It has been a glorious week onboard Right Hand!
This is Seaquel, winter home to our friends Eddie and Gail. They anchored nearby in Key West so we could enjoy the town together, and plan our escape to the Dry Tortuga Islands. Here, Eddie is waiting for the sun to dip below the horizon so he can blow his conch shell in solute to a fabulous day on the water.
At sunrise on Feb. 13, both boats weigh anchor at sunrise to begin our 68 mile journey west. Passing this boat as we leave the anchorage the ‘attachments’ caught our attention. We have no idea who this boat belongs to, but we are glad our grandchildren aren’t onboard to see this slide and climbing wall!
The weather forecast was predicted to be 10-12 mph winds with 1.5-2 ft waves, and for the most part that prediction held true. However, about 15 miles from our destination I noticed a line of rapidly forming cumulus clouds southwest of our location. The front became very well defined over the next 30 minutes, and Keith started our radar to see if rain was associated with these clouds. The radar did not show rain, and we could see that the cloud bank was very narrow. As the cloud bank passed over us the winds instantly increased from 10 mph to 25 mph. By this time we were about an hour out from the harbor and spent the last leg with 3-5 foot waves hitting us on the beam (side of the boat).
Our boat handled the seas well, because we have stabilizers, but we were worried about Seaquel who was about 30 minutes behind us. To make matters worse, both boats had been trolling during the trip, and while we didn’t catch anything, they had a small tuna hit their line just as the wind picked up. Landing that fish in those conditions was a Herculean task, but they managed it 👏 Both boats made it into the harbor fine, and we anchored successfully in a semi-crowded anchorage.
The next morning Keith was calling to me, “look out the stern”. We are not certain what type of creatures (our first guess was sharks 🤷🏼♀️) were swimming around the boat, but they were large. Remember the Whaler is 11 feet long, and those animals are swimming several feet below the surface.
We were happy to see Fred was still here. Last year a large Goliath Grouper took up residence under our boat. We believe this is the same fish, which now measures about 4 feet in length. This picture was taken by leaning over the swim platform, but since Fred likes to stay in the shadow of the boat it was hard to get a good picture.
During these times of Covid safety, everyone is cautious about always having a mask at hand. Our trip to Dry Tortugas National Park gave new meaning to the question, “does everyone have a mask?” I can’t think of a better way to spend Valentine’s Day than snorkeling with my honey!
We were incredibly lucky to enjoy three days of snorkeling. Two of our snorkeling adventures were right at Fort Jefferson. There are numerous structures around the fort that provide a great environment for coral and fish.
One day we packed lunches and took our dinghies on a three mile trip to Loggerhead Key. While Garden Key (the home of Fort Jefferson) is accessible to visitors by way of a ferry or seaplane, Loggerhead Key is only accessible by personal boat. This picture was snapped as we floated face down along the coast of the island.
Water clarity wasn’t great that day, but it was clear enough to see plenty of amazing sights!
Loggerhead Key provides a small mooring area for people to tie up dinghies. Anchoring in the park is only allowed within one mile of Fort Jefferson. Luckily, on this day the current was running along the beach in the direction that allowed us to jump in the water from the mooring and drift with the current for almost .5 mile along this island. At the end of the island we swam to shore and walked back to our boats. The boats appear as small dots in this picture, just past the light house.
I know this is a great example of what NOT to do when taking a picture, but I decided to post it anyway to make a point about poaching. During our walk up the beach we happened upon this lobster carcass in the sand. The black thing in the pic is Keith’s foot (for size perspective) the subject- in the shadow of Keith’s leg - is just the cephalothorax (head and mid section). The abdomen (entire tail section) is missing. This lobster was HUGE, and it’s death looks suspicious. Those suspicions were sadly confirmed when we found two more huge lobster heads, also missing the tail...ugh...people make me crazy!!
We swam back out to our dinghies and enjoyed a leisurely lunch with our friends. What a perfect day!
Picture courtesy of Eddie and Gail on Zoom (their dinghy was named well before the word became popular from Covid)
Unfortunately, our stay was cut short by a forecast of strong (30 mph) winds out of the north heading our way. The prediction was for 5-7 ft seas during this 3 day blow. We quickly agreed that the Garden Key anchorage would not offer sufficient protection from this approaching front so on Thursday morning we weighed anchors at 0630 and headed for Key West. Picture courtesy of Gail and Eddie on Seaquel
This time it was our turn to land a fish, and luckily it was a King Mackerel...our favorite. I am posting this pic more for the purpose of the crime scene investigation instead of showing the fish. I happened to be at the helm when this fish hit our line. Keith yelled, “FISH ON”, and I quickly pulled the throttles back to idle and headed to the cockpit (the auto helm was keeping us on course). While Keith reeled the fish in, I readied the net. As soon as I dipped the fish I left the fish (in the net) on the floor of the cockpit, and immediately returned to the helm.
I did not realize, at that time, that the fish was bleeding heavily from the hook in its mouth. Keith secured the rod on the top deck and headed to the cockpit right behind me, but the damage was already done. Apparently, as it thrashed around on the deck it took a very short time for blood to be splattered everywhere. Days later, we are still finding blood spots on the cushions, ladder, rug...etc. Oops, I guess the next time it would be wise for me to dispatch the fish before returning to the helm. I have read that pouring alcohol on the gills will instantly knock a fish out. I have been wondering what to do with the moonshine gifted to us in Tennessee!
Back in Key West, the next day was calm and beautiful. I decided to kayak over to a nearby sandbar to get exercise before the winds pinned us down for a few days. From the deck of the boat the sandbar looked devoid of life, but I was pleasantly surprised to find a lot of healthy conch in very shallow water there. Many people think conch move like big snails, but they actually have this big claw that they reach out and dig into the sand (like and anchor) then contract their muscular body the pull themselves along the bottom. As it is illegal to harvest conch in FL (and this guy is immature anyway) he/she was immediately returned to the water after a quick pic.
I have long been intrigued by the stories of Portuguese Man of War, but I had never seen one in real life...until yesterday! All day, I had been listening to the radio chatter from tour boats coming and going from Key West. Most of them are looking for dolphins or asking about snorkel conditions. However, one made a strange announcement that caught everyone’s attention. The boat was pulling all snorkelers out of the water, because there were a lot of Man of War in the area. I immediately grabbed the binoculars and started searching, but couldn’t see anything unusual. I abandoned my search when we decided to go into town to grab lunch with Eddie and Gail. On our dinghy ride back to the boat we nearly ran over this beautiful specimen.
The Portuguese Man of War is not a jellyfish it is a siphonophore, an organism made up of a colony of organisms. They are also sometimes called ‘blue bottles’ or ‘floating terror’. The tendril can extend over 150 ft long (but are usually about 30 ft long) and contain nematocysts (stinging cells) capable of paralyzing and killing fish. The sting is excruciatingly painful to humans. The organism has no means of propulsion, and uses the air bladder polyp like a sail to move through the ocean.
For some reason Gail decided to cancel our afternoon swim👍
While on our way to the Dry Tortugas our Garmin satellite tracker clicked over to 10,000 miles covered since the beginning of this journey in July 2019.
Oh, what a wonderful 10,000 miles it has been!!
