Catching up 2

So many of the pictures I tried to take with my phone come into the computer sideways and refuse to post correctly so you'll have to trust me that we did visit a few cool pubs with some cool people.  We really appreciated meeting people with vast amounts of cruising experiences to places we want to go someday.  Folks are so generous with their knowledge and insights.  One couple, Leda and Roland, spent over an hour going over parts of the Bahamas we've never visited and they loaned us their car to make grocery runs.  We were able to pay them back a little by helping with some electrical issues and making a forepeak shade to protect their dinghy while stored on deck for the summer.  Other folks gave us detailed info on going up the ICW to the Chesapeake and others helped us find our way along Florida Bay.  That is the beauty of the cruising crowd, people are willing to share their time and talents.  Everyone is blessed with different levels of resources and all seem willing to generously share.  I'm happy we are part of it all.  Sometimes things just work out better than planned making up for the other times where plans get canceled.  Coming back from Boca Chica, we decided to check out some of the places we are learned about at one of the informal seminars.  One was Newfound Harbor.  Once there and safely anchored, we found several other boats with folks we knew from the mooring field and they knew about a great pub nearby.  We all went out the next  day to snorkel Looe Key.  Nice surprise for us after being disappointed in not making the Tortugas.

So much damage to the landscape is still visible from Hurricane Irma.  So many of
the little spits of mangrove islands are dead.  Up close, you can see some have
tangles of debris in among the branches including boats.

Following the leader.  They know where they are going!

We went up this LONG canal.  We would never have guessed there was
such a nice bar/restaurant up this way.  Turned out to have an awesome
band playing that night and one of the boats brought a cribbage board
along so just about a perfect evening.

Usual mix of houses along a keys shore.  This was Ramrod Key.

Sunset on Newfound Harbor.

Looe Key is still a nice reef with a variety of hard and soft corals and tons
of reef fish.  We saw a shark, large spotted eagle ray, barracudas and the usual
assortment of colorful tropical fish.  The boats are only allowed to stay on mooring balls
so the anchors don't tear up the reef.  You sometimes have to wait for a ball to be vacated
but we went early enough and all 4 boats managed to snag a ball.

The lines to the mooring ball were covered with small clinging creatures.

Trying to dry out the dive gear.  We had rinsed it but the rain you see in the
far right corner of the picture threatened to rinse it again,

This beautifully restored clipper ship was on it's way West.  These boats
used to ply the waters all over the world bringing goods from one
place to another.

On our way from Looe Key, we had hoped to anchor off of Bahia Honda
and visit the state park.  We tried 4 times to get our anchor to hold, even with
exact coordinates from where anchors had held before.  Sadly, the sand has
been so scoured away by storms, there wasn't anything for the anchor to sink into.
This is the old RR bridge.  A span section has been removed so sailboats can enter the space between
the old and new bridges.

Bahia Honda State park.

We passed this sad, lone tree on a small isle on our way back to Boot Key.