Day 206 – at Sombrero Dockside Marina - January 28, 2012

We have been waiting anxiously for a good day to take Boreas out to Sombrero Key Lighthouse to go snorkeling.  The wind has switched directions today, so this seems like our best chance.  We invited John and Rita to go along – John accepted, but Rita elected to say on Brandy IV and work on her watercolors.

The ride out to the lighthouse was quite easy.  We went all the way out Boot Key Harbor and then turned south to the lighthouse.  The waves were a bit bigger than we expected, but not too bad.  We learned at one of the dive shops we visited that there are mooring balls at the lighthouse, so we were watching carefully through the binoculars.  The mooring balls were easy to spot and we picked one up with no problem.

Fred III decided he just wanted a quick swim and didn’t want to actually snorkel, so Fred, John and I donned our new wetsuits and got the rest of our gear organized while Fred III took his quick swim.  Then off we went.  Both Fred and I were immediately thrilled with our new wetsuits – they are comfortable to wear (although not that easy to put on) and they keep you nice and warm.  The snorkeling was amazing!  There were millions of fish and beautiful fan coral.  The ocean was quite active from the waves and the movement of the fan coral was fascinating to watch.  The terrain at Sombrero Key Lighthouse is fingers of coral reaching out from the reef south of Hawk Channel with sandy spots in between the coral.  This made for a large variety of depths – from 20+ feet in the sandy areas to five or six feet over the coral.

When everyone was done snorkeling, we headed back to Sombrero Dockside Marina via Sister Creek.  We have traveled this creek in the dinghy and John has done some soundings with his handheld depth sounder, but this was our first time through in a big boat.  It was a bit shallow right at the entrance, but not a problem for us and it got much deeper as we got into the creek.  If we can use Sister Creek when we depart Marathon for Key Largo, we can cut over an hour off our travel time.
 
            Miles: 12.5      Bridges: 0        Locks: 0

the beautiful blue water as we approach the
Sombrero Key Lighthouse - the changes in color show
sand (lighter color) and coral (darker color)

Sombrero Key Lighthouse

Fred III treated us to dinner at Lazy Days South here
in Marathon where we got to watch a beautiful sunset

 

just the smallest sliver of sun is still showing