IT WAS A LONG WAY HOME...BUT WE'RE HERE!

Easter Sunday took us to Crandon Park Marina to take on fuel and water.  We needed to dump all the water out of the tanks we filled in Nassau as it did not taste good.  It was fine to wash dishes and take showers with but why not just put in all fresh water?  

From there we put up the sails and headed straight down Biscayne Bay.  At this point we decided we were pretty much just ready to get back to our home dock so we made quite a bit of progress every day. 

First stop was in Key Largo.  Went ashore for some music, food and fun.  First thing we saw was a rocket man, a guy on a jet pack.  It was fun to watch him maneuver.  There was an instructor on a jet ski who was running the “jet” so to say.  He had a long tether that supplied the water for the pack and he would shout out commands to the guy doing it telling him how to position his feet and distribute his weight to keep flying high.  I had never seen one of those before, looked like fun, although you do get wet  every time you come down but that is half the fun I would think. 

It was to the Caribbean Club for a beer.  This is a funky place and let’s just say there were a lot of interesting people.  Met a couple locals and enjoyed some music and the vibe.  

If you are ever in Key Largo, we can highly recommend the Big Chill.  For beer, atmosphere and great brick oven pizza, it can’t be beat!  We got back to Free Bird just as it was getting dark (yes, John was right to turn on the mast head light before we left) and settled in.  The Caribbean Club had a band that we hear from the back of the boat and they were great.  It was like having a private concert.  Great way to wrap up the evening.

Back to shore in the morning for breakfast at the Marriott.  Yes, we were treating ourselves a bit but don’t anticipate stopping a lot from here until we get back to the dock.  

I think the captain needs to build one of these for home!

 

Continued down through the ICW where again the water gets thin.  When I say thin I mean it is close to just 5 feet in depth.  We tried to time our arrival at these “skinny” points to coincide with high tide and must have done it just about right as we never felt the bottom.   To make my point about how shallow it was, check out this picture of the fisherman using the telescoping rod to push themselves along.  John thinks they were spearing fish, I am sticking with my version of the story.  Regardless it goes to my point that it was shallow.

It was time we got out of the sounds and into the Steamboat channel.  We actually took a free, yes, free mooring ball for the night at Lignumvitae  Key which is a State Park.  Unfortunately it was closed when we got there but it was time to stop as beyond this point we enter more of the Everglades and there is really no protected anchorages.  John went for a dinghy ride and I did some yoga and before we knew it another day was behind us.

Woke up and found we had a visitor in the night.  There was a shrimpy looking shrimp laying on our swim platform. 

I wanted to break out the cocktail sauce but John put him back in the water and we got underway immediately.  We had a lot of water to glide over to reach our desired destination for the day in Shark River.  We were in new waters for us now, the Yachtsman’s Channel which basically cuts off the rest of the Keys and we can finally turn to the North!   Another day of big travel as we needed to make it at least up to Cape Sable to find an anchorage.  There was a chance of wind and rain coming and we wanted to get to Shark River before it developed.  We got anchored there and within a half hour the wind started to build.  We watched a shelf cloud develop over us, reach out from the land to the sea and then the winds really picked up but we got no rain.  We watched it go right over the top of us and head south into Florida Bay.  Was kind of cool to watch it all, especially when we felt no real impact.  It turns out that days later we met up with some folks coming up the bay that day who ran into BAD weather that sunk 2 boats and forced them way offshore.  Guess we dodged a bullet on that one…

At this point it was pretty clear we had barn fever.  We were just ready to be back home at Fisherman’s Village.  The seas were predicted to be 2 feet or less and the wind 10 knots out of the East.  Sounded like perfect sailing weather to us so up go the sails.  I did not medicate Molly as we thought it would be kind of benign.  Well, needless to say, weather predictions are not always accurate and this day was no exception.  The winds were more like 15 to 20 and the seas 2 to 3 feet with like 1 second intervals.  We were offshore as our next waypoint dictated and the waves built, we were taking on sea spray and sailing like fiends.  Was a bit more than we anticipated but we were at speeds of up to 8 knots so made great time.  What I did not remember was that when I shut the top hatches over our bedroom area, I did not “dog” them down which would have sealed them and prevented any salt water from getting into the cabin.  By the time one of us went below to use the head, we discovered we had a lot of sea water all over our bedding.  Bummer!  I went down, disassembled it all and put it all in a net bag.  We arrived at our anchorage at Factory Bay in Marco Island and I draped all the wet linens I could over the boom and laid the rest on the deck to try to dry them out.  Things soaked in salt water never really dry but luckily we had one more set of clean sheets!

Weather had settled down and the following day we motored and sailed through Boca Grande Pass and into our favorite anchorage at Pelican Bay.  We were almost home!  It had been a full day and it was time to just relax before our final push into Punta Gorda.  We didn’t even put the motor on or take Marley out, we just chilled.

On Friday, April 1^st we woke to a beautiful day and sailed all the way up Charlotte Harbor under genoa only.  We got a call on the radio near the marina from S/V Avia.  They are the other boat from our marina that left the same day we did for Belize.  Amazing that they ended up coming back at the exact same time that we did as we looked over and there they were.  We both got in and were greeted by many of our fellow boaters.  Feels good to be home!  You know you are in Punta Gorda when you see the Easter Bunny manatee mailboxes! 

Nina and the Pinta are visiting our marina!

 

All in all, we put on 1,304 statute miles during this voyage and Free Bird performed flawlessly.  We enjoyed sharing our journey with you and are glad you came along for the ride.  Thanks to all of you who have joined our adventure by reading along.  

We will now be here in Punta Gorda for another month and then pull Free Bird up and store her in the boat yard before we leave around the 1^st of May. 

If more adventures come our way we’ll be sure to let you know.  In the meantime, happy Spring!!