Having Fun, Making Progress

Yesterday was our last day on a mooring ball in the Marathon City Marina.  We did a few chores to get ready to leave, and ended the day with cocktails on Jim and Sharon’s beautiful 40’ Albin, Blue Angel. We met them at the Looper’s event last Sunday, and they have completed the Loop twice already.  They’re from Michigan, but have lived full-time on a sailboat for 8 years, and now 5 years on their trawler, a 40-foot Albin. Jim and Sharon are mellow, knowledgeable, interesting people, and they told us about lots of great anchorages we can check out as we move north up the Intracoastal Waterway.  We hope to see them again in Michigan this August.

Today we pulled out of Marathon at 8am, and after getting fuel and water at a nearby marina, we headed back north to Plantation Key.  Cathryn has continued to be more timid than Bob about some aspects of dealing with this new boat, so today she broke through a few barriers. She piloted the boat for the  majority of today’s 50 miles,  including docking at the fuel dock.  Most importantly, at the end of the day, Cathryn took us into an unfamiliar marina with narrow fairways and docked us in a side-tie position (like parallel parking, not in a typical slip) between two much larger and expensive boats that she was worried about hitting.  And it went well!   She continues to work toward achieving “full Co-Captaincy”, which was a condition of Bob’s agreement to undertake this journey.

We have been in very shallow water almost all day, and there is only 3 feet of water beneath the boat here in the marina. We’re getting much more complacent about depth. So after a week on a mooring ball, and 3 nights anchoring out before that, we’re finally back in a marina, a very pretty one near Tavernier.

We plan to journey back to Fort Pierce more slowly than our trip down to the Keys, and hope to enjoy more anchorages and shorter travel days.