Welcome to Coconut Grove - Day 132 - Key Largo to Miami, FL

Our day began by checking the weather.  The temperature in Chicago at 8:00 AM was +1 degree with a windchill of -9 with a forecast of snow for tomorrow.  Key Largo was 73 degrees at 8:00 AM with the 30% chance of showers and a slight chance a thunderstorm with the passage of a cold front in the late afternoon. 

Guided Discovery at the Pilot House fuel dock

The next order of business was calls to marinas to secure a reservation.  The first was to our preferred destination, the Ocean Reef Marina at the north end of Key Largo.  Unfortunately, Ocean Reef is a private club and they do not accept riff raff.  I even checked if the had reciprocity with the Sarasota and Bird Key Yacht Clubs hoping I might be able to use connections to get in.  Turns out Ocean Reef is too high class for those clubs.

We were hoping to get into Ocean Reef, which is approximately 15 miles from Pilot House.  Unfortunately, there are no other marinas on the Atlantic side of the Keys between Pilot House and Miami that accommodate a 50 foot boat.   This left a 57 mile run to Coconut Grove as our next option.

Thus our next call was to the Dinner Key Marina in Coconut Grove.  Dinner Key, a large marina with 580 slips, had no room due to the boat show.  Then we called Grove Key and got the same answer.  They recommended Grove Isle, just a mile further north and we got lucky, they had room for us.  In retrospect, making reservation in Miami 6 days before the boat show was a bit optimistic.  Note: We would not learn until we arrived at Grove Isle that we got very lucky.

The next order of business was deciding whether to move from Key Largo to Miami as the cold frontal passage and the possibility of thunderstorms had a direct bearing on our decision.  Essentially, the forecast for our new destination, Miami's Coconut Grove, was essentially the same as Key Largo's. What gives us confidence is our ability to monitor to weather in real time using our Sirus Satellite Weather system.

The left side shows the front about 200 miles north of our position (the black boat shaped symbol at the southern tip of Florida) with storms breaking out in advance of the front over the Gulf and Atlantic.  These storms were moving to the northeast and therefore were not a threat.  The screen to the right shows our position along the Keys.

As we mentioned in the article yesterday, Pilot House was not a good place for us.  The combination of the tides, being at the fuel dock and a fixed set of stairs made getting on and off the boat difficult, especially for the Furry Kid.

Our recently acuired ramp helped. Note the steep slope

We decided to leave at 11:00 AM on the rising tide.  This gave us an hour to walk Kodi and get some exercise ourselves.  We returned to the Community Center Park and played Frisbee with Kodi and walked their track.

On the way back to the boat I took a detour to shoot some photos from the other side of the harbor.  In the process I walked by a stack of crab traps.  The thought of setting them of fire did cross my mind but alas I do not carry matches.  Good thing.  Taking out this bunch would not have solved the crab pot problem.

Tempting but I could not find a match

We departed at 11:12 AM and headed down the narrow canal. We issued a securite' message on the VHF radio announcing our move to determine if there were any boats in the canal heading toward us.  Fortunately there were none.

View of the canal looking east

Six minutes later we were out and into Hawk Channel.  As soon as we reached "deep water" (8 feet) we ran the engines up to 2100 RPM and headed northeast toward Miami at 23 MPH.  The light southwest winds (10 to 15 MPH) gave us a 2 foot following sea and a smooth ride.  Best of all, there were VERY FEW crap pots.

Two hours later we left Hawk Channel and turned west into the Key Biscayne Channel.

View of Key Biscayne Light from the Biscayne Channel

As we traversed the channel we encounter some strange structures on the sandbars. 

Strange structure of a sandbar on the north side of the Biscayne Channel

A check of the weather on Sirus revealed that our decision to move had been correct.  At 2:05 PM. the screen show our position in the Miami area.  The left screen show that the front has move 50 miles south with rain showers ahead of the front.  These too were moving to the northeast. 

We departed Biscayne Channel and crossed Biscayne Bay and 21 minutes later entered the Deering Channel.  Essentially, you have to go west then south to reach Grove Isle Marina as shown in the screen photo below.

On the way into Grove Isle we passed some interesting buildings, one of which was also a photo on the Sea Ray Navigator screen.

We arrived at Grove Isle at 2:21 PM and they assigned us to the "T" on E dock.  We liked this assignment as it allows us to launch the dingy.

Guided Discovery at the Grove Isle Marina

Now here's the best part.  The Grove Isle Marina has a first class hotel, restaurant, spa, workout room, heated pool, seating around the island, beautiful landscaping and first class security.  And the price is $2.50 per foot or $125 per day.  What a deal.  We will be here until the 16th when we then move four miles north to the Miami Beach Marina for our boat show and reunion with friends.

First class restaurant with unique outside seating

Condo residences

We caught a sunset as walked to Chart House, which is about a mile south of Grove Isle at the Grove Key Marina.  Dinner was excellent.

Sunset as viewed from the Grove Isle Marina Bridge

Dressed "up" for dinner at the Chart House.  No riff raff us

Another spectacular day on the water and land.

Written by Les.