Tavernier Harbor to Long Key Bight

Day 21:  April 15, 2014

We got underway fairly early today.  As soon as we motored out of the little harbor near Tavernier, we raised the sails and proceeded to sail for most of the day.  We had strong blustery somewhat gusty winds that ranged from 14 knots to 20 knots.  We reefed the main sail and partially furled the jib so that we had a great

Typical wind speed and depth for the day.

manageable ride.  The wind was coming from our port fore quarter so we beat most of the time.  Since we were heading up wind, our progress was not that great.  We were traveling at around 4 knots.  But, it was fun exhilarating sailing.

The ICW followed an interesting path as we headed southwest.  It would traverse large open bays that were shallow just outside of the sparsely marked channel and then, out of nowhere, we would come upon a very narrow path way that might be 200 yards long.  There would be a number of channel markers directing you through an area that might be 6 or 8 inches deep on either side of the channel.  With the help of the GPS/chart plotter, it was no challenge to navigate these areas, however, without it, I can imagine that there were (and possibly still are) unwary boaters running aground.  I have heard it said that “If you haven’t run aground in the Florida Keys, you haven’t been in the Florida Keys.”  The really nice thing about our boat is that it will travel in waters of less than 2 feet so if we do venture into an area where we are not supposed to be, we can raise our centerboard and rudder and head back for deeper waters.

Marker 98 and cormorant rest stop in Bowlegy Cut

At the edge of these large bays, we headed into a narrow creek that wound through the mangrove islands.  The first one we entered had a significant adverse current that was caused by the running tide.  In that one, we were motoring along at a fairly good clip but our actual speed over ground was about 1.5 to 2 knots.  Surprisingly, we haven’t seen much wild life.  We see a lot of pelicans and some gulls, not much else.  Last year, we saw dolphins on a number of occasions; however, we saw none on this trip.

At one point, as we were sailing along, I realized that the boat had plenty of wind but had slowed down significantly.  Checking out all systems, I realized that I had not raised the motor when I shut it down and it had captured a lobster trap buoy and was dragging it along.  I raised the motor and the buoy slipped off.  We were back on our way. 

 

Unwrapping Lobster Trap Line from the prop

Thirty minutes later, we had fired up the motor and were cruising up wind when I heard a bang and the motor came to abrupt halt.  I had hit another lobster trap buoy but this time it got wound in the prop.  I pulled the Dink up alongside of the boat, got in and spent the next 20 minutes bouncing around trying to free the line.  What luck!  These lobster traps are set all over the area and I couldn’t believe that I had hit two of them. 

 

Within an hour, I hit my third one.  This time, it was wound so tight that I had to finally take to propeller off the motor to free it.

Truly enjoying a Spam Taco

My lunch today was another wonderful spam taco.  Since I was busy sailing, Janine lowered her standards and actually fixed this one for me.  She’s truly a winner and keeper. 

Later in the afternoon, we motor sailed under the Channel #5 bridge to the Gulf side of the Keys.  I assumed that since the wind was coming from the southeast, the water would be quite rough, but it turned out that we could manage the waves quite well.  I would not have wanted to travel for 10 hours in the rough water but I am now convinced that we could handle the bigger waters that we would possibly encounter in a crossing to the Bahamas. 

 

Our destination was a large protected cove on the northeast end of Long Key not far from the Channel #5 bridge known as Long Key Bight.  There were about 5 other boats anchored out in the area but it was large enough that there was plenty of room to swing on the anchor.  The depth of the water was about 4 feet over a sparsely grassy bottom.  I set the anchor and put on my mask, fins and snorkel

Sun going down from Long Key Bight

and swam out to check on security of the anchor.  It looked good.  Back on the boat, I put out more rode (anchor line) to insure that we would not have a repeat of the dragging anchor problem of last night.  I also added a weighted “sentinel” to the line to improve the holding power of the anchor.  It turns out that the more anchor rode that you have out and the closer that you can keep the line to the bottom, the better your anchor will hold.  I felt confident in our set up.  

I grilled the last of our pork chops and we enjoyed cheesy mashed potatoes as our starch.  There was a fair breeze blowing but the anchor appeared to be holding so we crawled into bed at about 9:00.  It was warm so we left the ports open in the sides of the boat assuming it would not rain.