal neat Jupiter, Florida. Beautiful homes all around and calm. Tonight we we had dinner aboard Journey and toasted to the next leg of our adventure.
Thursday - October 9, 2014
Anchors up at 8:30 AM. Long day ahead, going through Fort Lauderdale. We passed through Jupiter and got a lot of nice pictures of the red lighthouse. It was slow moving through a lot of bridges and slow wake zones due to manatee areas. We had great weather and hit most of the bridges without long waits for openings. Finally dropped anchors at 7 PM just north of Miami (about 62 miles today). This was suppose to be a quiet anchorage, but whoever noted the "no wake area" on the reviews failed to mention that not many of the big boats bother to slow down...lots of rocking and rolling!
Friday -October 10, 2014
Anchors up at 8 AM. Today we passed through Miami and crossed Biscayne Bay. Seeing Miami in the distance was cool. Once in town, the houses, condos and resorts lined both sides of the waterway. Saw lots of cruise ships and many, many really big boats! Even saw the Hard Rock. Impressive! Once out of Miami it opened up into Biscayne Bay. It was on and off rough spots of wind and waves, but we made it to a very well protected anchorage off the north end of Key Largo. We are officially in The Keys!! Dropped anchor around 6 PM and settled in for a quiet night. Plan to sleep in tomorrow and decide on our next move...which may be to sit here another day or two.
Saturday/Sunday - 10/11-12
Decided that this anchorage would be a quiet place to spend the weekend. Nothing but the birds and fish to keep us company. Watched some football (Geaux Tigers!), read, napped and took a dinghy ride around Steamboat Creek.
Plan to head out Monday morning to Islamorada.
Monday 10/13
Anchors up at 9 AM headed south. Passed through a small thunderstorm but it passed quickly. Lots of wind today. Also lots of areas of very low water! Slow going and then there were crab pots everywhere. No rhyme or reason to the madness. It was like a mine field. Finally made it to Meticumba Bite and dropped anchor for the night.
Tuesday, 10/14
Another morning of dodging crab pots. Headed to Marathon today. Once there we will wait for a weather window to make the cross to Key West. Probably hang out at Sombrero Marina until Friday or Saturday.
Marathon 10/15-17 (Wed-Fri)
Made it into Marathon and got a slip at Sombrero Marina. We have been anchored out for a week on our trip from Fort Pierce and it is nice to be able to get off of the boat and walk around a bit. The marina is nice and there is a restaurant with great food and live music. The owners are a couple we recognized from our Latitudes and Attitudes magazine. The band was Eric Stone. Great times and fun hanging out with our dock neighbors.
We walked around the golf course across the road, made it over to Publix and West Marine (you can never pass up one of those!) and Hoppy and I got our Flu Shots! Enjoyed Cuban food, seafood, and a great burger. Weather window to cross to Key West/Stock Island is Saturday.
Saturday, 10/18
Dropped the lines at 8:00 am headed out to Stock Island. The weather is great, light breeze and the water is almost like glass and as clear, too. In 25' of water we could still see the bottom. It was a beautiful day and we made it into Stock Island Marina about 4:00. We checked in, got the boats tied up and settled in for a quiet evening. We will be here through the winter.
 |
| Add caption |
