Life Aboard a 40' DeFever Trawler
June 11-17, 2017 June 11, Dry Tortugas to Marquesa Keys - a bumpy ride + a stow away! It was finally time to leave the Dry Tortugas and our plan was to head to the Marquesa Keys to anchor for the night before heading into Key West. The weather forecast called for 2-4ft seas which may not sound … [Read more...] about Dry Tortugas to Key West and home
Thursday, Friday and Saturday, June 8-10, 2017 Thursday - Weather forecast is looking better After 4 days of cloudy skies, high winds, and rough seas, we finally had a decent day forecasted. Although Thursday morning called for SW winds near 20 knots and seas at 5-7ft it was to calm down … [Read more...] about Finally some decent weather in the Dry Tortugas!
Tuesday and Wednesday, June 6-7, 2017 While our hometown of Fort Myers was getting hammered with unusually large amounts of rain, we too were facing the same conditions in the Dry Tortugas. Since there is no wifi or cell service in the Dry Tortugas, it's difficult to predict the weather. To get … [Read more...] about Poor weather conditions continue in the Dry Tortugas
Monday, June 5, 2017 Sukha and crew departed on Monday morning to head back to Key West, while our weather forecast continued to look grim. It was a cloudy, gloomy morning with SSE winds at 15kt and 2ft seas. We decided that this would be the best day to try to get in some diving since the … [Read more...] about Spearfishing at the Tortugas Bank
Sunday, June 4, 2017 On our second day in the Dry Tortugas, the weather still wasn't cooperating with high winds and seas that makes for poor diving conditions. With the winds coming out of the southeast, we decided to try snorkeling Little Africa since it is on the northwest side of Loggerhead … [Read more...] about Snorkeling the Dry Tortugas with Sukha and crew
Friday - Saturday, June 2-3, 2017 Once we got our generator fixed, we were ready for the Dry Tortugas. We had been watching the weather and it was forecasted to be a bit on the lumpy side (15-20mph winds and 3' to 5' seas) for our departure so we decided to head to the Marquesa Keys to anchor … [Read more...] about Marquesa to the Dry Tortugas: Weather watching and meeting up with Sukha
The morning we left for Jewfish Basin, Randy discovered a fuel leak in our generator. He troubleshooted the issue for a couple of hours before we left and discovered it was due to an injector line that might have had a hairline crack in it. Since it wasn't leaking too bad, we decided to head on to … [Read more...] about Jewfish Basin and an early arrival to Key West
Since we are meeting our friends in the Dry Tortugas later this week, we decided to use the Memorial Day holiday to our advantage and head south to anchor out in the Keys prior to that. Our first stop along the way was to anchor at Cape Roman near Marco Island. We didn't get to Cape Romano until … [Read more...] about Headed south: Marco Island to the Content Keys
The last couple of weeks have been busy on Blue Turtle. We've been gearing up for our annual trip down to the Florida Keys and Dry Tortugas. This year will make our 4th year heading south to our favorite cruising destination. We've been working diligently to get Blue Turtle ready and stocked up … [Read more...] about Provisioning for the Dry Tortugas
Last week we had my sister, Tracy, and nephews, Jack & Ryan, aboard for spring break. Since the kids were all out of school for a full week, our original plan was to head to the Keys and anchor out near Key West to do some spear fishing and kayaking and then head into Key West for the weekend … [Read more...] about Spring Break cruising “stay-cation”
