Grateful Dreamin': March 2-8, 2010

Key Largo

Hi All,

We are on our way to the Bahamas and right now it is "uncomfortable". We have 4-6 ft waves along with the gulf stream rollers mostly hitting us on starboard bow or straight on. Grateful is riding it out OK and we're hanging on. Sometimes Grateful’s pulpit is 20 feet out of the water as we ride up the bigger waves. We think once we get closer to the Bahamas the seas may calm because of the East wind at 15 knots. (Ran out of service……)

I wanted to finish Key Largo last night, but I was just too tired to start it at 11:00, so here goes. The bumps really don't impact my typing much as I am a "hunt and peck" typist anyway. We really liked Marina Del Mar in Key Largo. It is a protected harbor with something going on all the time because of the sightseeing, diving and fishing boats coming and going - they all have to negotiate "crash corner" and the narrow jetty opening each time. Always something to see.

We had the use of the three surrounding hotel swimming pools and continental breakfasts. Had some breakfasts, but couldn’t quite get the swimsuit out in the 65-75 degree weather.

As we walked the docks, we were able to see begging pelicans (can you see the one with his mouth open waiting for the fish scrap to be placed there)?

Also, we found the original “African Queen” from the movie with Kathryn Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart.

One of the more interesting sights was watching these captains dock their boats at the end of the Port Largo Canal. The Princess is 70 ft long and 20 ft wide. In the canal she has no rival - other boats have to let her pass because she takes all the room except at the end of the canal where we were docked. Anyway, the captains would pivot their boats, a crew member would hook the line on dock from the bow and secure it. Then they would either go to the stern or another crew member would catch the stern line. This all happens in less than a minute. It's impressive.

We met some nice folks during our stay. Judy and Gary were from Grand Rapids, MI, and Char and Dick (sailing vessel, Carolina Girl) from Traverse City, MI.

Char and her daughters have Portuguese Water Dogs kennels. Char and Dick had a 6-month old female PWD puppy, Destiny, sailing with them. Porter really liked her and we were able to go to the nearby city park for playdays. A funny story with these two. We had joined a mixed group of dogs for play group, and one of the dogs (Ruby) was playing pretty rough with Destiny and barking at her. Porter put himself between Ruby and Destiny twice and kept Ruby away. Unexpected dog behavior from Porter, but then who knows what goes on in those brains?