Monday, 23 December - Bob Dahmer and I got in our kayaks and cruised the north edge of the mangroves today to see what we could find after all this recent wind. I ended up with a two gallon fuel tank for a Suzuki outboard motor, of which I'll try to find the owner, as a nice, large, blue fender which I'll clean up and keep. All the barnacles on it indicate that it has been in the water quite awhile.

Tuesday, 24 December - Christmas Eve - I cleaned up that fender and gas tank this morning. I,also, got an invitation to go to M/V Interlude, owned by Pete and Dee Schwartz, for hor d'oeurves and spent the evening in the company of about 20 other guests, most of whom I already know, but also made some new friends. Interlude is a motor vessel about the length of Island Time, but much more spacious. Motor vessels are built with less tapering at the bow and stern and about twice freeboard, or height out of the water. I got a tour of their engine room with space to walk around the two 120 horse power engines plus a built-in auxiliary generator. The engine room also had space for a huge roll-away type tool chest and work bench, but I'd hate to have to pay for the fuel in the 900 gallon fuel tanks every time you want to go somewhere.

Wednesday, 25 December - Christmas Day - The Christmas pot luck dinner was this afternoon. About 180 people showed up at the marina today to celebrate. Lots of really good food, then, later, people on about ten of the dinghies in the harbor had decorated their boats with lights and toured the harbor after dark. M/V Conky Tonkin, all light up with thousands of lights and Santa and his reindeer also took a spin around the harbor. Quite the show.

Thursday, 26 December - Much of today was spent at the marina office online updating apps and charts, then later joined several other boaters at the Hurricane for dinner and music.

Friday, 27 December - After I performed my duties as net controller for the morning Cruiser's Net this morning, I had to ready the boat to sail out toward the "back country", which is what the locals call the area that includes the myriad small islands on the Gulf side of the main Keys. We had a very nice sail over to Cocoanut Key, a tiny island just north of the Seven Mile Bridge. A beautiful day, nice breeze, smooth water. The only thing not perfect was when I picked up a lobster pot and had to stop and bring it to the surface with my grappling hook to cut the line. The line didn't come all the way off. I still had the float bumping on the bottom of the boat so I couldn't start the engine to anchor, but, luckily, was able to anchor in the lee of the island without the need to have power. Bob volunteered to check everybody's anchors and untangled the line from my propeller. At 5 o'clock we went to Bob and Ellie's boat for dinner, libations and to watch the sun and moon set. A very nice evening under the stars.

Saturday, 28 December - Right after breakfast the five of us, Bob, Ellie, Jeff, Sheila, and I got in our kayaks and circumnavigated Cocoanut Key (yes, that's spelled correctly). This Key, along with many others was severely damaged by hurricane Irma two years ago. Almost all of the mangrove trees on the south end of the island were totally killed off. Some were blown over, but, I think, most were just totally stripped of their leaves, battered by the salt water in which they live, and couldn't recover. A few barracuda were seen, as were a couple of sharks and many cormorants.
                    Back at the boats, the "boys" headed out to the next island to the west in Jeff's dinghy to see if we could locate a large group of bomb holes in the bottom of the ocean where Teakettle Key used to be used for bombing practice and to see if we could find any lobster in the holes. Well, to make a long story short, we weren't very successful at either of those activities. I think we may have located one bomb hole and no lobsters of legal size. However, Bob, diving in the one hole we found, came across a large horse conch attached to and eating a queen conch. The queen conchs eat seagrass and the horse conchs are carnivores. This horse conch had almost totally devoured the queen, so much so that while we had it out of the water, they became separated and the last vestige of the queen fell out into the ocean leaving Bob the new owner of a beautiful, large, and clean queen conch shell. It's illegal to harvest queen conchs, but the horse conchs are not protected. In reality, Bob didn't harvest the queen, he only collected the empty shell, which is legal.
                    As soon as we got back to the boats, we quickly got ready to weigh anchors and sail to the larger island, Bahia Honda, so we can explore it tomorrow. We sailed into the late afternoon sun and it was only by the grace of God that I didn't pick up any lobster pots with my propeller. The engine wasn't running, but the propeller still rotates as I sail and can tangle a lobster pot line very easily. Sailing into the sun, I couldn't see the floats attached to the pots until I was right up on them, if at all. In fact, I bet I saw at least ten floats only after I had passed them; some close, some not. We finished the day off with meat balls, shrimp, and margaritas aboard Jeff and Sheila's boat, Nautilus.

Sunday, 29 December - After a quick breakfast, the five of us boarded our kayaks and headed along the shore of Bahia Honda Key, exploring the shallow water and shoreline until we arrived at the west end of the island. We passed under the bridge, then went ashore, only to find that we weren't supposed to beach our kayaks where they were. We launched again, passed under the old Bahia Honda Bridge to the Atlantic side and came ashore again. We then explored a bit of Bahia Honda State Park, had some ice cream cones, and walked out onto the old bridge to see the old construction and the view. The old Bahia Honda Bridge was built on top of the old railroad trestle. Back in the kayaks, we headed back to the boats, then the "boys" went out lobster fishing. We saw lots of lobster, but very few that were big enough to catch. We finished off the day with lobsters and noodles prepared by Ellie on S/V Christi, plus a few adult beverages.

Monday, 30 December - What a great day. Jeff and Sheila on S/V Nautilus headed back to Boot Key Harbor this morning, then Bob, Ellie, and I kayaked the north shore of Bahia Honda Key and saw Bonnet Head sharks, Nurse sharks, sting rays, Nudibranchs, Blue Crabs, other various fishes, and several kinds of sponges, including barrel and vase sponges, and many other sea plants and animals that we have no idea what they are. We returned to our boats and, since there was virtually no wind, we motored back over to Teakettle Key to explore the bomb holes better. It was only about an hour of motoring, and with good visibility sailing away from the sun, it was an easy and pleasurable run. We still weren't exactly sure of the location of the bomb holes, but each of us seems to be anchored right in the middle of a different bomb hole. Bob and I both snorkeled to explore and each of us got a decent lobster that we'll probably have for dinner soon. Tonight we had some incredible mani and sweet potatoes, prepared by Ellie on Christinaki at sunset, then we swapped stories until about 10 o'clock, just after the moon set and before I headed out in my kayak into the darkness to find my boat.

Tuesday, 31 December - New Year's Eve 2020 - This morning Bob raised anchor to move a little way just to be in a different location to snorkel, but he couldn't find more of the bomb holes, so he ended right back where he started. Meanwhile, I rinsed all my dive gear in preparation to head back to Boot Key Harbor for New Year's festivities this evening. Our favorite band, the duo Fiddle Rock is playing at Dockside this evening. Actually, I think they'll be accompanied by a drummer and bass guitar player tonight. It should be a fun time...Nope. I was wrong. It was just the duo without accompaniment, and they rocked the very appreciative house. It was really nice to share the incoming year with lots of my boating friends.

Wednesday, 1 January - Happy New Year! Today was different. I was one of nine "official judges" for the harbor's New Year's Day Chili Cookoff. No, I didn't enter my usual can of Dennison's canned chili. Just because I don't cook doesn't mean that I can't be a judge. There was quite a variety of "mixin's" in the recipes, and I thought that most were pretty poor. I wasn't surprised, however, that a fellow Texan won for best overall.

All my best wishes for a Great New Year!

I've included a photo of the harbor's winning Christmas Lighted Boat Parade and about 20 photos from our sailing adventure, including some that I and you will probably know what they are, but some that I have no idea. I hope you enjoy them.