Key West Florida, Day 42

Total Miles Traveled 1767

Okay, I’m a little behind on the blog, I intended to do an update within two weeks but for some unknown reason time just keeps slipping away.  We can’t believe this is our 42^nd day at Key West.  We arrived two weeks before our original reservation date and extended our stay another week yesterday.  Needless to say we love Key West in the winter, and we couldn’t think of a better place to celebrate both of our birthdays.

Our looper friends Kevin and Jill on “Chasing 80” are here and several other loopers have come and gone during our stay:  “Cha Cha”, “First Forty”, “Tanuki”, “Gimmie Time II”, “Veridian” and “State of Bliss” to name a few.  We’ve really enjoyed meeting new friends and reuniting with old friends during our stay.

“Tanuki” starting their great loop adventure from Key West.

Speaking of time slipping away, I intended to remove the engine and transmission coolers to perform preventative maintenance cleaning for the last two years.  The engine aftercooler is the most critical, as over time contaminates can built up causing poor performance and degrading the internal metals to a point of costly replacement.  I contacted a Cummins service technician while at Fort Myers and was considering having the work done there on our return trip north but Wala!,  next door to our marina is Key West Engine Service.

According to boat owners in the marina that have had service work completed by them, all were very satisfied with their work and at competitive prices.  I was not disappointed, our service technician (former Cummins employee) with 18 years’ experience, completed all of the work at a lower hourly rate than indicated at Fort Myers. (Not to mention all of the answers to the gazillion questions I asked about our engine maintenance and operation)

After the work was completed and pressure tested, we decided to cruise to Sand Key Light, located about 7 miles southwest of Key West.  The light is located between Sand Key Channel and Rock Key Channel, two of the channels into Key West.  The Key is currently covered with water and is a sanctuary preservation area, which means no fishing or removing any form of sea life.  Anchoring is also not permitted but mooring balls are located around the area for visitors. 

We planned to attach our bridle to a mooring ball and explore the area in the dinghy.  We hooked up to the mooring ball, but we had 2 foot swells from the south and a northeast wind, the result was the waves were coming in on our beam making us rock and roll so bad we couldn’t get the dinghy off, and on, without risk of damaging the hardware.

Sand Key Light is the southernmost light in the United States.

As we crossed Rock Key Channel on the way back, we saw this military vessel heading east.

Looks like rain on the horizon, but it remained north of the keys all day.

Key West has something for everyone…………..Architecture

Restaurants and Bars

Various modes of transportation

A movie theater

And free roaming chickens…..everywhere.

This is a nice bike, good thing they have a heavy duty combination lock.

We have taken several dinghy rides while here too.  One of our destinations was the submarine pens.  Supposedly the navy cut 7 finger coral canals 90 feet wide and 25 feet deep on 122 acres of Boca Chica Key for a submarine base.  Our first observation was we had to snake our way through the shallow water in the dinghy to get there.  I took my depth finder and found the channel leading into the bay is about ½ mile long and around 15 feet deep.  The area leading to the channel is very shallow, maybe 6 feet tops. 

There are several stories on the internet about the canals but I don’t think they were created for submarines.

After exploring the submarine pens, we cruised back to Stock Island and ate lunch at the Stoned Crab.

They have sharks hanging around for the scraps too!

We took another dingy ride the following week along the Atlantic coast to Geiger Key, a 13 mi round trip adventure.

And another dinghy ride to Hurricane Hole.

The wind has limited our boating since we arrived here.  We’ll get a couple of calm days followed by a week of 15 to 20 mph winds, no rain just wind.  After one of the breaks in the weather we decided to try Sand Key again, this time we were going to fish on the way, dinghy around the key looking for sea life, and fish on the way back.  We trolled with two different lures on the way without a bite and when we arrived at Sand Key, we had almost identical sea conditions as the last visit.  We decided to circle around the key and return on the south side in deeper water, about 75 to 80 feet and try a different lure. We trolled all the way back to the marina, a 25 mile round trip, and not a single bite. 

When we returned to the marina, Moni decided to try her luck behind the boat.  Wham, she had a big one!  First I grabbed the net, but from the looks of the bend in her pole I grabbed the Gaff.  Just as she was getting it to the boat a huge fish came from under the boat and ate the whole fish in one bite.  The only thing left on her hook was the head. 

The big news in our area was the yacht that run aground.  The story we heard was the boat was normally operated by a licensed captain but the owner had guest aboard and decided to take them out himself.  According to owner, when he was leaving the marina the throttle stuck wide open.

Our last trip to Mallory Square to watch the sunset……….