Marathon - A harbor tour and we find another Beneteau 423

There is a new marina going in at the far end of the canal next to Publix. Not much here yet

Abiding our time today. We took a harbor tour this afternoon. The mooring field now has at least 7 open moorings. Boaters are finally starting to leave in force. We paid for a week's stay but we'll probably leave on Tuesday for the Rodriguez Key anchorage. The forecast is for light winds under 10 kts for the next two days, ideal for us. We wouldn't mind winds from the south at higher velocities but it's rare to get what you want.

I always stop by to see a fellow boater in a Beneteau 423

Even though there are a few empty moorings, the place is still full of boats. You are only supposed to anchor in designated anchorage areas but there seems to  be a lot of boats that don't follow the guidelines, many of which I've recognized from years past. I don't think they've moved in all that time. Regardless, we follow the anchoring rules (you don't want a knock on your hull at 11:00 pm from the local police boat that you have to move). That happened to us one time when we anchored in Cape May out of the channel but when the wind changed at night, we found ourselves swinging out into the channel and the local Coast Guard which has a station in Cape May shined a light into our ports at a late hour saying we had to move. That was our first trip south and the experience stayed with us.

We like our sunsets

The whole Marathon area is a rabbit warren of canals. Some are big enough to anchor in but the Marathon rule is that you cannot anchor in a man-made canal. I don't know the logic of that but the local police with ask you to move if you do. For this visit it wasn't a problem since we took an open mooring the first day of our arrival.

Provided the forecast doesn't change, we're out of here Tuesday morning.