8 Night sail

Tip a jigsaw puzzle onto the table and spread out the pieces so that they are just not touching. That’s what the mangrove islands off the west coast of the Everglades are like. The islands sit in shallow water and the shore shelves so gradually that, twenty miles out, it may be only ten feet deep. There are few places a keel boat can put in: especially this year. Hurricane Wilma removed Coconut Island and silted up the mouth of the Little Shark River leaving Indian Key as the only stop over on the way south.

From Indian Key to Marathon, in the Florida Keys, is an overnight eighty miles and a bit of a scary run what with the shallows, the sliding tides, and the mine fields of crab pots. We left at dusk; but there seemed to be only a few moment between dusk and total blackness. Plunging headlong through the night with the wind behind you is exhilarating (a bit like riding a motor bike at full speed with your eyes shut). You have to have faith in those glowing red numbers on the compass (and your chart work). By midnight the clouds had cleared. The masthead, with the cheerful red arrow of the lit Windex, stirred the constellations and the foam streaming from the bow over that black water was the cold white of bones in starlight. This happened to be the longest night of the year and the coldest. But with the Monitor steering we could huddle under the dodger in our fleece layers, ski hats and ski gloves. We were going too fast and had to reef to slow the boat and finally to anchor (in nine feet of water, streaming at two knots, miles from anywhere) to wait for first light.

We did not see a single boat all night. When we reach the Keys we will join all the East Coast traffic. We hope to meet some other cruisers. It has been a bit lonely.