Trip to Sombrero Key for Diving

Day 26: Friday, March 18, 2016

We were again blessed with a calm night for sleeping.  We broke our fast with old fashion SOS, or in the real non-military world, chipped beef on toast.  It was good and since we didn’t use all of the beef, we will get a chance to have it again tomorrow.

Route back to Mike and Vickie's boat in the early morning

I checked my email this morning and found one from our new friend, Vickie, with whom we had dined last evening.  She again reminded me that I could stop by their boat for my hat so, as soon as we finished breakfast, I fired up the Honda on Dink and headed for the other end of the harbor.  It was a pleasant ride through the still of the early morning and Vickie was waiting on deck as I arrived.  We spent a few minutes talking before I headed for the City Marina where I made a deposit of a bag of trash.  From there I walked across Highway 1 to a scroungey little carryout that sold beer and bought a 12 pack.  That will last for the next 2 weeks.

 

Our first goal for the day was to get an early start back towards Sombrero Reef and do a bit of diving over the coral beds.  The waters in the harbor were calm but the waves on the ocean were somewhat rolly and bumpy.  We arrived to a sparse group of divers moored and easily found a ball to tie up on.  It was so rough that although I speared the mooring line on the first stab, the waves struggled to jerk me into the drink.  Once we got the lines secured, we put our gear on and slipped into the water.  The area where we were tied was sparsely populated with coral and fish and the rough waters made swimming quite difficult so after about 5 minutes, we threw in the towel and got back in the boat.  We had enough!

Interesting, however, is the history of the Sombrero Light.  “The lighthouse was put

The Sombrero Lighthouse.  The lower platform is now gone.

in service in 1858, automated in 1960, and is still in operation. The foundation is iron pilings with disks, and the tower is a skeletal octagonal pyramid of cast iron. It is a 142-foot (43 m) tall brown painted tower. It has two platforms. The lower one, 15 feet (4.6 m) above the water, held water and fuel tanks, the generator (after the light was electrified), boat hoists and a workshop. The upper platform, 40 feet (12 m) above the water, held the quarters for the staff. The original lens, a first-order Fresnel lens, is now on display in the Key West Lighthouse Museum. The Sombrero Key Light is the tallest lighthouse in the Florida Keys, and was the last lighthouse constructed under the supervision of Lieutenant George Meade of the Bureau of Topographical Engineers.” (Wikipedia) You may recall that Lieutenant Meade later General Meade of the Union Army in the Civil War.

Heading back through the Moser Channel

We started the motor and headed for the Moser Channel cut in the 7 Mile Bridge and the calm waters on the bay side of the keys. We motored back to the site where we had spent a couple of days near the abandoned condo/marina project.  It is a well-protected area from winds that blow from the south and east and we could get to supplies as needed. We entertained ourselves watching the crews working in the marina where they had brought in a tugboat that had a pile

Lunchtime while underway

driver mounted on it.  The crews were driving what appeared to be 20 foot long pipes into the coral bottom of the marina.  The base is obviously quite hard because during the afternoon, they only got 1 ½ pilings driven into the ground.

I decided to test my skills at celestial navigation so I did the prep work for a dusk sighting.  As it turned out, I didn’t have a good horizon in any direction except one so when I did the final sighting and reduction, I was way too far off.  Good thing we were not on the move and that our GPS still

The abandoned 5 star yacht club

works.  I will try again later. 

Janine fixed pork chops and mashed potatoes for supper and we enjoyed a peach parfait for dessert.  We traveled by Dink to town where we made another trash deposit.  The City Marina is located next to a beautiful city park through which we wandered on our way back to the boat,.  They have all sorts of recreational facilities including several watered ball diamonds,

Abandoned condos

soccer fields, tennis courts, basketball courts, and playgrounds.

Back at the boat Janine read while I did my celestial thing.  Bedtime arrived at around 9:00.