Dry Tortugas

From Key West we left at 4:30 AM and sailed to Dry Tortugas National Park.  We arrived just in time as the weather moved in and we were there for 4 days without internet, phones or much else.

The name Tortugas came from all of the turtles that inhabitant the island and then later came the name Dry because of the lack of fresh water on the island.  The park rangers currently get their water from collecting rain water in a cistern.  The only way to get to the islands are by sea plane or boat.

Garden Key is the main island of the Tortugas and is taken up mostly by Fort Jefferson.  Each of the islands boasts some of the best snorkeling and diving due to the coral reef and ship wrecks in the area.  While there we also visited Loggerhead Key but didn't do any snorkeling due to the cold front that had moved in. 

The day after we arrived another sailboat came in and it just happened to be a Morgan 41, a twin to our boat just built a few years before ours.  Aboard was a family of 9 doing the same thing we are.  They sold everything, bought the boat Invincible and are sailing south.  We enjoyed hanging out with them on the island.  Hopefully we will hook  up with them again.

Now we are back in Marathon and are going to start moving a little further north to take off for the Bahamas!  

Next post will be from the Bahamas.  Yea!!!

Sea plane arrival area

Fort Jefferson as we arrived

Speed Ferry that arrives daily with Shambala in the background.

Fort Jefferson was used to house prisoners, a famous on being Dr. Mudd.  It is said to have an alligator that lives in this moat.  The kids only saw the snout as it was hiding most of the time. 

While on the boat we read more of the Harry Potter Series, we are currently on book 5.

Light house on Loggerhead Key.

Now we have two new photographers on the boat.  Samantha and Nicholas both enjoy taking pictures of all the crazy antics we do. 

Daddy doesn't like being woken from a nap.

On our way back to Marathon....more crab pots.  UGG!

Key West

We took our time going to Key West and enjoyed some beautiful scenery along the way.  One of our favorite stops was Looe Key, which is a coral reef in the National Marine Sanctuary.  This kids rode in the fishing kayak and looked through our homemade looking bucket while Paul and I paddled around with our mask and snorkels.
The ocean floor was full of color and sea life as if we were at an aquarium.  Samantha braved the water coming out to snorkel with Paul and then with myself.  While Samantha and I were out exploring we happened upon a few sharks.  Thank goodness they looked well fed and didn't seem interested in us at all.  Very Cool!!!

When we arrived in Key West we attempted to anchor and had some difficulty with our anchor holding due to the sea grass so one night we decided to try the mooring field.  The moorings are not very well protected against the North winds so we rocked all night.

While visiting Key West we were able to meet up with my friend Julie and her family.  We have not seen each other in over 8 years and it was amazing to be able to catch up with her and meet her entire family.  We are going to try and visit them again at the end of the summer when we get up closer to Maine.

Julie and her husband Luc

The entire family

The kids all had fun together

Julie, we will meet agin soon! Love you!

Leaving Marathon

We are on our way to Key West and are leaving this afternoon to start our journey.

We have many fond memories of this place and will be coming back to wait for our weather window to cross to the Bahamas.

In the meantime we are going to visit Key West and visit with some very good friends then onto the Dry Tortugas.

We rented a car this week to start our provisioning and after over $1000.00 worth of food we are hoping to feed ourselves for 3-4 months.

We will see.

Nicholas and Samantha have both been learning to drive the Dinghy.

More video the kids fishing

Hard to believe it is winter

Nicholas asked the other day, "When is it going to be winter?". 

Nick and Sam help work on the boat.

We told him this is winter.
It has been warm and recently a heat wave of 80's in the daytime and 70's at night.
There is a cold front moving in but expected low will be in the 60's and it is only going to last 2 days.

In the meantime we spend time at the beach, in the library for school so we can have air conditioning and install the water maker. 

We are all enjoying our time here in Boot Key Harbor.

The Beatiful Keys

We are about 2 weeks in to our month stay in Marathon, Florida.  The weather is unbelievably warm and sunny almost every day.
Paul has been up the mast to change our anchor light and took some great photos and the kids are enjoying the beach, the library and especially fishing with Paul.

Here are some new pictures to enjoy.

This was taken from the mast of our boat.

Samantha and Froggy enjoy watching PBSKids.

The beginning of the bimini project.  Taping it into position for the patterning material.

Cutting out the fabric.

Then sewing it together.

We stay on the boat and enjoy the sunshine.

More sewing.

Almost done.  A few more adjustments.

DONE!!! Yea!!

We now feel like we have a whole new room added to our boat.  This bimini project turned out so nice we might try building a new dodger to match.