Trip to the Marquesas Keys

Since the weather was just absolutely perfect for a December, we extended our stay and journeyed out to Marquesas Keys.

Not to be confused with the Marquesas in the South Pacific, Marquesas Keys is a natural atoll (reportedly formed by a meteor) 25 nm west of Key West. Exactly 15 nm out of cell range if you are wondering. I won't tell you how I know that.

After a bout of "Where are the boat keys"-which turned into a battle of the sexes-Team Chick won with: Always look where you least expect them, i.e. toolbox.

We headed out.  Contrary to the norm, we had a beautiful ESE wind, light and variable.  Normally we'd be dealing with 20kts out of the North, at which point we would not have made the trip.

But, variable winds coming from your aft quarter makes for a boring ride.  We tried valiantly with both sails, but finally dropped the main so that we could motor sail with just the full Genoa.  The boat seemed to love that idea and settled into a nice 6.5 kts nice with low RPMs.  About 1.5 hours into the trip, even I was wishing for the North winds, it was boiling.

We made terrific time and made it to Marquesas Keys with plenty of daylight left.  Now, our first attempt anchoring the new boat.  We have a Rocna Anchor, and Tim tried to get me to lay down beside it so we could show how big that sucker is.  Add 100 feet of chain and 200 of regular rode, we have ourselves an anchor.

Now, the two cruising guides we have were horribly against the Marquesas.  But, they didn't explain why.  The Active Captains that spoke badly against it, also did not really explain why.  Please, people, explain why you hate the anchorage, not that it sucks.  Thanks to our new friend James, because without his local knowledge, we might not have made the trip.  His description in our weather conditions was spot on.

So after a quick lesson to my helmsman on how you should read the depth meter and not the chart plotter, we set our anchor.  And it just looked like it sat there.  Little wind on the lee side of the island and the tidal current hadn't kicked in yet.  Hilarious.  I, the anchoring freakout chick, was confident in our anchor--very weird.

I love this chart.  Bombing and strafing target areas.  Whoo hoo.
U.S. and their desire to bomb the shit out of atolls.
But, no atolls in this area were harmed since 1980.

Here's the satellite view if you are really curious.

So, boat nerds, both pics above are north up.  We anchored over on the west side in 10 feet of water, and I can hear the lake people's sphincters clinch over that. (sorry, too much?) In the south west corner you will see two islands.  They are not charted usually, but the north is named Boo Boo Key, and the South is named Tin Tin Key.  We, of course, renamed them to Honey Boo Boo and Rin Tin Tin. We anchored off of Boo Boo Key.

A note to Active Captains. PLEASE, describe what was wrong/right about your anchorage, not IT SUCKS.  Yes, there is a tidal current. We anchored originally true 90 degrees off of it.  We held anchor watch for not one, but four hours so we could go through the first tidal swing and see how we were doing.  If you don't like tidal swings....you are going to be very limited on where to anchor in the Keys-Florida anchoring laws be damned.  But, if you are in a 20kt norther, that would be a HORRIBLE anchorage.  We did it once off of Indian Key, the rock and rolling, wow.

We did notice that with our keel up, we were the first to swing, even before the two catamarans and one power boat there.  Interesting, must keep note of that.  

So, lovely sunset, lovely night under the stars.  The hubby brought out his iPad (read entry about tech twitch) and tried to use the Star Map app, but it doesn't work without a connection. Either he hasn't updated it to use the iPad's built in GPS, or it just sucks I don't know.  We did get it somewhat working, but I know where Orion is, and its opinion and mine were not matching.  Tried to stay up for the moon set, but I was zonked.

Night at anchor.  I did pretty good, this boat also has some stern slap, we might get a damper for it, it isn't a pounding like the Hunter had, but can wake me up.  Our folded down solar panels also block two of our most valuable hatches while at anchor (in tidal swing), we'll have to put them up or eventually move them.