Shark River

There were fairly strong Easterlies blowing but by staying in the lee of the coast we were quite sheltered and had a reasonably calm cruise down the coast from Goodland, heading into one to two footers all the way.  We pulled into the Northern entrance to Shark River and dropped the hook in the open water, away from the shore.

Shark river is deep in the Everglades National Park and is known for it's wildlife (gators, snakes and sharks, Oh MY!) and lots and lots of hungry bugs.  Especially the dreaded No-see-ums.  These little beasties are hungry and you can barely see them.  But man, can you feel them. They are very annoying and small enough to squirm their way through most normal screens.  So once the anchor was hooked we booted it inside and shut up the boat tight, save for our few fine bug screens.  Blah! + There is no cell or tv reception here.  It was a cloudy night so no star watching, and we were exhausted after our day on the water.  After wolfing down some left overs it was early to bed for us.  The plan was to set the alarm for six and head out at the first hint of light.

Pulling the anchor at sunrise

After hitting the snooze button a few times we made it out on deck as the sun was rising and offered our warm blood to the beasties while we got the anchor up.  The full-moon was still high in the morning sky, which meant that the extra-low tide was still on and we were almost at the lowest point of it.  We carefully inched our way out following our track from the day before.  This is not the place you want to get hung-up on a shoal.

We started inching along and bam, just like that, all our electronics went black.  I put the boat in neutral while Jeff checked the fuse, cleaned the contact and got them going again.  Off we went.  Whew!

Then I looked at Jeff and made the colassal mistake of saying "Jeeze!  What else could go wrong?"

Heading back out onto the Gulf of Mexico.
Note the moon still high.  That made for an ultra-low tide.

Just like that, he glanced at the temperature gage and saw the boat was heating up.  And fast.  Back into neutral and engine off.  We had been underway for about five minutes and we were already on our second problem.  We hadn't even had coffee yet!!

Anchor back down (we were luckily still in about seven feet of water).  I stayed on the flybridge and fed the no-seeums while Jeff investigated.  After some fiddling and checking it became apparent that a fan belt had broken.  Luckily there were spares onboard that came with the boat seven years ago.  Unluckily, I don't know why, they were just ever so slightly too tight.  It was shaping up to be that kind of day.

So, down in the hole in the floor Jeff went, hanging upside down over the very hot engine with sweat dripping off his face.  Using very creative language while banging, coaxing and tugging on the belt, he had me heave on a heavy pole with every pound I have, trying to lever that sucker into place.  Voila!  We got it on and it worked!  With mission accomplished we were on our way again.  It's always an adventure.

The day turned sunny and warm.  The winds calmed, the water flattened and we had a beautiful day on the water, making it to Marathon in the Florida Keys by late afternoon.

Tired guy.  A calm Gulf of Mexico made for a great nap!