South to Key West

Along the GIWW - fishing NEXT to the boat

On 4/16 & 4/17/11 we chugged down the GIWW, pausing at countless bridges as the waterway was having a busy weekend there in South Florida. Found a great overnight anchorage on the 16th at Longboat Key south of Braedenton, Grouper's hometown. Had stone crabs at Moores Stone Crab Restaurant. If you're not eating oysters stone crabs are a great substitute. We made it all the way to Sanibel Island where we anchored in the same anchorage we used with Grouper in 2009.

Moores at Longboat Key

Roy's Stone Crabs

Dale's Stone Crabs

 Sanibel is at mile 0 of the GIWW. Here you can either go East on the Okeechobie Waterway to the East Coast of Florida, if your boat doesn't draw too much water or your mast isn't too high, or you can head out San Carlos Pass into the Gulf to make the trek to the Keys.

4/18/11 Of course we had no choice so it was out the Pass and a 6 hour sail to Marco Island which is just north of Naples, Fl. This was our last stop before the open water crossing to Key West. We'd checked the weather and knew that our weather window was closing fast so decided to get some rest then head out around midnight for the 13 hour sail, about 90nm to Key West.

Too excited - couldn't sleep so around 9:30pm we looked at each other, looked at that lovely full moon, lifted the anchor and sailed away.
 It was as nice a night sail as they get. Wind from the SE at about 15kts waves eventually reaching 2ft but much less for most of the night. We don't do this very often, so don't have that rhythm of standing watch and sleeping down. We take turns at the watch but find the sleeping part hard. (AND I absolutely don't intend to do this often enough to EVER get this routine down)

Dawn

The moon was still up

Dale in our "Watch Nest"

Made it and had the anchor down for 11am!! WHEW.

Our Anchorage in Key West is about a 5 minute dingy ride from Old Town and all its pleasures (treasures)