Christmas in the Keys

What a great week!  Half a week, I guess is more accurate.  It was definitely too short a time.

Hanging out with my brothers, their families, and Grandma was awesome!  And the house they rented was pretty great.  We took full advantage of a free washer and dryer and did tons of laundry.  Okay, Trevor did most of the washing, because he's good like that.  Did some work on the boat.  Installed a new compass (thanks, Mom and Dad!).  It's the nicest-looking piece of equipment on the boat, mounted on a nice piece of teak (we look swanky, if you only look at that 8x8' square).  We may have killed our batteries in the process.  The compass lights up when we turn on our nav lights at night.  Well, we turned on the lights to see if we wired it in right.  And then forgot to turn the lights off.  Not sure how long they stayed on, but we're having trouble getting the batteries to hold a charge.  Note to everyone: Never buy batteries at Wal-Mart.  This is our second pair now that have been killed by one run-down.  And there are no Wal-Marts in the Keys, so we can't even exchange them.  We're still trying our best to charge them up, though, so we'll see.
In addition to battery trouble (new problem = extra frustration), we're still not sure what's going on with the engine.  It's probably a pretty big deal, though.  Mike thinks it might be on its way out.  But we might be able to have it rebuilt instead of buying a new one (a new engine would be more money than the whole boat is worth).  We're going to try to get a mechanic working on it Monday.  Then we'll know more. 

But other than the usual engine trouble and the new battery trouble, we've had an amazing few days!  We played tons of Wii Bowling.  When we come back to the real world and have a living room and a tv, I'm definitely getting a Wii.  So much fun!  And a workout.  I bowled pretty hard, so I had Wii-shoulder.  There was also a fair amount of Uno, Rummy (Ethan taught me to play), and Jenga (hard to play with 5-to-7-year olds).  The last two days, the pool was even warm enough to swim (so nice!). 

At one point, I was volunteered to go diving for lobster.  Dave agreed to go with me, so we loaded up in Dad's dinghy and went out.  We stopped at a shop to get a dive flag (gotta be legal), which we lashed to a fishing pole (totally worked).  We rode over to the Gulf side and tied up to a mangrove tree in a foot of water.  We donned our wetsuits and snorkel gear and took off.  Yow, that water was cold!  So cold we could do nothing but giggle over the absurdity for a few minutes.  We toughed it our for about half an hour, then decided maybe the Atlantic side might be warmer (or maybe at least a little clearer).  No luck.  It was just as cold.  We didn't get more than waist-deep over there.  With the wetsuits, our bodies were warm enough (barely), but our faces were so cold they hurt.  So we gave up and went back to the house.  We stepped into the swimming pool to see if it had warmed up yet, and it felt amazing!  Also a great place to wash wetsuits and snorkel gear.  But it wasn't long before we realized the water wasn't actually very warm, just felt that way compared to the 60-something degree water we'd been swimming in.  So no lobster tails for dinner that day.

Yesterday, Mike took me, Ethan, and Sean fishing at the 7-Mile bridge.  The pesky fish there just kept stealing our bait.  Sneaky little devils.  Eventually we figured out the right hook size to catch them.  Check out my whopper!

And my fish was the biggest.

My brothers were determined to eat as much seafood as possible while they were here, so we ate really well.  Our first night, Crystal made Manhattan clam chowder.  Amazing!  The next night we had pizza (to appease the Dad); it was probably the best Pizza Hut pizza I've ever had.  Thursday, Dave did a shrimp boil (shrimp, potatoes, onions, broccoli, corn on the cob).  So good!  And Mike grilled mahi mahi (yum!).  And last night we had stone crab claws.  Lots of work, but oh so good.

This morning, we all said goodbye and left the house.  We planned to head down to Boot Key Harbor to get a mooring ball until we could find a mechanic for our boat and a boatyard to haul out Mom and Dad's boat for some bottom work.  We headed out the way we came in, the water getting rougher every minute.  We estimate they were probably 4-foot waves.  They rocked us all around.  Trevor and I were splashed pretty good a couple of times.  It was not comfortable, and was heading toward unsafe.  So we called it off and headed back to shore.  We tried to find a place to anchor, but the bottom was hard coral rock.  No luck there.  We finally headed around the point and back inland a little (ah, the calmness in protected waters).  Mom and Dad found a marina and parked.  The slip I was supposed to take had another boat tied up in it.  They expected me to maneuver around it and get in.  I could have done it under normal conditions, but we had a wicked cross-wind.  Finally, they moved the boat, and we parked the boat.  So happy to be secure and off the water!  When we went to the office to register and pay, the lady told us the restaurant had a happy hour with 25-cent shrimp and wings from 4-6.  Oh yeah!  We were there by 4:10, hungry and ready.  The four of us ate 48 shrimp and 30 wings.  It was delicious!  And filling.  We're still not hungry.

Tomorrow we try again for Boot Key Harbor and the awesomeness of mooring balls.  It's a great community there, so we're hoping other boaters can point us in the direction of a good diesel mechanic.

Happy New Year, everybody!