Photo #1: Sunset at Cayo Costa
Photo #2: Thunderhead across our anchorage at Cayo Costa
[Hilde’s log]
Cruising attire has become a lot more casual since we arrived in Florida from the Bahamas. When we’re close to others in an anchorage or marina we suffer in shorts and t-shirts and sandals. The instant we manage to elude our fellow humans, all those clothes end up in a heap in the laundry basket. Folks, it is hot. For example, it is almost 8 p.m. as I write this in the cabin and the thermometer (at which I try not to look) shows 88. It’s probably 8 to 10 degrees cooler in the cockpit, where David is milking the sunset for enough light to read his book. We hope we are anchored far enough from shore to be invisible to the insect life out here (just off the ICW channel close to the island park of Cayo Costa).
Amazingly enough, “hot” is uncomfortable only if I (i) wear clothes or (ii) go into the cabin. As long as I am in the fresh breeze with little or nothing on, I’m quite comfortable. Yesterday we spent the day at Ft. Myers Beach, Florida, in the city mooring field. David finished some boat chores, and when he was done, I was determined to clean up a bit below. While he worked, I sat in the cockpit in civilized attire and read. It was about 90, but a breeze was blowing and Raven’s cockpit curtains kept the sun off while allowing the breeze to waft across the boat. I was perfectly comfortable. The instant I went below, the heat became stifling and I lost all the water I’d drunk that day (a considerable amount) to perspiration. Who am I kidding? It was sweat! Running in rivulets down my back, under my arms, and even off the end of my nose! Needless to say, as I swept and damp mopped the cabin floor, I became more and more irritable. I barely managed to last until we loaded the dinghy with laundry and bath items and took off for the bath house and laundry room maintained by Matanzas Marina.
What a glorious feeling to step into the air conditioned laundry! Marathon is a great place, but they have no air conditioning, and bathing in their showers in the summer is a lot like taking a Turkish bath, even though all my showers there were in cold (read: tepid) water. At Ft. Myers, the laundry and the bathrooms are air conditioned. The bathrooms look like hotel bathrooms, with tiled floors, sinks, and mirrors. Both of them were sparkling clean and one of them even had a tub! You can get dressed in comfort, without every piece of clothing sticking to your body. Again, a huge contrast to Marathon. The baths there are filthy. No algae or anything, but plenty of dirt tracked in and left on the floors and years of dirty hand and fingerprints on the walls, as if every boater there had changed engine oil before coming up to bathe. Marathon mooring balls (off season) were $20 per night. Ft. Myers was $13. Go figure. Perhaps it has to do with Marathon’s brand new mooring field, which is quite impressive and regularly inspected. It can’t be the facilities. I loved Marathon, but I must admit, Ft. Myers is my new favorite Florida port.
Ft. Myers has a great mooring field as well, less than two years old. The balls are especially welcome due to the strong current that runs there, turning the boats 180 degrees every six hours. Across the channel from us and on the other side of a large sand bar were about 20 shrimpers. They stayed tied up while we were there, which was a bit of a disappointment. I wanted to see them leave in the early morning. Perhaps there is a season on shrimp. It’s a working port, with large and small work boats and a Coast Guard station, as well as lots of private fishing boats and pleasure craft. The Gulf side beaches were covered with happy vacationers, but there are no over large hotels or other obvious tourist spots in Matanzas Pass, where the mooring field is located. Instead there are several live music tiki bars and one great band played under the roof of a huge open air aluminum building that looks as though it earns its way as a commercial fish market during the week.
The mooring field is also home to many snub nosed gray dolphins who came in each evening and morning to feed or maybe just to hang out. They floated close to the surface of the water with their dorsal fins exposed and moved slowly up and down the river, huffing noisily as they took deep breaths. They’d pass within ten feet of us, singly or in groups of two or three, like people out for an evening stroll. We had a terrific rain last night and afterward, as I lay in the v-berth enjoying a beautifully cool breeze, I listened to the dolphins huff and puff their way up and down beside the boat.
We ate out our first night in Ft. Myers, just to get cooked food in a cool room. We’ve had to motor a lot the last few days, and motoring bakes the interior of the boat until it’s well over 90 at night when we stop. Even after opening all the port lights and hatches, it takes a long time for it to cool down because the hot engine continues to radiate heat through the hull. The heat effectively discourages me from doing any cooking. We aren’t hungry for the most part, anyway, until we walk into an air conditioned space. When we are able to sail, we’re still out in the heat all day (under the bimini, of course) but there is very little engine activity to heat up the cabin and the breeze keeps us comfortable.
Cruising attire has become a lot more casual since we arrived in Florida from the Bahamas. When we’re close to others in an anchorage or marina we suffer in shorts and t-shirts and sandals. The instant we manage to elude our fellow humans, all those clothes end up in a heap in the laundry basket. Folks, it is hot. For example, it is almost 8 p.m. as I write this in the cabin and the thermometer (at which I try not to look) shows 88. It’s probably 8 to 10 degrees cooler in the cockpit, where David is milking the sunset for enough light to read his book. We hope we are anchored far enough from shore to be invisible to the insect life out here (just off the ICW channel close to the island park of Cayo Costa).
Amazingly enough, “hot” is uncomfortable only if I (i) wear clothes or (ii) go into the cabin. As long as I am in the fresh breeze with little or nothing on, I’m quite comfortable. Yesterday we spent the day at Ft. Myers Beach, Florida, in the city mooring field. David finished some boat chores, and when he was done, I was determined to clean up a bit below. While he worked, I sat in the cockpit in civilized attire and read. It was about 90, but a breeze was blowing and Raven’s cockpit curtains kept the sun off while allowing the breeze to waft across the boat. I was perfectly comfortable. The instant I went below, the heat became stifling and I lost all the water I’d drunk that day (a considerable amount) to perspiration. Who am I kidding? It was sweat! Running in rivulets down my back, under my arms, and even off the end of my nose! Needless to say, as I swept and damp mopped the cabin floor, I became more and more irritable. I barely managed to last until we loaded the dinghy with laundry and bath items and took off for the bath house and laundry room maintained by Matanzas Marina.
What a glorious feeling to step into the air conditioned laundry! Marathon is a great place, but they have no air conditioning, and bathing in their showers in the summer is a lot like taking a Turkish bath, even though all my showers there were in cold (read: tepid) water. At Ft. Myers, the laundry and the bathrooms are air conditioned. The bathrooms look like hotel bathrooms, with tiled floors, sinks, and mirrors. Both of them were sparkling clean and one of them even had a tub! You can get dressed in comfort, without every piece of clothing sticking to your body. Again, a huge contrast to Marathon. The baths there are filthy. No algae or anything, but plenty of dirt tracked in and left on the floors and years of dirty hand and fingerprints on the walls, as if every boater there had changed engine oil before coming up to bathe. Marathon mooring balls (off season) were $20 per night. Ft. Myers was $13. Go figure. Perhaps it has to do with Marathon’s brand new mooring field, which is quite impressive and regularly inspected. It can’t be the facilities. I loved Marathon, but I must admit, Ft. Myers is my new favorite Florida port.
Ft. Myers has a great mooring field as well, less than two years old. The balls are especially welcome due to the strong current that runs there, turning the boats 180 degrees every six hours. Across the channel from us and on the other side of a large sand bar were about 20 shrimpers. They stayed tied up while we were there, which was a bit of a disappointment. I wanted to see them leave in the early morning. Perhaps there is a season on shrimp. It’s a working port, with large and small work boats and a Coast Guard station, as well as lots of private fishing boats and pleasure craft. The Gulf side beaches were covered with happy vacationers, but there are no over large hotels or other obvious tourist spots in Matanzas Pass, where the mooring field is located. Instead there are several live music tiki bars and one great band played under the roof of a huge open air aluminum building that looks as though it earns its way as a commercial fish market during the week.
The mooring field is also home to many snub nosed gray dolphins who came in each evening and morning to feed or maybe just to hang out. They floated close to the surface of the water with their dorsal fins exposed and moved slowly up and down the river, huffing noisily as they took deep breaths. They’d pass within ten feet of us, singly or in groups of two or three, like people out for an evening stroll. We had a terrific rain last night and afterward, as I lay in the v-berth enjoying a beautifully cool breeze, I listened to the dolphins huff and puff their way up and down beside the boat.
We ate out our first night in Ft. Myers, just to get cooked food in a cool room. We’ve had to motor a lot the last few days, and motoring bakes the interior of the boat until it’s well over 90 at night when we stop. Even after opening all the port lights and hatches, it takes a long time for it to cool down because the hot engine continues to radiate heat through the hull. The heat effectively discourages me from doing any cooking. We aren’t hungry for the most part, anyway, until we walk into an air conditioned space. When we are able to sail, we’re still out in the heat all day (under the bimini, of course) but there is very little engine activity to heat up the cabin and the breeze keeps us comfortable.
Photo #2: Thunderhead across our anchorage at Cayo CostaThe thunderstorms help. A big one swept by us to the east this afternoon as we approached land. None of them have bothered me at all for a long time, but this afternoon was different. As I watched the storm develop, my hackles went up and I seriously did not want to turn east and head toward it. About the time we approached our turn, the Coast Guard announced that a water spout had been sighted near our location. A water spout is a tornado on water, and not anything anyone wants to be near. The Coast Guard announcer, some young woman, rattled off the coordinates in such a rush that even though I had pen and paper to hand, I couldn’t get all the numbers. I was some kind of angry. I hailed the Coast Guard on 16, told them there was no way I could write down the numbers when she spoke them so quickly, and asked her to repeat the coordinates. About a minute later, she did. Sure enough, those water spouts were right about where we are anchored tonight!
But about 10 minutes later, my feelings of foreboding disappeared and the storm moved off slowly to the east, taking its water spouts with it. As we approached the cut, we moved through a fleet of small fishermen and clouds of sea birds who were all doing their best to catch the hundreds of fish that were shoaling in the cut. Not one of them moved a foot for any silly storm, water spout or not.
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