On the move again - Boot Key FL to Key Largo FL – Mar 9, 2017

Mar 6^th – It was another extremely windy day with a mix of sun and clouds.  We decided to visit Key West again with the crews of the boats that are rafted with us thus we put on our rain gear and headed by dingy to the dingy dock.  It was windy and a little lumpy in the main mooring bay thus we did get splashed, however the rain gear did its job.  We then walked over to the bus stop and another Looper that we haven’t seen in a while, Mike from “Tranquility 3”, stopped by for a quick visit to say “Hi”.  The bus ride on the way down was packed to the point where I thought the bus was going to break at the seams!  We walked around Key West along Duval St, along the water front, stopped in a Tiki bar and had a great lunch at a restaurant in town.  It was a busy day with a long bus ride back and then we had to travel by dingy back to the boat in the dark.  We’re continuously looking at the weather and it appears there may be a weather window as early as Thursday, however Sunday seems to be the best day.    

Mar 7^th – It was another extremely windy day with a mix of sun and clouds as well as scattered showers.  The people on the boats that we are rafted with went to town to do laundry and buy provisions for the Bahamas while we used the day to do a few boat related jobs like cleaning the barnacles off the bottom of the dingy and installing a charcoal filter on the forward head vent hose to keep our neighbours happy ;)  Later we had a community dinner together and the gang surprised Maria with a belated Happy Birthday cake since they hadn’t caught up to us on Maria’s birthday which was a month ago.  Our plan is to go to town tomorrow to do some last minute provisioning to prepare for our jump north to put us in position for our Bahamas crossing which could happen as early as the end of this week.

Mar 8^th – It was a windy warm sunny day.  We went into town today to do our final shopping before heading north tomorrow to prepare for our Bahamas crossing.  It looks like Saturday will be the best crossing day at this point.  After going to the Liquor store, Bank and grocery store we took a cab with all of our supplies back to the dingy and then packed it away in the boat.  We went to the Florida Keys Steak and Lobster house for our final happy hour in the area and enjoyed some cold beers and great appetizers.  Later we headed back to the boat to discuss our Bahamas trip and timing and then went back to our boat to prepare for an early departure tomorrow morning.

Mar 9^th – It was a warm sunny day.  We got up early this morning and left our Sister Creek anchorage and travelled 75 miles on the ICW to Key Largo and anchored in Steamboat Creek.  Each of the boats stopped at Burdines on the way out of Boot Key harbor to fill up with Diesel, Gas and water.  We are now positioned to cross to Bimini in the Bahamas tomorrow morning.  Once we arrived at our anchorage I spent the evening catching up on internet related things including paying bills, putting up my blog post and catching up on emails.  I also charted a course to Bimini.  Now it’s time to relax since we’ll be getting up early tomorrow for the crossing.

On the Road Again - Heading North on the ICW

Waiting for a Bus to go to Key West ... for the 2nd time

There were big waves in Key west and we got our feet wet here

And yes ... she is wearing underwear!

Maria was surprised with a belated Birthday cake ... she's making a wish

Our last night in Boot Key before moving north

The sunset at our Key Largo anchorage