Shades of Crusing Years Past

Pat and Judy Sorenson arrived for a visit on March 7. We had hoped to visit Sombraro Reef the next day and do some snorkeling, but because of the windy weather, we ended up staying put again. So we played tourist and visited the local Turtle Hospital where they reabilitate injured turtles and also went to Pigeon Key which presents the history of the construction of the railroad and highway bridges across the keys. It also talks about Henry Flagler who had the dream.

After the weather did settle down a little, we took the Sorenson's back to Little Crawl Key so we could use the services of Curry Hammock State Park. We did some kyacking and watched the kite boarders again. From Little Crawl Key we made it to Bahia Honda State Park about 20 miles further south. The wind was blowing between 15 and 20, but we were going downwind, so the ride was pretty good. Judy was still watching the horizon from time to time because of the bumpy ride. Bahia Honda was very nice and had lots of people there, many of which were on spring break. The next day, we helped one of the boaters in the marina move his boat from one side to the other. He had lost his engine so we helped him walk it around 3 or 4 boats to get to the boat ramp where he was going to haul it out the next day. We left Bahia Honda and headed back for Boot Key Harbor where we were again going to stay and be ready for Pat and Judy to leave today the 15th. Our trip from Bahia Honda to Boot Key was long being directly upwind from where we were. After tacking most of the afternoon in pretty bumpy seas, I decided to motor sail to gain a little more in the direction that I wanted to go. It turned out to be a bad idea. About 15 minutes after starting the engine it died and we were unable to restart it. Good thing we have a sailboat. We continued on to the entrance of Boot Key Harbor and anchored in the lee of the key. After anchoring we looked at the engine. After replacing both fuel filters and purging the fuel injectors, it finally start again. We seem to have water in the fuel, but I'm not sure why. We'll have to watch the fuel/water separator a little closer and hope that this doesn't continue to occur. After getting the engine running we motored into the slip we had reserved at about 6:30pm. Much later than I had hoped to be there. First we needed a beer, then something to eat, then a shower and finally time to sleep.

Judy and Pat left this morning at 8:45 am. We did some reprovisioning and I replaced the filters that I needed to use. We have some more projects for tomorrow. The next thing we need to decide is where we head from here. As soon as we know, I'll let you know.