Yes, I know. It has been a very long time since I last updated this blog. First I’ll give you some reasons and then I’ll add some excuses. Reasons- #1 Posting and adding pictures uses a lot of data. Getting free wifi and not using up our paid data is difficult if not impossible depending on where we are. Most marinas offer free wifi, but it rarely is strong enough to get a decent signal on the boat. If we are on a mooring ball, anchored or cruising, free wifi is nonexistent. Here in Ft. Meyers Beach is the first free wifi we’ve had in about a month. Excuses- # 1. We’re busy. There’s a lot to do while cruising. Mornings are spent drinking coffee and checking all the weather apps to see what’s happening in the way of wind and waves. Of course we have to have breakfast. Then we may spend time reading and discussing where we want to go next. Do a little house cleaning before going to lunch. There’s always some shopping that needs to be done- cute T-shirts or caps, maybe some groceries. By the time we’ve finished those chores, its cocktail time. And there’s no way a blog is going to get written then. So you see, there is good reason not to get the blog written.
I left off with Osprey and Subject to Change heading to Key West. Yes, we had said that we were not going to the Keys on this trip. Well, the boat name says it all. Wayne and Elda Gaudet, Aloha and Luke and Juliene Durdin, Norman Jean (they went to Cuba with us) were going to be there and it just sounded like fun that we couldn’t resist, so we decided to go for it. The crew of Osprey planned to go to the keys anyway, so it was a pretty easy decision. The crossing started out great and deteriorated a bit during the night with some rolly seas, but not too bad.
Lucky for us, Wayne met us as we pulled into the mooring field and helped us grab the ball and get our lines set with winds blowing 10- 15. He sure made it easier. So glad we got in the day we did, because the following day, the winds picked up to a howl.
We woke to 25 to 30+ mph winds. It was honking! Boats were swinging around on their mooring lines like bats at a little league game. Watching the loop on our mooring ball rub back and forth on our line, Tim felt we needed to do something to keep our line from wearing too badly. No way that he and I were going to be able to do anything on our own, so we enlisted Wayne to join us on our dingy. The plan was to wrap a 3/4″ line around our mooring line to make a loop that the mooring ball loop would stay in. It would stop the constant wear on the mooring line. We pulled on our foul weather gear and hopped in our dingy to get Wayne. Waves were crashing over our heads as we hung on. Wayne and I tried to hold the mooring line and get the smaller line wrapped, but the pull of the boat and the rocking of the waves were too much. It was about all we could do just to hold on. We agreed that our line was heavy enough to hold through the storm and turned to take Wayne back to his boat. As Tim drove the dingy into the waves, Wayne and I turned our heads out of the spray and back towards Subject to Change. There I saw a sailboat moving rapidly toward the bow of my boat. What!!!!! My eyes went to the cockpit of the sailboat to see what fool would be moving their boat in this weather. NO ONE, there was no body in the cockpit. The boat had broken free of its mooring and was running loose in the mooring field. Wayne saw it too and we immediately had Tim turn our dingy around and head back to Subject to Change. Luckily, the mooring lines were hanging off the bow and Wayne and I grabbed them while Tim drove the dingy between the the two boats. We were able to drag/push the sail boat away from S2C, but it was now heading straight for another sailboat. That boat owner came out his companionway just in time to fend off the derelict when he heard all the commotion. The owner of the next target was already prepared to fend off his boat. Meanwhile onlookers called the Mooring field office on VHF for assistance, so the cowboys on the power boats arrived to take over the rescue. They grabbed the bow lines and Wayne scrambled aboard the wayward boat to help steer it away from the rest of the moored boats. The boat was reattached to it’s mooring ball and we safely delivered Wayne back to his boat. By this time the dingy had several inches of seawater in her but Wayne’s electric bilge pump sucked it out in a flash. Once back on our boat, Tim and I rehashed the events. What an adventure. It was like being at Shlitterbahn on steroids. I know the waves had to be at least 2 1/2 feet tall in the mooring field. I remember looking up at waves that were crashing over my head as I sat in the dink. Crazy!
After that, everything else was non eventful. Eat, walk, shop, eat, drink. The crews of S2C, Aloha and Norman Jean hung out in KeyWest for New Years. We went bacj to the boat around 8 since we had to dingy back to the boat in the dark. Those in the know, know that I don’t last till midnight anyway, so it worked out. Osprey joined us on Luke and Juliene’s boat for a New Years Day lunch and to watch the Texans lose their game to the Titans. Boooo.
