March 28, 2009: Marathon Key, Fl

There is a route to travel the 50 miles from Key West to Marathon without going out into the Atlantic. So this morning, we left the beautiful Key West bight and headed North to circle above the keys back to the Seven Mile bridge we had left several days before.

There was an amazing view of a group of wind surfers in the shallows off of Fleming Key. Several boats were anchored on a sandbar, and there were at least 5 wind kites in the air. It might have been a class, because there was one guy holding the kite while another got on the board. It looks like such a dangerous sport with the potential for the kite to lift you off the water at any time, especially in wind like we had today.

The ride this afternoon was through the Great White Heron National Wildlife Refuge waterway skimming a couple of miles off the north coast of the Keys. The seas were 3 to 4 feet for a pretty choppy ride with lots of spray coming through the open front window. The 3 hour ride gave us a coat of salt all over everything but we enjoyed the beautiful turquoise water. We passed through the old railroad bridge a little before 2 pm, and entered the Boot Key harbor on Marathon Key.

The water was suddenly very calm where the channel was sheltered by the mangroves trees and we proceeded by the large lift bridge up to the Boot Key City Marina mooring field. There are 226 mooring balls, and we got one of the few available slipping in between two large sailboats. We took our dinghy to the city dock and Tom found a Baptist Church not too far away. Unfortunately, we had a mishap with my bike, and now my wheel is bent, so I will need a professional repair job (or new wheel) before I am riding again. We hope to sort some of that out tomorrow.

We had broiled grouper and cheese grits from our galley on the boat tonight and watched pink streaks fill the sky beyond the next row of sailboats.