Wyvern's Wanderings

Charlie and I were up early and weighed anchor before 7:00. Charlie had went out several times and brought in about 20 feet of chain. Then he would let it set and most of the mud would rinse off. He did it several times and we didn't have a mud bath on deck. We motored to Marathon Marina fuel dock. Burdines and Pancho's were already full with boats at the dock. Put 30 gallons of diesel and 50 gallons of water, plus got 2 gallons of dinghy gas. Cost was just under $170. Should get us home though. We put the main and the mizzen up as soon as we cleared the channel. Didn't put the jib up right away, because we were going downwind and we were going to jibe (change the sails to the other side with the wind behind us) when we got to the opening of the 7 Mile bridge. We sailed with all three sails most of the 37 nm to the Little Shark. Could have sailed the whole distance, but we stayed upwind of our rhumb line so we could hit the beaches south of the Little Shark. Jack and Kris opted to sail on to the anchorage. The first beach we stopped at, our walk was cut short because there was an alligator just off shore in the water. This is his habitat, so we relinquished the beach to him and went back to the dinghy. We did go back his direction in the dinghy thinking he might go up on the beach and we could see how big he was, but he wouldn't go ashore and we weren't going to get too close in a rubber boat. His head looked like it was about 18 inches or bigger. It wasn't a tiny gator. We went back to the Wyvern and motored with just the jib out another 5 miles north and stopped at Upper Cape. No alligators or even signs of any on this beach. We picked up 15 Styrofoam floats and some decent shells today. I hang this kind of floats in the lanai at the house. They are painted different colors and are beat up enough to have character. At the Upper Cape, we anchored too shallow and were aground when we returned to the boat. Charlie went out in the dinghy and picked up the anchor, then pushed the bow of the boat around. The bottom here is soft mud, so with him pushing the bow and then me powering forward we were able to get off fairly easily. Again we motored with the jib another 5 miles to the Little Shark arriving at 6:30. Said hello to Caprice and anchored the boat. I had put up the screens on the cockpit, because the Little Shark is notorious for bugs in the summer. After we anchored, I helped Charlie pull up the dinghy on the davits and the noseeums attacked. Charlie didn't even finish tying off the ropes that keep it from swinging. Again, this is their habitat and we closed ourselves in the screening and let them have it. Had our salmon and salad in the cockpit with the little buggers clinging to the outside of the screen. The anchorage is extremely still and calm. When the sun went down, the wind just died. Probably about 10 other boats anchored. The wind was mostly east today, but a bit northeast at times. We had a brisk sail this morning with winds about 15 kts. It started to subside after noon. The seas just had a small swell with wind chop on top. Wyvern was pretty close hauled and stayed heeled over pretty good all morning. Hard to stay on the seat on the high side of the boat. We also had to maneuver around the crab pots. Not quite as many as we had in February when we left, but still plenty to keep you carefully watching. The skies started out mostly clear and ended up with a lot of clouds. Not stormy ones though. When the sun wasn't out, it was chilly out on the water. A good day. We only have 3 more days until we get home.