We left Ft. Lauderdale today, it was a great day out on the water. Bonnie and Harley cuddled almost the whole way there today. Mike did a great job getting us out of the slip before handing it over the Jen to drive and get us to our next destination. Kelly watches the charts and helps to keep us in deep waters and in the channel.

We saw lots of mega yachts today, the pictures don’t do it justice on just how big they are. The fenders for these boats are as big as Jen lol

Once we got to our anchorage Mike took over at the helm and Jen went downstairs to turn on he windless and grab the headsets. When we anchor we have found it helps for Mike and Jen to wear the docking headsets so they can communicate easily. They are quite the team.

Bonnie hates her life jacket. So when we take it off she goes crazy and decided to play with Harley. Jen seems to always take pictures at the perfect time and it looks like they are going to eat each other lol

Beautiful anchorage with great holding. Sandy/muddy bottom, and super quiet.

The 17th Street marina was very nice. We loved the marina so much we didn’t venture out into town. Except when Mike and Kelly went and picked up Mike prescription from Walgreens. Which was only about a half a mile walk.

Mike spent the days working and the nights relaxing.

Jen spent her days relaxing by the pool and reading. There we lots of mega yachts that came through the area. Watching them dock was pretty cool, they had anywhere between 5 and 15 deckhands.

The best part of our time at 17th street marina was getting to see our dear friends from Marathon. We met Martha, and Kevin at Faro Blanco. They are the absolute sweetest people. Martha made dinner and brought it over. Jen made almond fudge brownies desert.. So so yummy.

Hold on! Miami boaters are the worst. They fly by so close going way too fast creating such huge wakes. We are a 42ft boat the weighs almost 50,000lbs and we were rocking and rolling like crazy. They don’t have radios, and if they to there’s no way they can hear you trying to hail them over their loud obnoxious and vulgar music.

Once we got out of Miami it was mostly peaceful, Jen and Harley sat up on the bow together. He likes it but only for a short time, then he’s ready to go back up on the flybridge and lay down. Bonnie got to take a turn up on the bow… she just barked and stood watch the whole time. She’s so crazy lol

Getting into Ft. Lauderdale was a little crazy. We ended up being sandwiched in between two cruise ships trying to navigate the high traffic area and head out to sea. It was kinda stressful as there was no communicate to the boaters around on what to do or where to go to get out of the way for them. But like always we figured it out.

Made it to the marina and docked with no issues. Mike did fantastic. Once we got all tied up the Wishes crew grilled hot dogs on the fly bridge and had a few beers.

After FaceTiming our fourth crew mate, Michale we headed to bed and called it an early night.

Jen spent the week recovering from concussion. She rested a lot and went to the beach across the street from the marina a few times. It was beautiful beach and super quiet. Not a lot of people go there, so it was a great place to relax and read.

Mike spent the week working. One of the owners of the company Mike works for was gracious enough to loan us his car for our time there… Thanks so much Larry! Having a car allows us to explore easier and run errands.

Kelly did trip planning, and got marinas scheduled for us. As well as she washed the boat.

We met a boat captain, John. He works on the boat parked behind us, he’s super sweet and friendly. He gave us the number for a guy to call to help us get our canopy fixed. Which we were able to have fixed in two days.

The boat next to us at the marina is owned by a super nice guy, Phill. His company builds sets for tv shows and movies. Oh and fun fact his dad played Santa in the movie “A Christmas Story”.

On Thursday’s at the park next to Bill Bird Marina, is the Food Trucks in the Park Festival. Bonnie got to go with us, she was such a good girl and loved getting to go.

The dogs all got baths. Harley gets his on the back of the boat, and does really well with it. Bonnie and Teddy get their baths in the kitchen sink and they tolerate it.

On Saturday we spent the day exploring Miami. We started the morning by going to the Van Gough museum. It’s a traveling exhibit that has brought Van Gough’s artwork to life! They recreated his paintings of his apartment so that you can actually step in and have a seat. The digitized his artwork and projected in a large 360 degree room. The sunflowers cascaded down the walls and the boat in the starry night paint travels around the room. It is a beautiful and relaxing tribute to his work. We all missed Kelly’s mom (Grandma Shimmin) because we know she would have loved to seen it.

Miami is known for its street, graffiti artwork on buildings. We drove around some the famous streets like Wynwood Walls. Graffiti artwork is celebrated and there is actually a guide to see the most popular sites.

Another highlight of the day was touring the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens. It was owned by businessman James Deering, a manufacturer of harvester equipment. The gardens around the home is known for its great beauty and perfect picture backdrop. We saw many ladies dressed in pretty sundresses taking pictures. Watching the ladies was just as much fun and seeing the landscape. Among these ladies was Jen… she takes so many pictures everywhere we go lol

We ended the day with dinner at Area code 55 Brazilian Steakhouse. Captian John suggested we go there, and it was very good!

We returned Larry’s car and went back to the boat and got ready to head to Ft. Lauderdale for tomorrow.

Miami here we come!

Crew slept great last night, the anchor held really well and we barley moved all night. It was a super nice anchorage with a sandy bottom, it was protected from the winds as well.

We knew there was going to be some rain during our travels today so we kept a watchful eye on the radar. We traveled about 20 miles, and after assessing all of our options we decided it was best for us to drop the anchor and wait out the storm. Mike and Jen are becoming a great team when it comes to anchoring. The wind was at about 30mph with gusts around 50-60mph. It was little scary how dark it got. We were very nervous about our anchor holding with the crazy winds but luckily it did! Made that’ll teach us to trust our anchor lol

During the storm we heard a very loud bang. Jen went outside to investigate, our canopy had broke. The wind was so powerful it ripped a few of the zippers and one of the metal arms broke free. After the wind and rain stopped Mike and Jen went upstairs to fix the canopy, and the metal arm that broke free fell on Jen’s head. It was heavy enough and fell fast enough that is gave Jen a concussion.

Jen spent the rest of the day laying down with the dogs. She has had concussions before from when she played softball, so this is nothing new.

We raised the anchor and made our way to Miami. It was an easy trip and seeing the Miami skyline was very comforting after the storm.

Miami bridge operators are very rude… that is once they finally decide to answer on the radio. After making it through the bridges, we made it Bill Bird Marina and docked beautifully.

Today, we left our remaining friends at Faro Blanco Marina, Marathon, FL.  We were sad to leave but excited to start moving again. We were feeling a little anxious because not moving for two months made us feel “soft” on our boating skills. However, once we pulled away from the dock, the stress went away.

We left on Gulf side of the Keys and crossed under the #5 Channel Bridge and traveled on the Atlantic side. Just passed the Keys, we turned into the Card Sound. Weather was great in Marathon but it started to rain when we got close to our destination. The trip along the inter coastal from the Atlantic was a bit concerning. Our charts were showing shallow water on both sides of us and we had to carefully stay in a narrow channel….while in the rain.  Our boat has a 4.5 foot draft. That means our boat is 4.5 feet below the water surface any water depths less than 7 feet can be stressful. We took it very slow just in case we ran aground – only go as fast as you are willing to hit something.

Once we got to the Card Sound, we found our anchor spot, Long Arseniker.  This spot isn’t talked about much amongst the Loopers. Not sure why, because it turned out to be a really nice spot.  We wished we could have stayed longer than one night because we would have put our paddle boards in. It was very calm and beautiful. Instead, we grabbed our snorkel gear and jumped in. We didn’t see any fish but it was still fun. 

We left the air conditioning off and enjoyed a quiet peaceful night….half way through the night, we were all wishing we left the air conditioning on! It got pretty warm.

Today is our last day in Marathon. After 2 months in paradise, we are leaving tomorrow to get back to conquering the loop.

Jen spent a few hours enjoying the pool for one last time.

Because our plan is to leave early in the morning, we decided to get fuel today. Which was not an easy endeavor. Getting out of the slip was a little tricky as the current wanted to push us back into the slip, and because of the way it’s shaped and angled we couldn’t just give it gas and pull forward so we had to kinda wiggle on out. Once we made it over to the fuel dock there was a whole lot of current pushing us away from the dock we had to pull up next to. The dockhands were very helpful and basically had to man handle pull us in… it was in that moment we wished we had bow thrusters. After we got fuel, we pulled out no problem and we able to get back to our slip, which we had to wiggle back in to. High fives to the Wishes crew after all that.

Instead of 5 o’clock docktails we had dinner with all of our friends at Lazy Day’s in Marathon. Mel bought some fish from a local fisherman and Lazy Days cooked it for us. It was super yummy! We had an absolute blast at dinner. We love our friends at Faro Blanco and leaving them is going to be hard. They really have become family.

When we got back from dinner, we enjoyed the sunset and started getting ready to leave tomorrow.

We’re all feeling a little anxious and excited to leave. So hopefully we can all get some good sleep tonight as we’ve got a big day ahead of us tomorrow.

This morning we said “see you later” to our good friends Kevin and Martha on the sailing catamaran Just Diftin’. They are headed back home to New York, for the summer. We said “see you later” to Bob and Diane on the Ocean Alexander, Soulmate. They are doing the loop as well, we hope to bump into them again along the way. We never say goodbye to boat friends because you never know when you’ll see them again out on the water.

The dogs were crazy today, Bonnie and Harley did a lot of wrestling.

Kelly did some laundry and yelled at Harley for trying to play on it. For some reason they love to lay all over it as soon as she’s done folding it.

Kelly and Jen went to Paradise Flavors, our favorite ice cream shop and stocked up on ice cream bars. We bought 35. I know that sounds alarming and like over kill but once you have tasted their ice cream you’ll understand.

Jen made BBQ chicken sliders for docktails tonight. This is the last docktails we are attending before making our way north. They are Mel’s favorite, he was very happy Jen made the sliders for him. Harley was happy too, he got to go with to docktails.

After docktails, we went to the community theater to see them preform The Outsider. We have never laughed so hard, it was hilarious. One of the actors looks exactly like our friend from back in Texas, Josh.

Quick shoutout to Josh for being so amazing. He has been such a bug help to us when we have boat questions. We are very lucky to have him as a friend. We love you Josh!

Michael and Mike spent the day changing the oil in both engines. It’s important to collect a sample of oil from each engine to send off for testing. We send ours off to BlackStone Lab. They check the condition of your oil and look for elements in the oil that would indicate sign of wear on your engine.

After Mike and Kelly drove the kids the to Miami airport.

On the 31st Kelly picked up Jen from the Miami airport, and the girls drove 2 and a half hours back to the boat in Marathon. Mike made the girls dinner, steak and pasta. It was delicious as always. Harley was so excited to see him mommy, he missed her very much. Jen and Harley shared some ice cream before heading to bed.

Today was a great day. Well, any day when the family is all together is a great day.

We started the day by having breakfast at Marathon Bagel Company again. Then, we went fishing on Marathon Lady. It was fun. We caught different types of reef snapper. The best part was the moray eel that Jen caught. Jen and our new friend Kimberly saw one while snorkeling so it was fun to see one close up and watch it curl on the hook.

When we got back to the dock there was a scientist from the Florida Department of Fishers and Wildlife waiting to collect some samples.

Overall, we caught 27 fish! We froze some and Jen cooked the rest for dinner. Fresh fish and Jen’s great cooking made it awesome.