Today we left World Wide Sportsman Marina for a nice trip to a Florida state park on a close by key called Lignumvitae. The trip tried my navigation skills as alway around the lower keys with very little water in any channel. We were leaving the "Little Basin with only about 4' of water on an outgoing tide. It was only because the low was supposed to be higher than normal by about 6". I felt the boat touch from time to time until I got to the deeper water of Yellow Shark Channel. The channel led to an intersection channel again with not much water until we felt our way into the dock at Lignumvitae. Ranger Robbin Tangen met us and welcomed us to the island. It has been sort of protected since 1919 and finally turned over to the state parks and recreation. Lignumvitae is a tree that grows very slowly. We saw one that could not have bee 15' tall and it was estimated to be 400-500 years old. There were several rare trees there. Iron wood that was used on the decks of submarines in WWII as if a piece came off it sank. I thought all wood would float. There was a very interesting house built out of quarried coral from the island. The island had been a coral reef thousands of years ago and was submerged at that time and now is 14' above sea level.
So, we had a wind pinning us to the dock and the rangers helped me get off and told us where the mooring balls were. That's where we watched the sun go down. It's pretty dark with no moon at this time.
Picture is the rangers helping Liquid Therapy out of the slip at the park.