Key West to Isla Mujeres
Hey friends and family, we finally got that weather window we were looking for and took off from Key West on Friday around 5:00 pm. Again, we were blessed with calm seas but unfortunately no wind, so we motor sailed the whole way. The water was the most beautiful color of blue I have ever seen and the one word that seems to fit it the most is "azule". We were amazed to see that we would be in 7000'+ of water. We made our way west from Key West and headed toward the Dry Tortugas where Fort Jefferson is located, something we wanted to see, but it just wasn't going to work out. Turned south and headed straight for Cuba where we caught a counter current and made some good time, 7.5 knots. I had no idea that Cuba was so mountainous and wooded. We were about 12 miles from shore and could see land with our marine binoculars. After leaving the southern tip of Cuba we were in the Yucatan channel, there was some ship traffic, counted 12 ships during our passage, but not one other pleasure boat...guess that is because they are all safely in a hurricane hole by now. About mid way across we hit that heavy northern current and slowed down to 2.5 knots. As the sea floor began to rise plus the current and what wind we had on our nose, we had some pretty uncomfortable sailing then, as the boat was rocking from bow to stern and side to side. This went on until we reached about 300' of water, then the seas and our boat settled down.
 |
We arrived at Isla Mujeres around 4:00 am on Sunday, Father's Day, and hove to about 10 miles offshore till day light....trying to catch some much needed sleep. We motored to the north end of the island and entered a protected lagoon where we set our anchor. This anchorage is just West of a great little marina named El Milagro run by a really nice guy named Eric. We stayed on the hook for a day and then decided to go into the marina for a couple of days or so until we got our Zarpa and were officially cleared in. We hired an agent named Chepo at the Pariaso Club de Yates which is the marina next door to El Milagro. It's also a nice place, but we liked Eric, so decided to go there (EM) instead. Luckily, when we went out to get Island Sol, we got there just as a squall arrived and she started to drag. We had set an awning, (really nice, made by Shade Tree) but had been warned by another cruiser that "people who set shade structures drag" Also, when we first set the hook, a nice guy named Lawrence came over and said "when I bought 400' of chain it changed my life". I asked him how much scope he had out and he said 250'. That seemed a little extreme to me for 15' depth of water (I had out 100' of chain and the new Manson anchor and was sure that was enough but later found out this stretch of sand and grass is known as "the drag strip"). Very aptly named. So, you get little hints of what will work and you need to listen to experience. More scope is better in sand and grass, don't leave your shade structure unattended at anchor. Anyway, we made it to El Milagro where we'll stay until we depart for Guatemala.
The last thing we need to do "officially" is to get our "import fee" for Island Sol. Mexico requires that if you stay more than 5 days, you need to have this document showing you have paid up or your boat can be impounded. Well, we don't need that, so we took the ferry to Puerto Juarez on the mainland (where the Banerjito is located) after lunch only to find that Chepo had duplicated one of the copies of our tourist cards and so we needed another copy, but the official needed to close in 15 minutes, so it's back to the ferry in the AM.
 |
| north side of the island |
No comments:
Post a Comment