Category: Captain’s Log

Captain’s Log – Fri 5/16/25

We had to sail into the anchorage yesterday evening when the engine overheated. I took a look at it this morning to find that the coolant circulation pump had seized, torquing the pulley shaft and shearing it off. Not a simple impeller change that I expected. We need a new water pump. The log showed one spare aboard, but that was not the case. We have extensive spares onboard and would have had this part if not for the documentation error.

With my friend Art’s help, we tracked down one in stock front a supplier willing to overnight it to Key Largo. Tomorrow morning I will dinghy ashore, catch an Uber to Key Largo and wait for the UPS truck. Hopefully I will get back in time to install it and depart Sunday morning. Right now there isn’t enough wind to sail out of the anchorage, so I’ll have to catch a ride there.

Since the engine is also our supplemental power generator in addition to the solar, we shut off all nonessential systems until the engine is back online. The refrigeration takes priority now.

Not one to let an otherwise beautiful day in the keys go to waste, we launched the dinghy and went to the local sand bar. Well they call it a sand bar, but it’s not like the one’s were used to in St Pete. It was pretty rocky. But it was hot out, the beer was cold and the water felt good!

With this delay, that wouldn’t put us into Key West until Memorial Day weekend and the marinas appear to be booked up. We could get there sooner but then we’d be skipping a lot of the keys. Something may open up, we’ll see. We’re also considering skipping Key West on this trip, cutting through at Marathon to head north. It’s suddenly getting really hot.

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Captain’s Log – Thu 5/15/25

A perfect morning for diving, about 5kts of wind and wind and under 1’ swell on the reef with an occasional roller. This weather isn’t any good for sailing, but perfect for spending time snorkeling around which is what we wanted to do this week.

We used the snubas to dive the Christ of the Abyss statue at Dry Rocks reef. We grabbed the 3rd mooring ball from the South side of the reef on the outside. I took a compass bearing from the boat to the marker, then we descended and swam towards it. It was an incredibly majestic sight as we crossed the reef to see the statue on the other side. What an experience. Unfortunately there was a go pro malfunction and the experience is stored in my head only. I did manage to get a few photos though.

The statue of Christ is covered in Fire Coral, so even if the holy water doesn’t burn you when entering a cathedral, touching this will!

As we were leaving the statue, a flock of demonic looking devil rays swam by. Everything was very surreal.

We had lunch and moved on to the Grecian Rocks site. It’s super shallow so we just snorkeled here. There was an incredible amount of colorful coral and fish here, even a sleeping shark. Shh… be very quiet and move along.

The sea breeze started to fill in as we headed towards our anchorage late afternoon. This turned out to be fortuitous because the engine overheated as we were getting ready to head into the anchorage, which we normally drop sails for and do under power. This time we had to sail through the other boats, furl, turn into the wind and drop anchor under sail. We nailed it! It was disappointing that there was no one to witness our prowess.

I’m decided to leave the repair for morning. Hopefully a simple impeller change. 🤞

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Captain’s Log – Wed 5/14/25

We left Marina Del Mar first thing in the morning, planning to stop for fuel on the way out. Of the two fuel docks there, one was closed (assuming out of fuel) and there was no way I could get a 41’ boat side tied in the 30’ of space the other had. It was high tide so we motored over to Pilot House Marina about 5 minutes south of Port Largo. We took 13.5 gallons, a little over half a tank, of fresh fuel and 10 gallons spare fuel. It diluted the fuel that had the water in it and everything looks much better.

With the delay to run around for fuel, we opted to go to Molasses Reef which was closer. Finally have good conditions at the reefs, with occasional 2’ roller but mostly 1’. We both used the snuba units this time. It was a fairly shallow dive, but we have them so why not. The best part of the reef and the most fish were actually right under the boat. We swam towards the lighthouse thinking the shallower part might be pretty but should have used more of the air time near the boat.

We limited ourselves to a 30 minute dive while we are getting used to the limit of the battery powered snuba unit. Mine was noticeably harder to draw air the last 5 minutes or so as we returned to the boat. My meter read 1/4 battery when I pulled it out. I probably could get 40 minutes in a pinch. A little less than a standard dive tank. Unlike a dive tank, the gauge is on the unit at the surface so you actually have to come up to check it.

On the plus side, we plugged both of the batteries back in and they were charged up in about an hour and a half. We could theoretically keep going all day by swapping out batteries with short breaks between dives. The chargers draw about 2 amps each so it’s nothing for our solar panel.

We headed back north to stage for tomorrow stopping at the same spot we were ran off with the higher seas. It was initially a little bumpy with the sea breeze but calmed to flat overnight.

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