April 17, 2006
We have been back in Texas since Feb. 26th and just arrived back to our boat in Key West today from an extended stay in Texas during the loss of Sonny's mom' and caring for her during her battle with cancer.

We cannot explain how good it feels to be back on Valentina  and living aboard.   It is truly a different lifestyle, but we really love it and have missed it over the past few months.
We have come to know a great family from France that watched over Valentina while we were in Texas.   They are Bruno,  Sophie,  and our new French grand-daughters, Estelle and Marjorie.   They will be leaving Key West in May (when the girls are out of school) for Panama.


Sonny swam and cleaned the bottom of one side of the boat.   It was growing hair, as it has sat for 2 months.   We will need to scrape some barnacles off, also.

April 18, 2006

Today, we needed to provision the boat again, as we emptied the refrigerator before going to Texas.  So, we dinghied over to the bridge near Winn Dixie and tied the dinghy up, under the bridge, to the mangrove trees and walked over to the grocery store.  We bought a lot of groceries and carried them back to the dinghy, then to the boat.

We went to the sailmakers loft and picked up our mainsail.  She had to make a minor repair on our mainsail.  Now.....we need to attempt to put it back up in the roller furler-in the boom with little wind.
We met some of our neighbors on S/V Preferred Stock, who have been cruising for 11 years.

Tonight, we took Bruno and his family out to dinner for our gratitude for him watching over our boat while we were gone.   We enjoyed them very much.  Sophie and the girls are learning English and Estelle, who is seven, is getting pretty fluent.

April 19, 2006
We woke up early to a gentle  breeze coming down our hatch over our v-berth, so we looked at each other and jumped out of bed, ready to get our mainsail up.    After several tries, we finally had our mainsail back in the groove on the boom and the battens in place.
Sonny replaced the regulator on the alternator and I unpacked from our trip, cleaned out drawers and closets (again) and stowed away things for our crossing.
We walked to the Post Office, then to the Internet Cafe and are attempting to download our website.  We will send out an update from the boat email until we arrive in Isla Mujeres.   We are trying to slow down and enjoy, so it may take us several days to get there.
Sonny is standing in front of Jimmy Buffet's "Margaritaville" on Duvall Street.
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April 20, 2006
Today, we walked to town to download our website on our new "little" laptop and will walk to the post office to see if our Cruising Guide has arrived.   We washed clothes at the marina and got some last minute groceries before heading out.   We plan to head to the Dry Tortugas Saturday.

April 22, 2006
The wind howled all night about 20 knots.  We dinghied over to Home Depot to get screen and Velcro to sew screens for our hatches for mosquitoes.  We filled up with diesel and left Key West at 2 p.m.  We are 53 miles away from Dry Tortugas and with little wind we are traveling 4 knots, so it should take us 13 hours.  We want to arrive at daybreak so we plan to sail all night.
The water is beautiful aqua blue.   This is what you dream about.
Key West is having the World Sailfish Tournament this week and last night was a Beatles salute/concert at Mallory Square.  April of the tournament, we have been over-run by huge power/fishing boats returning to KW.  A helicopter is flying over them taking photos.

April 23, 2006
We anchored at Dry Tortugas at 9:30 a.m. and had a great day, just resting and re-cooperating on the boat.  We grilled chicken, and had salad and green beans for dinner.  We tried real hard to stay up to watch the sunset........and barely made it.
April 24, 2006
Talked to Chris Parker, Caribbean weather guru, on the Ham radio this morning and he gave us the weather info for crossing to Isla.  Looks like the timing is right.
We met Robert and Ane, from Argentina, on a catamaran, who are also going to Isla, so we plan to travel together and keep up with each other, by site, HF radio, or Ham radio with scheduled times.

We snorkeled around Fort Jefferson and the water and fish were absolutely beautiful.   It is much clearer than when we were here before.


April 25, 2006
We pulled up anchor at 7 a.m. with Deux Pieds ("Two Feet" in English) and headed towards our waypoints Chris told us to get into for currents.

There was only 6-8 knots of wind, so we went to the deck of the boat and fished.  After no luck, we just put the poles in the rod holders.
It is noon, and we called our buddy boat to check in, Ane said they could not talk, they had just caught a BIG fish and were trying to reel it in.
At 12:30 p.m. our location is N24 27 974, W83 14 31.
About 1:15 p.m. our fishing line started screaming, so we both jumped up and started trying to reel it in.  The fish had taken out so much line, we tightened the tension, so we could get it in.  It took both of us probably 30 minutes to get him in.  It was the biggest fish either of us had ever caught.  It was 35 long and about 10" across.  On our chart it looks like a Crevalle Jack.  We cleaned him and put in the refrigerator.

Around midnight, we saw something on the radar that we recognized as a storm cloud, so we reefed the main, pulled in most of the jib, and put the enclosure back up to batten down the hatches.
Sure enough, the storm came, rain, lightning, 40 knot winds.  Our jib was flapping in the wind, so we tried to pull it in, but it had twisted around the shrouds and the green UV strip was ripped in shreds on the ends.   We are not sure of how much damage we have.   We will check in the morning.   It slammed us pretty good, but only lasted about 30 minutes.   We were soaking wet in the cockpit.


April 26, 2006
We sailed all night, of course.
At daybreak, we pulled out our jib, and it looks like we can just have the UV cover re-done, and will be OK.............whew!
We were sitting in the cockpit and saw about 6-8 mahi mahi dolphins dancing on top of the water.  Our fishing line was out and they were headed right towards it.   We did catch one.   It was beautiful and we cleaned him and put him up for dinner.
Not much wind.........seas are calm and we are motor/sailing today.
Our buddy boat is having autopilot problems, so we stopped for about an hour to wait for them.  While we stopped we showered (outside in the buff) and were about 30 miles from Cuba.  We ate breakfast (biscuits and omelet).

April 27, 2006
We motor/sailed all night.  Not much wind at all, calm seas.  We passed Cabo San Antonio and headed straight to Isla.

We caught another mahi mahi dolphin, lots more seaweed, and some kind of strap.   We left the line out all night, and when we checked it the next morning, we had lots of seaweed and a strip of fish meat.   Something had eaten the fish we had on our line.
We watched for ships on radar.  Kay and Sonny both had to hail one on their watches to make sure they saw us.  There is more ship traffic at night than in the daytime.    It so so dark at night............you cannot see anything.   The stars are so low to the horizon, it looks like boats or ships.  Very deceiving.
We saw the Southern Cross constellation for the first time.  It is a famous constellation that is on the horizon once you are south of latitude 23° north.  Its longer bar of the cross points almost exactly toward the south pole.
We see falling stars, we saw lots of phosphorescence in the water.  It looks like fluorescent / turquoise lights in the water as you pass in the boat.
We check on Robert and Ane, but, if is difficult, because their English is limited and our Spanish is limited.      They suggested to stop at Cuba to anchor and rest for the night, be we told them we could not.   So, we all went on.

April 28, 2006
Crossing the Yucatan Channel with the very strong north current is very challenging.  As you leave Cuba, it progressively gets stronger until you reach the Yucatan.  At the strongest current, the wind had dropped to 5 knots.   Normally we can motor 6 knots, but in this strong current,   we were motor/sailing and could not make but between  .7  to  2 knots progress for about 20 miles.

We arrived at Isla Mujeres around 10 a.m. this morning.   It was such a welcome sight after three days at sea.   We checked into Customs and Immigration.  We ate some flautas and a taco at the vendor on the square.   It was very spicy, but good.

We ran around town today and bought a few groceries at the local market.
We ate fajitas at a local restaurant.   It was very good.  We ate in the evening with Roberto and Ane on their boat.   Ane had prepared some of the fish they had caught along the way.   It was very nice.
The anchorage here is the best we have had so far.  Nice, consistent wind, not crowded, and easy access to dinghy docks.

April 29, 2006
We rented a golf cart today with Roberto and Ane.   It was 450 pesos, or $45 for all day.   We went all over the island on it.   Here is a family we passed along the way.  No car seats? We snorkeled at one stop and Kay got stung by a Portuguese-man-of-war on her lip close to her snorkel mask and  also on her arms.   It hurt.......her lip was still numb at night.   We put vinegar on it, which helps, but it still stung.   The snorkeling was in rough water and good, but, not the best we have seen.

Communicating with our new Argentina buddies is challenging, but rewarding.   Roberto was telling a story of when they were in Cuba and had Annie's "doctor" come visit them.    Sonny asked, "You had Annie's doctor come visit you in Cuba?"   Roberto said, "Oh, No, No.....not Doctor, it was her daaaaughter!"...... They are attempting to help us learn Spanish, and we are attempting to teach them "Texan".  They said they can speak three languages now, Spanish, English, and Texan.

We met two other couples on S/V Valhalla from Fort Meyers, Jim and Connie, and crew members Jay and Kathy.   Connie reminds us a lot of Donna Bartley on "S/V Breaking Wind".

At 5 p.m., our buddies wanted to go to mass at the Catholic Church on the square.  There was a wedding before the mass, so we all went to the wedding and mass.   We sat on the back row in our shorts and t-shirts.   The wedding was a high society family and lots of very beautiful Mexican women in attendance.   It was fun to be a part of it.