Boot Key Harbor to Key West

Day 17: March 16, 2013

The original plan was to get out of bed early, do all of our morning things quickly and then get underway at around first light.  Well, we crawled out of bed at first light, ate oatmeal, our quickest breakfast, and got underway at  8:30.  Our goal was to travel the 42 miles to Key West in one day.  I had sited some potential anchorages along the way in case the weather didn’t cooperate.  It dawned a bright sunny day with winds out of the northeast at 10mph which is terrific for our trip. 

Leaving Boot Key Harbor

We began by motoring to add some electrons to our batteries, but with the favorable winds, we also hoisted the sails and motor sailed actually until  3:00 in the afternoon.  The wind continued to build as did the waves, with the average wave height around 2 feet.  The forecasters tell you that the wave averages are the average height of the top 1/3 of the waves measured and that there could actually be waves twice the size of the reported height.  So we had a relatively smooth ride with a few bigger guys pushing us into a surfing situation.  Most of the day we were traveling about 7mph but I did happen to look at the GPS as we surfed down a large wave and saw 9.2mph.  The only time I have ever seen a higher speed was once when we were riding a flood tide going up the East River past the United Nations building in New York City.  That day we took a picture of the GPS to authenticate bragging rites.

 

Large Cruising Yachet



We were traveling west on the Hawk Channel which is a deep passage along the Atlantic side of the Keys and is generally used by bigger craft.  We saw one that was big enough to trigger our AIS alerting system.  That is a sophisticated radio system designed to receive signals from vessels that are carrying a transponder. It emits a signal that identifies and gives specifics about the craft.  That signal is then transferred to our GPS and we can see his course, potential collision courses and so forth.  This boat, that we saw, was a 55 meter by 30 meter wide pleasure boat cruising along at 14 knots.  At first I assumed it was a commercial freighter. 

At around 3:00 we shut down the motor and sailed the remainder of the trip.  The wind by that time was from the east so we put a preventer rope on the main and held it to port and used a whisker pole to hold the jib out to starboard thereby sailing wing and wing or “wung out” for the rest of the trip to Key West.

Boot Key Harbor Pump Out Boat

I must also add to the log that we traveled out to the three mile offshore boundary of the State of Florida.  The purpose for this jaunt was to empty the contents of our composting commode.  It is a neat machine from which the composted materials do not need to be dumped but about once every 3 weeks.  And, it is illegal to dump any kind of waste into the coastal waters so one must make the 3 mile trek to take care of that task.  Some places, especially along the  east coast, require that you show proof that you have disposed of your boats waste in legal pump out stations.  Interestingly, the folks at Boot Key Harbor provide a pump out service to those boats moored on a weekly basis for free.  Thay have two really nifty boats that are designed for just that purpose.  I asked him if he would empty my compost box and he said that he could only draw out liquids.  Enough on that topic.

The trip from Boot Key Harbor to Key West was basically a westerly trip and once we got to Key West we pulled in the whisker pole, came around to a northerly course and sailed close hauled through a channel that passes the west end of the Key.  We had been traveling about 6mph under sail but when we turned north our speed dropped to about 2.5.  There was a strong southerly tidal flow down through the channel holding us back.  We assumed that we would be at the Key West City Marina on Garrison Bite by about 4:30, but with the current there was no way to get there before about 5:30 or so.  I called the marina and the lady told us of the slip that we were assigned and said that we could settle up in the morning. 

Special Forces Training Facililty on Key West

To get to the marina, we needed to travel around a peninsula that ran about 3 miles north of the town of Key West. The total trip around that feature ended up being about 7 miles.  So with the current we didn’t get there until about 6:00.

We were told to look for the moored houseboats and that our slip was number nine.  We found these structures to be most interesting.  They were basically house trailers built on pontoons.  Some of them were quite sophisticated while others were really junky.  We motored very slowly towards our slip near the most inland end of the dock and when we were about 10 feet from turning into our slip, we drug bottom with the rudder.  I could lift the rudder to allow the boat to float on but would not be able to steer it.  At that time, a gentleman on the dock offered to help.  I threw him a line, started the motor and promptly wrapped the dinghy painter in the prop.  We were able to maneuver the boat into the slip with just the rope.

We decided to head for an eatery so we buttoned up the boat and started walking.  We didn’t have a map but knew that the action was on the west end of the Key.  We started what we assumed was west but it turned out we were heading south into a rather poor-appearing neighborhood.  After walking for about 10 minutes and finding ourselves still immersed in a dense neighborhood of small Key houses, we saw a cab sitting alongside the street.  We asked for a ride and he said sure but he had to wait a few minutes for his friend whom he was giving a ride to work.  He was busily stuffing his face with a huge burger and fries.  His friend turned out to be an interestingly dressed, free-speaking, free-thinking waitress.  I would say she was about 21 years old wearing skimpy lime green clothes and glasses in honor of St. Patrick’s Day, which by the way is tomorrow.

We traveled to Deval Street which was packed on both sides with all shapes and sizes of St. Patty’s Day revelers.  Lining the streets were numerous bars, tee-shirt venders, restaurants, art galleries, a Wendy’s, and about anything else you can imagine.  Most of the folks walking were carrying some form of beverage, the type of which I would assume one would not provide a child.  The music was loud, the traffic was nonstop and the atmosphere was most festive.  It is what I would assume Bourbon Street would look like at Mardi Gras time.

The cabbie suggested that we eat at Caroline’s and his suggestion was good.  It was an open street café that served wonderful food.  I had a shrimp poorboy and Janine had a fish sandwich.  Both were very good.

After dinner, we walked the street amongst the revelers and stopped in one of the art galleries.  The perfectly coifed young sales lady very effectively presented the beautiful paintings, castings, and glass art.  We assumed that they were all very expensive and we did not buy.

We were tired so we called a cab and headed back to the boat.  Unlike the majority of the you revelers, we were in bed by 9:00.