Our passage from Bradenton got underway the middle of January 2005. We were anxious to leave Regatta Pointe Marina. Not only was the marina very expensive comapred to Texas, but the weather was cold. Our friends, Nicola and Noel, had arrived from England. They were going to make the passage with us, so we were all ready to go. On the day we left the marina, we fueled up and then anchored in the Manatee river so we could get a very early start the next day. A Norther had come through, so that night while at anchor in the river the temperature got down to 39 degrees. The good news was that when we left the next morning, every mile was going south, so it got warmer. The even better news was that the steering worked! The steering failure on the gulf crossing was the reason we were in Bradenton instead of Tampa. It had taken three weeks to get the steering fixed. The delay was mostly the holidays, but the difficulty in obtaining parts for the hydraulic ram caused a delay.
The passage to Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas was a wonderful overnight sail. We sailed a fair amount, but had to end up with several hours of motor sailing. We anchored in the anchorage next to the Fort which is on Garden Key. I had last been here in 1992. Since then the anchorage is now split into two. A north and a south anchorage. Over the years, Garden Key and Bush Key have grown together.
We spent a good portion of the day visiting the fort. We also did some relaxing. We were only going to spend one day at Fort Jefferson, because another Norther was coming and we did not want to be caught at Fort Jefferson, or at sea. The next morning we got underway and did an overnight passage to Marathon in the Florida Keys. This passage was also uneventful. We met a very good friend from my days at Digital, Paul, at Pauncho's fuel dock in Marathon. He came out to the anchorage with us, found us a great spot and we anchored. We got settled in, set a second anchor and waited for the Norther.
