MIami CSI - Crusing In Style!

SHIP'S LOG:

I was surprised but not really at how stiff I was this morning. Wow, six miles of rowing can sure take it out of you. My shoulders especially were really sore and tight, but after a morning swim, everything felt just fine.

It was another one of those terrible Miami days, high was about 80, no clouds, a little wind and a lot of humidity. This is suffering like I haven't known since last August!

Being Saturday, everyone with a boat was on it. Some working on the boat, some like me just sitting and enjoying the weather, more going out fishing and a lot just rushing up and down burning gas and having a great time. Speaker systems are very big on runabouts down here and for the most part they blare out what is probably Cuban music. It really sounds great except when two or more compete with each other and then the music becomes noise and it is over powering. But since the boats are moving at a high rate of speed, the noise quickly passes. There is a local spot called Belle Island at the head of this "canal" and lots of boats congregate there for picnics and swing and whatever. Today you could barely see the beach for the boats on it or anchored off it.

Speaking of boats, I notice the boats around me since I have been here and as I was looking them over again today I spotted one that didn't look quite right. Actually it was the mast I saw, the boat itself blocked from view by other boats or so I thought. When the wind shift, I happened to look toward that mast and that is all that it was. Evidently, the boat had sunk on its mooring or at anchor. How long ago this happened, I have no way of knowing but it must have been a while at least for there was a red flag on one of the shrouds so people would avoid it. It is tough to estimate how big it is so maybe I will go over tomorrow to check it out. This makes two anchorages where there have been sunken boats down here in Florida.

Four huge ocean liners came in yesterday and loaded up and went out again today. I don't know how many people were on them but together they could have populated a small town if they were all filled. They all started playing Caribbean music when they unloaded and kept it up all day until they reloaded and all departed around 4:30pm, music still playing. I am not sure where they are bound but it ain't New York!

This anchorage that i am in off the Miami Yacht Club turns out to be the only free, no time limit anchorage in all of Miami. Every place else you get approached and told to move on after 7 days. I didn't realize it when I dropped my hook last week but I made a good choice nonetheless. Sometime next week though I will have to go to a marina for a"pump & dump" and perhaps I will use that as an excuse to move to a different location or head further south. This warm, sultry weather makes it so hard to get energized about moving.