Fort Myers Beach to Marco Island

Day 6: March 5, 2013



Derelict Boats near Ft. Myers Beach



We awoke this morning after a truly peaceful night’s sleep.  The river in which we anchored was absolutely calm with not a ripple on the water.  It was a bit chilly but the heater burned all night keeping us toasty warm.  We got up around 5:30. 

I fixed sausage and eggs and blueberry blob muffins (with fresh blueberryies) for our breakfast.  After cleaning up the boat we headed back down the river, through the south end of the large mooring field through which we passed yesterday, and swung south down a relatively narrow, shallow channel of Mantanzas Pass behind Estero Island.  The west side of the channel was lined with luxurious homes and the east side was mangrove swamp.  Much of that water is manatee water so the speed limit was minimal. 

Home in Fort Myers Beach

Toward the south end of the Island, we came upon a huge marina.  We were in need of ice so we pulled in and tied up to the brand new floating docks.  Floating docks are rare in these waters.  Most of the time, they are stationary docks made for large boats  with large pylons that are used for tying boats.  It is quite inconvenient for small This marina had a huge warehouse in which they stacked boats, I would say, 40 feet high with the biggest forklift used to place them there.   



Bascule Bridge at Big Carlos Pass



We bought our ice and headed down toward Big Carlos Pass.  The pass is the exit from the waters behind Estero Island.  A lift bridge (bascule bridge) crosses from Estero Island to Black Island and when we called the bridge tender on the radio.  We became concerned that the bridge was no longer operating because the tour book told us that Big Carlos Pass is extremely shallow and should not be attempted.  We had not read that when we started down behind the island and if we could indeed not get through, we would add about 20 miles to our trip.  As we got closer to the bridge, I noticed that there was a phone number posted so I called the guy and he did respond.  I asked if he knew about the channel depths and he said that yes it was shallow.  We decided to try it any way and I am pleased to report that it was easily deep enough for Panache to pass.

About a mile out into the Gulf, we turned south and headed for Gordon’s Pass which is the entryway into the Gordon River which runs through Naples.  The wind was from the south southwest so we put up our sails and had a wonderful sail.  The trip to Gordon’s Pass was about 21 miles and we sailed about half of that distance when the wind shifted to the south making our forward progress quite slow.  So, we dropped our sails and motored the remaining 10 miles. 

We dined again today on wonderful Spam and horsey sauce and PBJ sandwiches.

Mangrove north of Marco Island

We swung into Gordon’s Pass at about 5:00 and traveled about a mile to where we intersected with a passage that travels behind the barrier islands for about 6 miles to Marco Island.  This passage was totally through the mangrove swamp, much of it with a minimal speed limit.  We were amazed by the number of powerboats that transit this passageway.  In the areas where the speed was allowed up to 30 mph, the boats flew past us rocking our little craft that was moving at 5.5 mph.  At the end of the passage, we swung into the Marco River and as we motored along, we were accompanied by a dolphin.  We were going so slow, we assumed, that she got bored and soon left us.

We pulled into Factory Bay mooring field a little after 6:00 and dropped our anchor amongst approximately 15 other boats.  The forecast was calling for high winds for tomorrow so we planned to hunker down and wait this one out. 

We fired up our grill and while it was getting hot, we enjoyed some Tillamook cheese and crackers with a bottle of Yuengling Black and Tan.  I threw a couple of bratwursts on the grill and Janine made some garlic mashed potatoes.

After supper, we read for a while before I drifted off to sleep.  I was just beginning a super dream when Janine exclaimed that a big boat was about to run over us.  He had a huge, very bright spotlight that he was shining in through our open rear hatch to which Janine responded by shining her LED headlamp back at him.  It turned out that we were right up against the narrow channel that this 3 decker excursion catamaran used to return to its dock.  If fact he deftly past about 30 feet behind us and quietly “roared” on to his dock for mooring.

To bed about 9:00.