Week One aka Hell Week

Our first week in the mooing field was filled with a lot of ups and downs. Well, more downs than ups. Literally, our dinghy went down… under water. We sunk the dinghy on day one of us “getting settled” into the Key West Mooring Field. 

Though, I guess it did “come back up” technically, but she was toast. The inflatable tubes came completely unattached from the hard bottom and transom, leaving us with a sinking dinghy that completely fills with water.

Now What

Well, since we live in the mooring field and require a dinghy to get from our boat to land, we had no choice but to go buy another dinghy. That was day 2, the day after we had just brought our cars down from Southwest Florida.

Guess where we bought our new (used) dinghy? Southwest Florida! Yup. We turned around the next day and drove another 5 hours up to Marco Island to buy “RumRunner” our 13ft Boston Whaler that immediately became a vital part of our family. 

Not So Fast

But the ride home was not a smooth 5-hour trip back down the keys. No, it actually took us 10 hours, since the wheel bearing on the trailer gave out half-away across Alligator Alley, not even 1 hour into our trip. 

So, we limped our way down the keys at 30 mph max, having to stop to let the bearing cool off every hour or so. But we DID MAKE IT, at 3am, in time to feed our then STARVING kitty cats. 

Really, you have to watch the video for the full effect.

Don’t Stop The Party

That wasn’t the only fun we had during hell week. There was also a fire on a neighboring boat in the mooring field. Will and our new boat neighbor friend, Jesse, jumped on his Whaler with fire extinguishers ready to assist. 

But, it turned out to be a small grill fire that was tamed before they arrived. They weren’t the only ones who rushed to help though. At least two other boaters had come to the rescue, which was pretty cool to see.

Luckily things calmed down from there, and we survived Week Two with less drama… other than fixing my work laptop that became a casualty to the sunken dinghy incident, but we won’t bring that up.

Here’s a nice Hell Week sunset instead.