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Our first few days in the Exumas

Hi all – its been way to long since I wrote – a combination of not having decent internet access, some computer issues, and just getting behind,. Here’s an update from about 3 weeks ago. Here goes…

We sailed from Bimini to Allen’s Cay – a really smooth, beautiful 30 hour sail (actually – motor, as we were going directly into the wind for 80+% of the time. The only excitement in our journey was when we passed New Providence Island (the island with Nassau on it). Shortly after dawn – as Julie was driving and I was catching a few zzz’s, a really fast police boat zoomed up to us, slowly circled us, and then zoomed off. We think that they were confirming that we had checked in and cleared customs – and since we were all legal – no issues.

We arrived in Allen’s Cay a little after noon and headed into the relatively tight harbor. Again – no real issues – but we got our first case of having to rely on Visual Piloting Rules (VPR). Basically, VPR is when we have one or two people on the bow of the boat reading the water to make sure that we are staying in the deeper water and away from shallow sand bars or coral heads. After a few zigs and zags, we were safely in the harbor and heading towards the spot in the anchorage that we were told was the best by the folks in Bimini. We dropped our anchor and I hopped into the water to check that it was well dug-in. Everything looked good – except that there was only about a foot of water under our boat. Probably OK – as it was near low tide – but something we’d keep an eye on. Willie and I zipped into shore for a bathroom stop – and are introduced to the famous Allen’s Cay Iguanas.

These ugly guys are pre-historic iguanas – mostly docile – except for the largest ones who seem to take-on the role of ‘protectors of the flock’ (or whatever you call a bunch of iguanas). Luckily, they weren’t interested in messing with Willie – and he was mostly interested in just going to the bathroom and sniffing around.

As I was heading back to the dinghy, I ran into Atom – a really nice guy on one of the boats that was anchored outside of the harbor. He mentioned that his crew were planning to have a cookout and bonfire on the beach and invited us to join them. Great news!

We head back to the boat – and now I notice that there are only about 4 inches of water between the lowest point on our boat and the sandy bottom of the anchorage. OK – even though it is dead low tide, looks like we may want to move – as the next low tide is in the middle of the night – not the best time to deal with an issue. Easy enough to do – we just move about 100 feet farther from shore. The only downside to the move is that we are now in more current – which just made swimming off the boat a bit more of a challenge. After re-setting the anchor, it was time to head to shore for the cookout.

On shore, we meet up again with Atom – and meet Joe, Christa, and Wilson. Joe is the owner of the boat – and Christa, Atom and Wilson are traveling with him. Like just about everybody we’re meeting on this journey – they have a great story. Here’s how I understand it… Joe’s plan is to sail around the world – sailing for a few months at a time and heading home for a few weeks to manage his company in Oklahoma. One of the stops was in Bimini (a week or two before we arrived there). While the boat was in Bimini – and most the crew was back in the states – a fourth crew member stayed on the boat for ~3 weeks. In this time, he met and became friends Wilson – a Bahamian who was working at the marina. Turns out, Wilson’s dream was also to travel the world. When Joe and the rest of the crew got back to the boat, they invited Wilson to join them for the rest of their trip. Before I go any further – I have to mention that Wilson is awesome! Super nice, really hard worker, and a super fisherman, and all around good guy. After Joe and his crew left Bimini, they went to Nassau – where Wilson showed them the Nassau most non-Bahamians never see. They visited Wilson’s extended family, played dominos with some of his old friends, ate and drank in local places, etc. Sounded fantastic. Anyway – back to the story…

When we got to the beach, Wilson and Atom had already collected a bunch of conch and sea snails and had a roaring fire for cooking the snails and another one for a bonfire (in a fire-ring of conch shells). Wilson then showed us how to open and clean a conch. He then cut-up the conch he cleaned into 5 pieces for our family to try – fresh, out of the shell. It was fantastic. Really sweet, really tasty, and not too chewy. I was pleasantly surprised. Next came the sea snails. As the name implies, these are snails that live in the sea – and the shells are about the size of a clenched fist. They were cooked in a dutch oven of boiling seawater for one to two hours, pulled out of the shells and cleaned up, and eaten right away. Again – really tasty. As the sun was just starting to set, another boat pulled into the harbor and joined us. A kid boat – mother, father, 8 yr old boy, 10 and 12 yr old girls. Again – really interesting people – but I’ll skip the details on this one. We spent the next few hours around the campfire talking and getting to know each other. When it was time to go back to the boat, we realized that we didn’t leave any lights on – and it was now pitch black. Luckily, we had a general idea where the boat was – and with a little looking, we were able to find it. A great first day in the Exumas!

The next day, we explored the island – and had a few interesting moments. First, we had a face-off with an alpha-iguana. As we got onto the beach, a pretty darn big iguana ambled out of the brush and headed directly towards us. He stopped about 3 or 4 yards from us, struck pretty aggressive pose, and just held his ground. Since he was between us and the path we wanted to travel, we decided it best to walk around him – which meant we had to wade through knee-deep water to the other side of the beach. Once we got around him, we walked up and down a 100 ft path in the brush and ended up on the Atlantic side of the island. As we walked down the beach, we encountered two bales of marijuana that had washed up on the beach. The night before, Atom and Wilson had mentioned them – and Wilson was very clear that the Bahamian government does not mess around with drugs and we should stay clear of them (which we did – and would have even without the warning). Our best guess is that someone was smuggling the drugs to either the US or Bahamas, got spooked by the authorities, and dumped them overboard before getting caught. Anyway – made for an interesting stroll down the beach. Later in the day, we went back to the beach and scoured the rocks for some sea snails for dinner that night (they were that good!). After less than an hour, we had 20 or so snails, and posed for some pictures:

Right after this picture was taken, Sally’s snail decided to come out of its shell and attached itself to Sally’s hand. Here’s the result:

We’re still laughing at that one…

Since the wind was kicking up a bit and it was getting late, we decided against to starting a fire on the beach and, instead, opted to cook them in our pressure cooker onboard.
We also decided to ‘fancy them up’ a bit – and cooked them with a little garlic, butter, and white wine – served over rice. Super yummy!

The next day, we met-up with the kid boat folks and went snorkeling at a reef just outside the island. Later that afternoon, I went back to the reef with Rob (the dad) and Grace (oldest daughter) to try spearshing for the first time. Unfortunately, the catch of the day that night was rice and beans. I think I may have scared one fish with my spear – other than that, I didn’t get very close to getting anything. Oh well – I’ll keep trying…

Well, that’s all for Allen’s Cay – as the next day, we made the last-minute decision to head a bit further east to Eleuthera. More to come on Eleuthera later.

Until next time,
Mark.

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A week in the Bahamas

A post by Mark
Hi all,
We’ve had a good week or so since I last wrote.

We stayed a bit longer in Bimini than we planned – as it took 8 days to get a weather window through which we could travel. Life on Bimini was good – we met some great folks, ate some good food, did a little fishing, enjoyed the beach, climbed the mast, and visited the Dolphin Museum.

The highlights:

Friends
We made some great friends – Carly, Alfredo, and their 9 (almost 10 YO) daughter Sophie. They are great folks – and Sophie and Sally were nearly inseparable by the time we left the island. We will keep in touch and really hope that we meet up again sooner rather than later.

We also spent a few hours with another cool boat family on South Bimini. Lastly, we met a bunch of other sailors at a happy-hour type gathering at a neighboring marina where we got some great tips on where to go throughout the islands.

Food
For the most part, we’ve eaten every meal on our boat since we left Racine, except when were visiting family in FL. On Bimini, we treated ourselves to some great conch salad. It was fantastic – very simple – chopped conch, onion, pepper, tomatoes, garlic salt and lime juice – and delicious. The folks at Joe’s Conch shack de-shell the conch when you order your salad and prepare everything right in front of you. So tasty! There was a side benefit as well – conch slop. Conch slop is the slimy, disgusting mess of that is cleaned from the edible meat of the conch. While it is really gross – it is fantastic fishing bait (more to come about that). Our other Bimini treat was coconut Bimini bread. Bimini bread is a really tasty, sweet white bread. The day we went to Charlie’sbread bakery, he was just finishing up a batch of coconut bread – which we could not resist. It was very, very tasty. It made a great breakfast!

Joe’s Conch Shack

Fishing
On our crossings, we haven’t had any luck catching anything – as most of the time, we’ve beeb sailing through the ‘good’ fishing areas at night. At the dock, we had better luck. Using our conch slop as bait, we caught about 10 fish over a few days – 2 were ‘keepers’. We ate one the night we caught it  (yummy) and have the other in the freezer (as it is supposed to be good in fish stew – but we need more fish for that).

The Beach
Bimini is known mostly for fishing – as it lies right off the Gulf Stream, so it is less than a mile from the dock to great bluewater sport fishing. While it doesn’t have the typical tropical beaches you find in the guidebooks, we made due with two small beaches that were a few minutes walk from our boat. When we first arrived in Bimini, the first thing we did after clearing customs was to walk to Radio Beach and go swimming. It was great – the water was clear and warm(ish) and there were pretty shells all around. About 10 minutes after we got to the beach, the cold-front that kept us in Bimini for 8 days blew in and cooled us down significantly – but it was still nice. A little closer to our marina was a small, un-named beach on the point of land that makes up the southern end of North Bimini. When we first arrived, it was littered with trash – mostly plastic and other junk that looks like it washed ashore. It seems as though all of the floating junk that comes by Bimini ended up on that beach. The 2nd day, we met-up with a Bahamian work crew that was collecting trash and helped them for about an hour. It was fun to help out – made us feel a bit less like tourists. This little beach was great for sea glass – as it seemed like all of the glass in the area washed up here as well. In our time in Bimini, we collected about 2 mayonnaise jars full of sea glass (and we didn’t spend all that long looking)! Lastly, our little un-named beach is where we would hang out with Willie – running up and down the beach, digging in the sand, and chasing sticks and coconuts into the water. Lucy did a great job tiring Willie out there each afternoon.

The Mast!
On our passage from Marathon to Bimini, our wind indicator decided to quit working. So, I ended up climbing the mast to take it down so I could try to fix it. It was really windy all week – so it was challenging at best. After I did my climbing, the rest of the family tried as well – and all had some fun. A few days later, I tried to put the indicator back on the mast – but only got 2/3 or so of the way up before I turned around. It was too windy for me to keep going – I was getting tired of getting banged around the mast – and I guess got a bit scared. Heidi, however, really wanted to climb the mast – so up she went. She flew up with what seemed like little effort and worked on the wind indicator. Looks like we found our new mast climber!

The Dolphin House / Museum
On our second day in Bimini, we met Carly and Sophie – and they brought Julie and the girls to the Dolphin Museum (I took Willie for a longer walk – and after hearing the stories of the museum, I wish I had joined them and walked Willie later). From what I pieced together from their stories, the Dolphin Museum is a 25 year-old work in process. It is a house, built by one man (Ashley), entirely of recycled materials with all of the design and artwork inspired by dolphins. A visit to the museum is a guided tour around the house by Ashley – where he tells one heck of a story. As he tells it, his life changed one day when swimming with the dolphins. On that swim, he connected telepathically with them, and now sees the world in full color through the eyes of a dolphin. He has since dedicated his life to creating his shrine to the dolphins. No – I’m not making this stuff up…. Like I said – I think I missed a good one here. Oh well – Willie and I did have a good walk.


So, as you can see, we had a good time on Bimini.

Next stop – Allen’s Cay in the Exumas (where i’m typing this now…). Our adventure keeps getting better – more details to come.

Until then,
Mark

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Greetings from the Bahamas!

A post by Mark

Hi all – we finally made it to the Bahamas!

Last Friday, we started making plans to head out on Monday afternoon. On Sunday afternoon, it looked like we were going to be in Marathon for at least another week. On Monday morning, we got an improved weather forecast. On Tuesday morning, we departed Marathon – heading for The Berries in the Bahamas. On Tuesday morning, we arrived in Bimini (not The Berries – but ~70 miles closer to FL). We’re all good – and here’s the story of how we got here…

On Friday, we got a mixed weather report – saying that there was a weather window to the Bahamas – but it may be short (and uncertain). Since the next window was at least a week out, we figured we’d plan to leave Monday – knowing that we could always decide to stay put if the window wouldn’t work. The biggest thing for us to do was to get Willie to a vet – as he needs to get checked out by a vet 48 hours before arriving in the Bahamas. We make an appointment for 9:00 AM Monday.

On Sunday, the cruising community in the harbor had a great potluck brunch – at least 50 or 60 people all hanging out having a good time. We brought Monkey Bread – which appeared to be a hit – as it was all gone by the end of the brunch. After the brunch, we had a meeting with most of the folks who were planning to head to the Bahamas. In that meeting, we got a bit ‘scared’ – as the vast majority of folks were deciding to stay put. The only boats going over Monday were two ‘kids’ (a senior in college and his brother who is taking a gap year between high school and college) and a pretty experienced crew (we think from France) who were delivering relief supplies to Puerto Rico.  Both of these boats are on a schedule – so we were reluctant to sail with them.  Looks like we’re staying put for a bit…  Since we weren’t going on Monday, we decided to cancel our vet appointment.

Monday morning rolls around – and the forecast has improved! The front that was coming through stalled a bit, and now Tuesday morning is forecasted to be a good, solid window – and the best one for the next ten days. Furthermore, the seas are projected to get smoother and smoother as the day progresses. Later in the morning, we catch up with a family from Maine who got the same weather report as us and is also now planning to head out on Tuesday. This is great – because now we have a ‘buddy boat’ to sail with. Things are looking up! The downside to the forecast is that there is a big front coming in right after this window – with winds blowing up to 40 knots and gusts even higher. Thus, wherever we go on our crossing, we should expect to stay there for at least 4 or 5 days until the front passes. Knowing this, we decide to head to Great Harbor in the Berries – about 70 miles East of Bimini – kind of the middle of the Northern Bahamas. According to the guide books and folks we talked to, there is a nice anchorage with good holding there, along with some great snorkeling, pretty beaches, etc.

So, Monday morning, we call the vet and get an appointment for 2:45. The rest of the day, we finished getting ready to go…. Topping off our water, picking up a few last-minute things from Home Depot and Kmart, a final shopping trip to Publix (and I’m sure one or two other things I’m forgetting – turned out to be a really busy day). All was going smoothly –  until about 7:00 pm as Julie and I were walking home from Publix with a very full wagon full of groceries. It’s only a mile or so from the marina – so we ended up walking home (we thought about getting a cab – but we didn’t have our phone with us to call one and didn’t have any luck flagging one down). Tuns out, we should have tried harder – as our wagon broke down about 1/4 mile or so from the marina. So, while Julie hung-out out with our broken wagon, I ran to the marina, get a cart, and headed back. What a pain in the neck – but all part of the adventure. The rest of the night was uneventful (thankfully).

On Tuesday, we head out at sunrise to this beautiful view.


When we leave the harbor and head out, we start our sail in pretty bumpy water. Sally and Lucy don’t fare too well in the waves (Sally quite a bit worse than Lucy). Turns out, our buddy boat is also having a tough time with the waves – as a ‘few of them’ are getting seasick (didn’t get much more info). Given this, they decide to cut their sail short, skip the crossing and head towards Miami to wait for the next weather window. Since both Lucy and Sally were OK (not good at this point – but surely OK), we decide to press on. It turned out to be a great decision, for about an hour or so later, the waves really began to lay down and the ride got smooth. By the time we got to the Gulf Stream – the seas were perfectly calm – with almost no wind. While this made really smooth sailing (mostly motoring), it wasn’t great for making progress towards the Berries. Since the wind died so much, we were going a bit slower than we thought – and realized that we may not be able to make it all the way to the Berries by nightfall the next day (we were already planning to sail overnight). Next came an hour or two of ‘hard thinking’ – mapping out different paths, modeling different current and boat speed assumptions, and looking for good anchorages with protection from winds from the North and East (where the big winds were forecasted). The only place we could find that we could comfortably get to was Bimini, but we’d have to stay in a marina there – as the anchorages there aren’t very good. While we weren’t happy about staying in a marina for up to a week – it was the safest and smartest thing to do. We were able to call a marina on our satellite phone and get a reservation. That relived a bunch of stress. NOTE: I’m writing this on Friday morning – in ~30 knot winds and after a night of 40+ knot winds. I can definitely say that I’m happy to be tied up to a dock and worrying if our anchor was going to hold!

Our crossing through the Gulf Stream was pretty uneventful – except that we had to dodge 2 cruise ships and a container ship. Nothing unexpected or dangerous – but the amount of commercial traffic in the Straights of Florida will definitely keep you on your toes!

Other than knowing that we’d have to pay to stay in the marina for a while, the only other downside to going to Bimini is that we arrived around 4 or 5 AM – and thus, had to just hang out outside the harbor entrance until the sun came up and we could get ahold of someone at a marina. No big deal – but for the first time since we left on Columbus Day, I may have gotten bored for an hour or two (I was also pretty tired – as the stress that both Julie and I took on trying to figure out the best path forward took a lot out of us).

All turned great again around 8:00 am. I got in touch with the folks at the marina, they gave us some guidance on how best to get through the channel into the harbor, and we were again on our way. By now, all the girls were up – and along with Julie, were at the bow of the boat helping guide me in by looking through the crystal-clear water at the bottom to make sure we weren’t going to hit a rogue sand bar. From the bow, the shrieks of joy erupted as we passed over a school of dolphin (the fish – AKA mahi-mahi), a spotted eagle ray, and a bunch of other tropical fish. The rest of the ride to the marina was smooth, and we got tied up in our slip without any issues. Within an hour or so, I cleared us through customs and immigration – and we were finally legal visitors to the Bahamas!

The rest of the morning we took Willie for a walk on the beach, took care of a few things around the boat, and had lunch. After lunch, we walked to another beach and went snorkeling. As we got to the beach, the winds shifted and started building from the North and dropped the temperature about 10 degrees – signs of the front coming. Not a lot to see in the water – as we just snorkeling went off the beach, and not to a reef, but we still had fun looking for shells and just being in the water. After a little while in the water, we were ready to head back to the boat and rest a bit before dinner. All in all, a great day!

Willie enjoying his time at the beach

Since this post is getting too long already, I’ll fill you in on the next few days in my next one. Spoiler alert – things are good!

Until then –
Mark

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We finally made it!🇧🇸🇧🇸🇧🇸

Hey everyone! We just made it to Bimini Bahamas! It is so beautiful and the water here is crystal clear! Everyone in Bimini is super duper 😉 nice and open to everyone! It is so great! On the way in the channel we saw lots of mana rays in the bottom of the 15 feet water. Once we got there, we went on the beach and found many pink conch shells as well as king conch shells. We met up with another kid boat and walked around town with them. We made our way to the dolphin house, an amazing collection of all recycled artwork built into a house, honoring the dolphins. We got an amazing tour there. We got fresh produce because today, Thursday is the day when the ship comes and brings fresh produce. We are excited to see more in this town and experience more fun things. We are all excited to continue our journey!
Bye for now, 😀

the one and only
Lucy

 

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Greetings from Marathon

A post by Mark

Hi from Marathon FL – the heart of the FL Keys

Marathon was hit pretty hard by Hurricane Irma. Something like 150 or 200 boats were destroyed in the harbor, the marina docks got pretty banged up, and the town itself was pretty badly damaged. That being said — the folks here have done a really great job rebuilding. While it is clear that ‘something’ happened here, Marathon is definately ‘open for business’ and a great place to visit. From the stories we’re hearing, the way the community here came together to help rebuild was beyond amazing. And I believe it… To a person, the folks we have met here have been among the friendliest, most down to earth, and generally great people we have met on our trip.

Sally recently wrote about our impromptu snorkeling trip — courtesy of our new friend Jon — so I won’t rehash the whole story. However, let me tell you about the few hours before the trip — interesting times….

Since Santa brought us a newer, larger dinghy for Christmas, we were looking to sell our old one. In Naples, we connected with a guy in Ohio (Dave) who was on his way back to Marathon and was looking for a dinghy. We arranged to meet Dave’s friend Jon in Marathon – and if Jon liked the boat, he would buy it from us. Turns out, Jon has been helping Dave rebuild his sailboat after Irma (and done a lot of good work so far). So, we met Jon – super nice guy. He lives here in the winter, and in NJ in the summer. Jon and I took the dinghy for a pretty long ride to test it out. On the ride, he showed me the beach, a good snorkeling spot, and gave me a list of other places to check out. As I would have expected, the dinghy rode like a charm — not a single hiccup — until we were about 30 seconds from the dock at Jon’s house. That’s when the engine decided to just stop. No warning, no bad sounds, no smoke, no sputtering… just humming along one minute, dead as a doornail the next. A few pulls of the cord — nothing. Are you kidding me? With Jon’s help, we get the engine started and limp back to his dock. Luckily, he knows a lot about outboards, and pretty quickly, we determine it was a clogged fuel filter. A quick clean of the filter, and the engine ran like a champ again. We take another ride around the harbor — this time with me, Lucy, and Sally following in our new dinghy just in case. Everything went as smooth as can be, Jon was convinced that the engine was cured, and decided to buy it. Phew…. As we were drifting around just out of reach of his dock, I was pretty sure I had lost the sale!

As if making the sale wasn’t ‘good enough’, our day got even better – when Jon generously offered to bring our family snorkeling at a reef about 6 miles offshore (Sombrero Reef). Since Sally did a good job describing our snorkeling adventure, I’ll move along…

The rest of our time has been good here – although the girls are a bit bummed that there aren’t any kids here. Turns out, we were a day or two late getting here – as a bunch of boats (and a few with kids aboard) left the day we arrived. We’ve been here a week now – waiting for a weather window to cross the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas. Fingers crossed – we think we may be able to leave the end of the week or early next week. While we are looking forward to going, there are worse places to be ‘stuck’ than Marathon – and we are thankful for that.

Until next time (hopefully, written from the sunny Bahamas),
Mark

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Where the Wild Things Are

 

Aaaah I completely forgot to post this. But hey better late than never..? Hahah sorry bout the delay.

As I’ve been growing older but not up, I’ve always wondered where the wild things are. After reading the classic children’s book by Maurice Sendak, I’m fairly certain I’m not the only one who’s wondered where these creatures live. Well, I think it’s safe to say that I’ve found them in Key West. Oh have we seen some people. I’m not gonna go into much detail for everyone’s sake but if you’ve ever been to Key West I’ll leave it at your typical Key Wester. As we mentioned in our family blog we saw some hilarious situations. My favorite being a cruise ship passenger tasting some soap and the reactions that followed. I also love all of the diversity of everything here. All of the artwork, animals, people, and food have their own special differences that make this place so interesting. Oh oh oh! Being a parrothead, it’s only right to visit the original Margaritaville and Captain Tony’s. Fins up!

If we go way back to getting here from Naples hahaha. That morning was full of lots of circles with only one engine working. Now, if we go waaaaaaay back to when I was three, four, five, six, and maaaaybe even seven Sesame Street was the best thing. And we all know that Grover is the coolest character on the show (Cookie Monster is a close second, don’t worry). One song that will stick with me forever and ever is Grover’s around, around, around, around, over, and under, and throoooooough. Okay so back to the circling around a boat hook. Teheheheeee my inner Sesame Street came out.  https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XKu3NE7Omkw

Wowie. So much has happened since October 9th. However, I feel that this trip is just beginning. This is it folks, haha this is where the story of the islands really begins. And the United States novel is coming to a close. I think it’s pretty safe to say that we end on a happily ever after. ✨

Cya friendos,
Heidi ‍

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Wait We’re Going Snorkeling…

I am going to write about snorkeling in Marathon at Sombrero Reef, it was super fun!There were a bunch of fish and I saw a barracuda! This is how it began! We where selling our old dinghy to a man named Jon, when he heard us talking about going to the beach then he offered to drive us on his motor boat over to the reef! SUPER nice guy. About 15 mins later we arrived at Jon’s house again with full on snorkel gear!! Then 15 more mins later we arrived at the reef! Yay! As we hopped in, Jon started to throw bread into the water hundreds of fish swam up to the bread! So cool! We started to swim away from the boat (don’t worry we where on a mooring ball) and stuck our heads in the water. So many beautiful fish! I was watching a little fish when I saw a Barracuda! I started swimming super fast to mom the barracuda followed me there than I swam towards dad and it disappeared into the deep! I started to get cold so I swam back to the boat! Soon we started to head back but to my surprise we got near an island as I came closer I saw a shark (everyone else thought it was a Tarpon)! Ahhhh!  We started to wade towards the island, lots of  lobster holes! We got on the island and was surprised to see lots and lots of coral! We came to the back of the island and saw a …bluish bubble thingy that looked like blown glass! Turns out it was a Portuguese Man of War ! We had such a blast! Thanks Jon! Bye for now!

Write sooner next time, Sally

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Greetings from the Conch Republic

Hi all-
As I write this, we are happily anchored out in Key West Harbor after a fun-filled day.
We left Naples Friday afternoon and sailed through the night, arriving Saturday morning. It was pretty windy – but relatively uneventful until about 7:00 am when we approached Key West Harbor.

As we entered the entrance to the harbor and fired up our engines, they didn’t work too well…. Since Lucy and Sally sleep on top of one of the engines, and Heidi sleeps over the bin of spare parts, it was a loud, rushed, rude awakening for the girls (Mom and Dad were navigating and steering). After some quick repair work (water pump belt), we got one working fine and motored into the harbor. In Key West, there are several anchor spots and a pretty big mooring field. We decide to pick up a mooring ball. Sounds pretty simple, however, with one engine, 25-30 knots of wind, ripping current and a ton of boats – it was anything but. The boat motors fine quickly with one engine, but has very little maneuverability going slow – making a challenging task. After 3 or 4 failed attempts, we finally get one. Unfortunately for us, the lines on it were very tangled, and snagged the boat hook. Try as she might, Mom couldn’t get it loose and the sea ate our hook. Ugh. It floated away from the mooring and dangerously close to two boats. On the third circle through that minefield, Heidi was able to grab it. Phew – things were looking better. After that debacle, we decided maybe we should just drop an anchor. That went very smoothly (should have done that first!)

There was, however, a bright spot in our mooring field adventure – Mom had a conversation with a sea turtle. During the second go-around to retrieve the boat hook, Mom saw a sea turtle surface and said “Hi Sea Turtle”. The turtle looked right at mom, waved (rolled to one side and flapped a flipper), and squeaked “Eeeh!!!”.

The rest of the day, we stayed on board, cleaned up from the passage, checked and fixed both engines (all good now), and laid low – it would have been a really wet ride into shore with the wind and waves.

Today (Sunday), we woke up to a brilliant, blue, clear sky and a bit less wind. We also all woke up in great moods – highlighted by Sally singing her new hit single “Its a blue, blue, blue, blue day” – sung at full volume. Lucy also serenaded the surrounding boats with a call of “Good Morning Harbor”, and Heidi quietly enjoyed her tea.  After a good breakfast (Thanks Dad), we headed into shore.

Willie was very happy to go ashore. Turns out, there are lots of good smells on Key West – an interesting combination of chickens, 6-toed cats, crazy people, and a few spilled drinks.

We first walked from the harbor on the north shore of the island to the Southernmost Point in the US.

After that, we walked down US-1 to the end of the road – Mile 0

We then wandered around a bit more and then headed to the boat for lunch.

After lunch, the girls tried their luck at fishing off the back of the boat. No fish tacos tonight.

In the afternoon, we headed back to shore without Willie (pretty sure he slept on the couch). We walked around some more, went to the Little White House, walked down Duval St, made the pilgrimage to Margaritaville, and hung out at Starbucks for a little while to download movies catch-up with some friends.

Hanging out on the grounds of the Little White House

 

A few highlights / interesting moments…

We saw a bunch of chickens and a cat that looked a lot like Cleo (our old cat).
We saw a cruise-ship tourist eat a free sample of soap (in his defense, it looked a little bit like candy if you squinted). He then returned the 4 other samples that he grabbed.
We then saw his horrified wife and shocked sample giver react to this display.
We saw a guy on a bike break into a spontaneous dance when he passed a car blasting music.

Back on the boat, we saw a beautiful Key West Sunset.

Not bad for day-1 on Key West. Tomorrow, we’re planning to say in Mallory Square for the sunset celebration on shore.

Bye for now –
The crew of S/V Love and Luck

Posted on

Happy New Year!

Hey friends!

Wow..another whole year. Another crazy year. So much has changed in these last few months but let’s start at the very beginning…it’s a very good place to start.

     In January, mom and dad were thinking about possibly looking at boats, then possibly sailing for a couple of years, and then possibly homeschooling. And come February, we were looking at catamarans in freezing snow and ice. And by March, we had a boat. A beautiful 37 foot catamaran. All of April and most of May were a blur of cleaning and selling most everything along with tackling school, swim, and cello. And on May 20, 2017, we became boaters. Moved out of the house and headed up to Sheboygan to start our new life on the boat. But here’s the thing. That was May 20, school ended June 6. So for a couple of weeks we drove an hour and a half to get to school and an hour and a half back. How fun. But hey come June 6, I graduated eighth grade -yay!

      Now, this is when the craziest, most fun filled summer of my life began. It all started with a trip up to Quetico to paddle the Boundary Waters with Venture Crew. I loved every minute of that trek and got to spend so much time with so many amazing people. Two days after I got home we started the drive to the Poconos to spend a week with cousins. Always love seeing those goofs so as you can imagine, I had a blast. After that week came to an end we headed to the east coast to visit old Girl Scout troops and my happy place, Grammie’s beach. Had an action packed few weeks there seeing some of my closest friends, cousins again, and family. Phew haha that was a lot but oh man the adventure hasn’t even begun.

      We headed back up to Racine, Wisconsin, -where our boat spent the summer- and had about a week at home….for the first time in forever. We had a nice time to relax for a lil bit and Sally, dad, and I got to see the one and only Jimmy Buffett at Wrigley so woohoo! Aaaand then, another week in the Boundary Waters spent with family.

      After quite a bit of traveling, we settled down back in Racine and took daily sailing lessons to prepare for the upcoming years. We had lots of fun meeting many characters we will remember forever and sailing is almost always fun. It’s always exciting when it involves the police coming after us and multiple turtles or capsized 420’s right? Haha oh boy I could go on forever but fast forward to October. October 9 we left. Let the adventure begin! As most of you probably know we successfully made it down all of the rivers with only a couple tows and engine break downs…

      We spent Thanksgiving in Florida with grandparents, cousins, and lots of Florida sunshine. We all have so much to be thankful for! Dad and I also attended the Hurricane Benefit Concert starring Jimmy Buffett, Toby Keith, Kenny Chesney, Jake Owen, and Caroline Jones. Super fun night filled with amazing music. One to remember forever.
We are happily spending the holiday season in Florida with grandparents. What a way to end the year. I hope that y’all have had amazing years filled with love, joy, and happiness. Wish for nothing but the best for the new year. May your days be filled with love and luck. Fair winds and following seas friends. 🍀❤️

Happy New Year!
Heidi 🎉

Posted on

Happy Holidays

A post by Mark
Hi all,

I started writing this about a week ago – I think on Christmas Eve – finally getting around to finishing it… we’ve been busy (all good stuff).  Here goes…

Merry Christmas from Naples FL. While our original plan was to be in the Bahamas for Christmas, we are very happy to be in Naples – visiting with Oma and Opa (Julie’s parents) and Grammie (my mother). We arrived around the 15th – its been nice to have a home-base for a while. We have been really fortunate – Jerry and Janet Belle (friends of my in-laws) have been super generous and have let us keep our boat on the dock in front of thier house. We can’t thank them enough!

Over the past two weeks, I’ve been able to get a lot of jobs done around the boat.  I rebuilt the fresh-water system – so now its working better than it ever has!  I also rebuilt a few winches and completed a few other small projects.  Its much easier getting things done when you have regular access to a car!  We also got to enjoy time at the pool, Willie had fun at the neighborhood dog park, and we all have had a good time.

Until about 3 pm today, we through we were leaving for Key West tomorrow – but at 3, we got the updated weather forecast for the Keys – not good.  Big wind (25 to 35 kts) and waves (up to 7′) forecasted for next Mon to Wed.  Also, the forecasters are saying that it won’t be safe to head from the Keys to the Bahamas until next weekend (at the earliest). So, while we could leave tomorrow (Sunday) and be safely at anchor in the Keys before the weather hits, we figured we’d have more fun here than hunkered down at anchor next week.   We’ll head South once the weather clears…

Wishing you all a Happy New Year –

Mark