Goodbye to Marathon - Hello Key Largo and a surprise

Sadly, we finally had to say farewell to Marathon and begin our journey home.  We were up before sunrise and were underway before 8:00AM.  Since this was the first morning with winds below 15mph, there were about 20 boats departing for the Bahamas, the Florida West Coast, or like us, up the east coast of Florida.  We followed 5 boats travelling together out of Marathon and on the "inside" route up the Keys.  The inside route is more protected than the ocean if the winds are from the east or south, but much of the Intracoastal waterway is around 5 to 8 feet deep.  Sailboats with typical drafts of 5 feet or more normally travel what is called Hawks Channel or the "outside" ICW which is deep, but you are on the ocean side and exposed to greater waves with higher wind speeds.  While we were travelling the inside route, our friends Mike and Polli on Sailing Vessel Chinook were taking the outside route. 

 This is the "office" as we travel.  Charts, Waterway guides, Skipper Bobs anchorage guide along with all the chartpotters, autopilots, depth finders, etc to keep us on course and off the hard bottom.

 

 That's not TIKA...another Camano, Sea Knight stopped by to check us out in Tarpon
Bay.  Turns out that he was from St. Augustine. Kind of cool that someone with a same boat would go out of his way to say hi.

Leaving the last bridge to the mainland in the Keys before Miami,  It' s mostly the open waters of Biscayne Bay from here to Miami.

 Our "non electronic" navigation tools are always spread out and constantly referred to as we travel

TIKA proudly flying the burgee of our home port of the Marina at Ortega Landing.  While we love this trip, we know we have an outstanding Marina to go home to.

 

While we were travelling, we kept in touch by cell phone with Mike and Polli.  We found out from Polli that other friends we had met in Stuart, Jim and Kathy were planning to stay in Tarpon Bay outside Key Largo.  They were taking their sailboat, Charm, down the inside route along with some friends they know from St. Augustine.  We had already planned to stay in Tarpon Bay, so we would be an unexpected surprise.  When we arrived in Tarpon Bay, we anchored between their sailboat and their friends' boat.  Both of the sailboats' dinghies were gone, so we figured they were in Key Largo exploring. While we were waiting, dolphins began leaping out of the water near our boat.  I mean leaping like you see at Sea World.....6 to 8 feel out of the water.  I called to Marlene, the resident dolphin fanatic, and she caught the dolphins as they finished a couple more leaps.  Marlene decided the dolphins were a good omen and this was a good spot to stay the night on anchor.
As Jim and Kathy returned on the mile journey back from Key Largo they could see that even though they had anchored in a remote spot of the bay, some boat had parked between their sailboats.  As they got closer, they recognized TIKA.  We were both excited that we had been able to connect up as they made their way south and we made our way north in the Keys.   Soon we were all on board TIKA, including Murphy, their Irish Terrier, for a little happy hour celebration which included Jim's famous Rum Punch......as you know sailors love their rum!