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February 25, 2015  Day 96 South for Winter

At anchor in the Everglades
Little Shark River, FL

Joining other boats at anchor in the beautiful
Little Shark River

We left the Rod and Gun Club at 8:45 under a sunny sky and retraced our route down the Barron River into the Gulf.  We could see a ridge of clouds and as soon as we entered the Gulf, we were in fog, and the fog lasted for three hours. We have radar and were fine, but it is still more intense, especially watching out for crab pots. At least the water was calm and we had a good cruise.  The sun came out at 12:30 and we were in awe of the water. We could see nothing but calm water and it was a beautiful color with the sun reflecting on it.

We arrived at the Little Shark River at 2:50 and anchored for the night. By the end of the afternoon ten boats were anchored here.  We were all lined up in a row because the river is narrow, but fortunately long enough to accommodate several boats. We were treated to herons, two dolphins and surprisingly a huge turtle that surfaced near the bow of our boat. It had to be three feet wide.

We also enjoyed our dinner of pork tenderloin which we had cooking in the crock pot all day.

Tomorrow we will depart at dawn and travel over 80 miles in the Gulf to Key West.  There is a front moving in and we are concerned about waves building up. We will travel at a higher speed than normal to make this an eight hour day. We look forward to spending a few days and maybe a week in Key West. This is our first trip there and we know there are many things to see and experience.