Key West Race Week, Day 4

We couldn't even see Andiamo or Pekabu III when we woke up this morning, the fog was so thick. Before we headed in to register at the city marina we had a treat watching a dolphin play cat and mouse with a small fish. He would surface, toss the fish up, dive and resurface to catch the fish again. He did this several times sometimes racing by the boat belly up as he chased his prey. He put on quite a show. The trip in from the mooring is a mile, and slow going with all four of us in the dinghy so it was a little after 10 by the time we got back to the boat. By then the fog had lifted enough for us to see the whole mooring field and surrounding landscape. Everyone but Pete (who had to work) piled on Brunelle and headed back around Fleming Key and out the ship channel in search of the race courses for today. We finally turned on the radar and spotted a large area of purple dots and headed for it!

Eventually silhouettes began to appear. We turned on the VHF to channel 72 and listened to several start sequences and realized we had found the one design fleets. When we got close enough we could see we were in time for the Melges 32's start and the Melges 24's. They were followed by a series of J classes. Luckily the fog continued to burn off and by early afternoon we were treated to the spectacle of over 100 boats flying spinnakers tacking downwind. The PHRF handicap classes had started racing further out, but they all seemed to converge on the same set of buoys at one point. We had a pleasant day in the company of great friends and ended it aboard Andiamo for another pulled together dinner. We heard from Glen and Maureen that they were in need of a new transmission and had moved off the boat into Navy housing while they wait for parts. We hope to connect with them tomorrow. The guys will probably make another trip out to the races while the gals see the sights in Key West. ~~~_/~~~M&D

I wish I had been quicker with the camera to capture more of this dolphin's breakfast ballet!

The inner harbor at Garrison Bight is lined with several piers which are mostly filled with houseboats. I liked the whimsical roof on the yellow one.

From starts to finishes the races were fun to watch.

As the day progressed the lighting got better and we also got a little closer. It was fun to see the mix of old and new boats. The C&C 34 (red and white star cut spinnaker) has been around since the 1970s. The Melges 32's did a nice job of posing for me!