2/22/16         Monday        Boot Key/Marathon, FL

David writes:

Another good day anchored in Sister Creek, where we are surrounded by mangroves,  where the no see ems come out when the wind is calm and sailors pray for a breeze!  These no see ems are smaller than their Maine cousins and march right through the no see em screening on our boat. So, we light citranenna (sp?) candles, spray ourselves with bug spray, pull the sheets over our heads and pray for a breeze!

Mind you, it is usually not all that bad except at sunset and sunrise, and wayyyyyy better than shoveling (or fearing) snow.

We are finally down to two on the wait list for a mooring ball in the Boot Key Harbor controlled by Marathon City Marina.

So, if other sailors take this Easterly and South Easterly to try to get to the Bahamas, we will have a mooring ball tomorrow!
This means pulling up three anchors and five lines we have tied to the mangroves. All are slimy with growth from the past two weeks plus, as well as the muddy sand of the anchors. So cleaning up the lines, drying and stowing will be our next (gladly) project.  Any suggestions on how to get the Florida goo off the lines that have been in the water is greatly appreciated.

Here at Boot Key, there is a "net" that takes place at 9 am daily on Channel 68.
The topics are Intro by Net controller, often followed by weather outlook, followed by agenda for net: new arrivals check in, departing cruisers check out, announcements and info about the area, then buy sell or trade, followed by trivia where people try to stump the net listerner's with a nautical trivia questions.

Recently, someone has been "stomping" on the net  by clicking on their VHF radio while others are passing traffic, thus  making their voice message un-readable. It has been pretty distressing to realize one person can mess up this community based network. The community is reaching out to the town, county and FCC to see what can be done to stop this illegal disruption. More to follow.        

Lastly: Observation from friend in Kennebunkport: The Sombrero Beach Public Park is open to one and all with many free parking places and lots of open access to beach and pavilions as well as exercise equipment, vollyball courts, etc.

This creates an inviting environment for visitors and locals as well, understanding that if the locals and visitors are happy they will stay and spend money to support the economy.  What is wrong with Maine, one wonders, that beaches are being cut off from public access and local land owners throw visitors off?

Interesting question that Florida appears to embrace tourism and Maine, in that area, appears to simply see visitors as a group to pull money off of. Hmmmmm?

To be fair: In Florida: several well to do land owners have apparently bought the attention of their legislators on the East Coat and have submitted legislation to the Fla Legislature prohibiting anchoring in the federally protected areas where cruisers anchor to prepare to cross to the Bahamas. Rememeber, that we are waiting for a mooring ball because others who wish to cross are stalled? Imagine someone with the power to say: NIMBY to a legitimate  cruiser who wants to safely wait for a good weather window to pass. Is this NIMBY person responsible if that cruiser makes a bad decision   because they were tired and wanted to rest/sleep  but a new law said they could not stop?

I hope someone is held responsible!

Anyway, for now we are good, waiting for a mooring  ball and the wind is blowing so the no see ems are
 at bay!
 A beautiful day in Marathon Bay!

2/21/16        Sunday           Boot Key/Marathon, FL


How did that happen?!? Third week in February?!! So we've been here in The Keys for 3 weeks. Dear friends, Nora & Dick, left today. They arrived a week after we did. We've had wonderful adventures together and now we're back to discovering another new "normal."

Today was a vacation day for the most part. We did not leave the boat all day. Well, we each got in the dinghy to do some beautifying efforts on Grace, so we were really off the boat but we didn't leave the boat....really. David skinned (scraped) some more railing and I oiled some more, different railing. David also washed the deck getting the mud off from the anchoring he and Dick did earlier last week.

New neighborhood David and Dick moved us to early last week
out of direct line of Voice of America broadcast to Cuba

The move down (up?) Sisters Creek puts us about 5 minutes closer to the marina and 5 minutes farther from the beach...which I don't seem to be getting to very often....YET.

clutter of line but a very clean fore deck
that little oriental carpet is from Wayne's house,
his birthday is coming up late this month, missing him

David, with my help, did a yeoman's work on an electrical improvement that did not improve. We have a new switch, though, and may be able to use it at some point after David does more reading and research. I was hard pressed to tear myself away from my book by Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin. Such a fine piece of literature. She is such an exquisite writer/storyteller! I finished it just a few minutes ago. It is just so touching...narrated by an aging woman who recalls her youth and marriage. and there is another novel within her narration and it is confusing...until the end...who are the participants in that interior novel. Wonderful. Definitely recommending this one.

David and I dined on board which we'd not done since Nora & Dick arrived, eating out or at their campsite. Nora is allergic to cats so couldn't stay inside on the boat. It was nice to sit at our table in the pilot house and enjoy food together, alone, with Amelia.

And tomorrow we'll see what it is like to be in the marina again, perhaps to move to a mooring tomorrow or Tuesday. The wind is shifting, giving those wanting to make it to the Bahamas a good 2-day weather window...if predictions hold true.

We spoke with our friends Dan and Wendy - David and Dan spoke. They are on the west coast of FL thinking of coming further south in another week or so. We expect to hang out w/them, do some island hopping then probably buddy-boat to head north by the middle of March. Aah, yikes. Middle of March is only 3+ weeks away. How did THAT happen?!!? And David and I will have to learn, all over again, all our sailing skills since we have barely been off anchor in 3 weeks. Thus, the island hopping will be good practice for us.

David and I started thinking about big (that is, expensive) boat improvements (like home improvements) today, thinking about how to balance the importance of money spent on boat home relative to money spent on earth home (7 Lavers Pond Rd) and thinking about future different or additional earth home in a warmer climate...for when snow birding on the boat is less possible due to our knees and other frailties or responsibilities or interests. Big subjects with no concrete decisions but the conversations are important if for no other reason than to alert each other that we are thinking about eventualities.We hope for those eventualities and long lives in good health.

And tonight, the full-ish moon.

 
Full ish, not fool ish

2/20/16     Saturday        Boot Key/Marathon, FL

OMGoodness. I slept for nearly10 hours last night, not all restful sleep but horizontal in any case. The day has been delicious and the evening wonderful. Coming back to Sisters Creek tonight was beautiful. Warm. Light wind. Our own anchor light star field. I've noticed that palm trees have become my norm and I look forward to being home on the boat. Now that both David and I have more confidence in the dinghy I can take it into the dock myself again.

Yoga this morning then sitting around the marina lounge - the large warehouse room - and working a jigsaw puzzle with some other adults. A fun diversion and I may purchase a puzzle to gift the marina so we'll have another to work. This one was an EASY 300 pieces. Fun to see how strangers work together, with our very own ways of doing things, to complete a project. I joined the trio and Beth handed me a stack of green stripped pieces saying "here are the green stripped meadow pieces, a project for you." I took them then ignored them, not out of resistance, its just that the horse cart with the words printed on it was more interesting to me. I got around to the green stripped meadow but it took awhile, and it was fun.

Dick and Nora joined us and we divided up - Dick and David taking the dinghy to Sombrero Beach and Nora & me getting lunch for all of us traveling by their van, and meeting at the beach picnic tables.

our picnic table is just to the right, water is beautiful

Mission accomplished and lunch eaten we all piled into the dinghy for a waterway tour. We went into the canals off Sisters Creek to look at houses. Beautiful! AND we saw an iguana, a yellow and brown one, that was 3' long. Dick got a couple of photos that he said he'd share..maybe by the time I finish this post.                  

We had a good time riding up and down canals. Also went into the waterway beside our new anchoring place, pretty shallow water (4'-6') that opens out into a really shallow (1') open "pond". Quiet and lovely but probably filled w/biting bugs around sunset.

Red Mangrove

Waterway tourists minus Dick, photographer

We ended our tour back at Grace for drinks on the aft deck admiring the day, the small grey heron, and appreciating our good fortune and our friendship. David took Dick and Nora back to their car at Sombrero Beach. I stayed on Grace to straighten and change clothes. David returned.

Dinner tonight w/Nora & Dick at the Sunset Grill next to their campsite. Food and atmosphere is family-friendly but hose families are generally quiet and contained enough to not intrude on anyone else's fun. A good 3-piece band was playing in the open air beside the pool, around which people were enjoying dinner. Guitarist was great! We've eaten her a couple times before and really enjoy it.

my camera/phone does NOT get sunset distinct colors but still...

Nora & Dick leave tomorrow so dinner was their last supper w/us in the Keys. They'll visit Nora's sis in Sarasota make another stop in D.C. to visit a friend then book it for Maine home. Loved spending time w/them here. Would do it a bit differently next time...like we did today...making plans in advance rather than getting together then trying to decide what to do/where to go. That was frustrating for me as it was hard to get us to decide, all wanting to not be bossy or feel guilty for always getting way or just wanting to know ALL the options. Triple Capricorn me is driven to distraction by some of this behavior. Opinions were not easily offered so as not to influence decisions. Duh! What's the point. So, make choices before we meet then just carry out the decision/
agenda. Hoooooooooooooooo hummmmmmmmmmmm!
Loving that they were here with us. Looking forward to "back to normal" boating here not that I know what "normal" is, particularly. But I look forward to cultivating some friendships here in the harbor. For example, I still haven't met the gardener but savored the gardens anyway.

tomatoes in the background

beds are about 2' high and 3' x 6'

    Friends, Dan and Wendy will probably arrive tomorrow and we are now # 6 on the mooring wait list. Wind is supposed to move to the east and southeast Monday and Tuesday, making it easy for folks to leave for the Bahamas and folks in the creek to move to balls. Could be us. Hoping to get a mooring as that would make it easier to leave, to come and go.                    

2/19/16         Friday                Boot Key/Marathon, FL

The north wind persists. For a few hours today it turned to the east with slightly warmer temps. Now back to the north.

I skipped yoga today, not my favorite teacher. Took off on my bike to the library...an easy 3 blocks mostly through parking lot and on sidewalk. Route #1 is too fast and too busy to be comfortable biking on the road. Watched a movie as part of my preparation for grant writing next week. Biked back for what felt like 7 blocks because the wind was so strong in my face.

Wonderful lunch by the water w/Dick & Nora then back to the boat by 4:30, thinking to join them again after a nap. We'd wanted to take them exploring by dinghy but the harbor is too choppy with the wind. Sigh. I feel as if we've not been able to share much of OUR experience on the boat because of the wind.

Took our naps from 5 - 8 PM, got up for a little reading and an Emergen-C and back to sleep.

A weird day.

2/18/16        Thursday           Boot Key/Marathon, FL


YIPPEE! A day on the boat. Same as a day at home. No commitments. No visitors. No schedule. Well, not exactly. But close enough for excellence. Felt great to hang out with David and Amelia. Amelia followed us from one of our few rooms to the other, where ever her humans congregated, she was there, too...sometimes sleeping but if she woke up and we were missing. Meow! Meow! Where are you??? Meow! It may be time for her to write another post soon. Her bout with throwing up seems to have subsided. I'm going with the too much food too fast and excitement and stress. Will try to ameliorate all. Just now she's walked across my computer AND the galley table and has settled at my thigh, her favorite resting place.

So, a day at home on the boat. Did some clean up tasks to prepare for Coast Guard inspection that didn't happen....today, at least. So we have a Boat Beautiful. We read aloud from the book we're reading together, Playing With Fire, which is pretty good....not the Dragon Girl series. I read the first one but there was way too much gratuitous violence in that for my tolerance. In this book the playing is a violin and the fire is an unpublished piece of music that is too filled with passion.

So, clean-up, reading aloud, David cut my hair (a little too short on top but my fault for instructing him. I didn't get to the library as I'd planned. We did get off the boat around 3:30, heading for the marina for shower (David) and computer juice(me). I'd also thought to go to the basket making class today but hair cut and reading aloud interfered. But I did see some of the beautiful baskets and trays that women have make from long pine needles and beads. I'm in next week! Thursday at 1:00 PM 1300 hrs). Had a great conversation w/Capt. Jack, the 94 year old resident, lives on his boat. He paints on sea shells and gave me one. That will be the "base" of my first pine needle basket! Capt Jack is a delight, can't hear well, loves to flirt, only a few bottom teeth. Sometime I'll find out about his family and past work.

We met Dick & Nora for a trip to Islamorada to go to an Art Walk. It turned out to be as much a craft fair as art walk and many of the vendors from the Pigeon Key Art Fair I attended a couple of weeks ago. Cool. AND I found the clothing designer whose clothes I LOVED and I bought a dress that David thought was a shirt. It could be either and I'll wear it as both...not at the same time. It is turquoise and looks great w/my eyes and hair. I've never spent so much money on one piece of clothing! And I found a pair of earrings that I bought in Beaufort, SC so I don't feel the need to buy more earrings. Phew.

Had a lovely time and got back to the boat around 9:00 PM to content Amelia. We had dragged our anchor, one of our anchors, so we set another. The newest neighbors are close and we don't want to become intimate w/then. There are strong northerly winds tonight which are broadside to us. Sooo, more anchors!  Three anchors. Five lines into the mangroves. We ought to be alright. Maybe a couple times awake for each of us tonight for anchor watch. Or maybe the wind will subside. That would be lovely.

2/17/16       Wednesday       Boot Key/Marathon, FL        Mary Griffin's birthday!!!


Some nights I wake up scared. Maybe a shard of a dream has sent me into gloom and doom. I start to enumerate all the things that could go dangerously wrong - the dinghy motor quits running and we're not where friends will help us/rescue us...going not so safely out to sea; there is a storm at sea; pirates really do try to board the boat; I make a misstep and miss a step and break something; David falls overboard. YIKES! What am I thinking is pretty clear. WHY am I thinking these thoughts...going down those waterways, is the question. I don't even need to answer the question. Just stop doing it. None of this has happened. None of it needs to happen. We've been very resourceful in dealing with any mishaps or engine troubles. Even my swimming lesson in the river was handled safely and w/humor.

I think, maybe, that as we get accustomed  to our place here and to Grace I might fear that we'll become lax, take our safety for granted and relax our attention. So my subconscious kicks into "pay attention/be careful" gear.The fear mongering reminds me to pay attention, remember that  anything can go wrong at any minute. Stay alert!  Okay, I hear the message and thank the messenger.  In the daylight I'm no longer fearful. Hmmmm.

Yoga today. I was so delighted to have cooked breakfast AND cleaned up after that I didn't remember to bring my yoga mat and strap. Remembered it halfway to the marina. No time to return. So yoga on the concrete sans mat..."au natural" as a friendly yogi said. All was okay except my hands felt gritty.

Our Yamaha dinghy has been colicky lately. One night it just quite while we were at the dock. David took the cover off and burped it. Nothing. Got the tools out and tightened something. Nothing. That's the night that Mike, with whom we'd rafted up in Vero Beach came to our rescue. Then last night it wasn't drawing gasoline appropriately so David took it apart and dropped a screw down into the engine. At least it wasn't dropped into the water. Troy and Lisa, and Dick and Nora, helped with that reassembly. Troy and Lisa followed us part way home just to make sure motor was running. And today David started the motor (you start it by pulling a cord, like old lawn mowers) and the cord didn't rewind. What is going on? Mercury in retrograde? That problem was solved with help of someone I don't know. We're thinking it may be time to go over this motor and tighten every last screw, similar to what we've been doing with the Grace engine over the months of travel and before we left. Tonight, no problem with dinghy motor.

Dick and Nora and we went to the Crane Museum and Nature Park this afternoon. It was so perfect. We took the trolley tour - a small electric bus - and a lovely, knowledgeable guide told us about the history and the vegetation and wildlife. The only wildlife we saw in the wild were spiders.

Gold Globe spider - color is wonderful but I don't really like spiders

The Marathon Wild Bird Rescue organization is in this park though. We re-met Becky (or Betsy) the blind elderly pelican we'd first met at the Arts Fair. There were about 20 pelicans, bunches of cormorants and some other injured birds there. We spoke with one of the rehab people who was feeding them. She'd begun volunteering there when she was 12 years old, now 25 and employed full time, having decided that child psychology was not the field she wanted to pursue after her first clinical experience. What a delight she was. Totally into her work with the birds.

Very late lunch of sandwiches in the Sombrero beach park, a little drive around to look at houses. Found a boat dock, with small land attached, for sell - $358K. We could rent the 2nd slip space to help pay the mortgage. Ironically, we pass this dock/land every time we go to or from the marina and have commented on what a good location it is. Is this another one of those pieces of real estate that we should have bought it when we saw it??? There have been several such pieces of real estate in our lives together.

Back on Grace and have discovered we have all the flares we need to be perfect legal with the boat inspections expected tomorrow. HA! Kitty snoozes beside me. I'm going to read my book and sleep early and soundly.

Continuing to feel blessed.

2/16/16         Tuesday      Boot Key/Marathon, FL

Sunrise was lovely this morning...and FILLED with no-see-ums. Fierce little bugs! And, truly nearly invisible they are so small. You feel something biting and there's a freckle....with hugh teeth, apparently. Only the sunrise shows up in the photo.

neighbors to our east

Talked w/my wonderful friend, Judy, to start my day today. So great to have a 30 year friend whose voice to hear.  Breakfast. Then we left the boat early to get in before the thunderstorm. We stopped to consider some other anchoring places as we dinghy-ed into the marina.

We've MOVED....not to the marina but about 1/4 mile closer...but 1/4 mile further from the beach. Sigh. We moved to get out of line with the most virulent electro-magnetic field...Voice of America broadcasting to Cuba for the past 30+ years. Broadcasting at 100,000 watts far exceeding the legal limits of the FCC. But, hey, it is our government trying to import democracy so...the rules don't apply. Dick and David moved the boat this afternoon and we're re-anchored but at an angle with the four broadcast towers. And now our GPS and radio receivers/transmitters work again. Phew! If they'd been fried we'd be poorer....or have to stay in FL and not travel too far.....or back to paper charts, exclusively. Photos of the "new" neighborhood tomorrow when there is daylight.

Dick and David moved the boat. Nora and I went to the library to compute; she working on Union of Maine Visual Artist publication, me working on Freeport Players job descriptions and grant applications. All around productive day for all of us.  Appreciating Dick's helping David w/the boat. Been there/done that and happy to share the experience with others.

Meanwhile, in our Community Library, Gov LePage conducted a Town Hall-type meeting. Word is that he "spared w/our legislator", full house and some people had to be removed for heckling. La di da!

Pizza in our oven for dinner and I'm ready to read myself to sleep.