Originally posted at www.svsweetescape.com
Greetings from Boot Key Harbor, our home for the winter!
After more than four months spent traveling almost 3000 miles through fourteen states we have done it. We have arrived at Marathon in the Florida Keys and picked up a mooring at Boot Key Harbor.
We left our mooring at the Las Olas Mooring Field in Fort Lauderdale on Friday. Dave, Brian’s dad always referred to Fort Lauderdale’s 17th Street Causeway Bridge as his “favorite drawbridge”. He would say “Every time I come to Fort Lauderdale I have to wait for that damn bridge”. So on this day we needed the 17th Street bridge raised for us. See the video at right. Dad, that’s for you.
We went outside at Port Everglades and motored south to Miami where we went back in through Government Cut at the Port of Miami. This was necessary because Sweet Escape’s mast is too tall to fit under the Julia Tuttle Bridge over Biscayne Bay. Once back inside we anchored overnight at Key Biscayne in the Marine Stadium, a large cut out area with grandstands where they hold waterski shows. This is a popular anchorage when there isn’t anything going on there.
We had a mishap while anchoring that resulted in some damage to the front of the boat. Brian was on the bow “helping” the anchor down with a boat hook when the anchor slipped off the boat hook and slammed into the bow, pointy end first. This put a small but deep gash in the fiberglass. It didn’t go all the way through but it is definitely into the glass and will have to be repaired. We have two other less significant areas that need to be repaired as well. One is a small gelcoat chip from when Brian got too close to a wall while docking on the Erie Canal. The other resulted when the lock master at the Deep Creek Lock on the Dismal Swamp Canal pulled the boat into the lock wall in an area where there were no fenders. We will have all three done at the same time.
On Saturday morning we left the anchorage and continued south on Biscayne Bay to the Biscayne Channel. This channel connects the bay to the ocean and to Hawks Channel, a waterway just inside a reef which runs the entire length of the Keys. We motored out to Hawks Channel through Stiltsville. This is an area of several buildings, houses I guess, that are built on stilts and sit out in Hawk’s Channel, a couple miles from land. Most of these houses were occupied only by birds but there was one that looked pretty nice and where people were living.
Once out in Hawks Channel we sailed almost all the way to Rodriguez Key, 50 miles down the Keys where we anchored for the night. The water here is very clear. We anchored in ten feet of water and could easily see the bottom. The water is turquoise colored like what you would find in the Caribbean or the Bahamas. It is mesmerizing.
On Sunday morning we continued on our way. We sailed initially until the wind went away and mindful of the need to cover 50 miles we then motor sailed the rest of the way. Just west of Key Largo we began going through huge crab pot fields. Having come south along the Chesapeake Bay we are no strangers to crab pots, but we have never seen anything like this. We spent the afternoon weaving our way through hundreds of floats, all the way to Marathon.
When we arrived at Boot Key Harbor, we were directed to mooring J4 where this being written. We put the dinghy in the water and went to check in. Afterwards we walked to the Keys Fisheries Restaurant for a celebration dinner.
Tomorrow we need to do some maintenance. Our refrigerator started giving us trouble recently, it’s not as cold as it should be. Brian will look at it. In our spare parts there appears to be a spare thermostat for the refrigerator. Brian will change it out and we’ll see if that takes care of it. If not we’ll have to call someone.
We are excited to not have to travel for a while. We are looking forward to getting to know the area and of course enjoying the beautiful weather. Thanks to everyone who followed us on this journey. It really has just begun and we will continue to update this blog as often as we can.
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