Playing African Queen On Sugarloaf Key

There's a fine line between stubbornness and determination, and I dare say the line falls somewhere between success and failure. It's too early to say for sure but it seems possible, nay likely that Robert's inveterate tinkering may have finally struck gold in the search for outboard reliability. We pondered the problem of sudden and complete refusal to run. Robert was convinced it was a fuel problem. I wondered if a carburettor gloat was sticking. I have a grasp of theoretical mechanics but the practical aspect of digging into delicate machinery fills me with trepidation.

Not so Robert who found a carburettor float filled with fuel, where it was supposed to be filled with air. Thus after a while the float would lose buoyancy and shut down the flow of fuel. Eureka! You can see the dark part of the u-shaped float which was filled with gasoline and should have been light gray and filled with air.

The discovery and replacement of the defective float required a test drive which would involve putting oneself into the tender arms of providence and faith that fatal defect had in fact been found and remedied. Off I went, across Cudjoe Bay and up the channel between the mangroves at the southern end of a Sugarloaf Key. I had Tow Boat US's phone number in my cellphone. Just in case, you understand.

Ten minutes after leaving my canal I was deep in the greenery of the main channel, wide and deep, and easy to plane through if you have a mind to. I was into puttering, it was such a lovely day.

Idle speed is a little low on the Yamaha so I had to pay attention to maneuvering close to the bushes but it was running fine, planing across open water at 24 miles an hour (20 knots) according to my brilliant phone GPS app.

Just before the old State Road 939 bridge remnants I turned south off the main channel and took off down what the charts call Tarpon Channel. The opening was side and deep so even though the tide was running strong and fast we powered through the gap quite easily.

There is plenty of room for a 14 foot skiff, and the constant tidal action scours the bottom, so the channel is deep, looking straight down at the sand and weed bottom it looked about six feet most of the time. Deep enough to drown me in any event.

It is a desolate stretch of water winding back and forth like a tormented snake out of sight of anything but green leaves and blue sky.

It is in these peculiar tropical environs that one thinks of movies that play on the strangeness of such surroundings. Katherine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart messing about in the jungles of East Africa comes to mind. They shot The African Queen in Africa for the most part, even though the boat itself is restored and offers yours in Key Largo these days. And it's time I paid it a visit.

They could have filmed it here!

 

 

 

Red mangroves grow out of salt water directly filtering the salt out into their leaves. But it's no place for humans or dogs to take a walk.

Some of the mangroves grow taller, looking from a distance like hillocks but it is an illusion as underneath it's all just salt water. The apparent end of the channel was also an illusion as a sharp ninety degree turn opened up as I got closer.

Tarpon Creek is all oxbows and the channel winds back and forth requiring sharp turns and patience. This is actually a ninety degree angle rendered thus by the camera:

Getting closer of open water dead clumps of seagrass start to appear everywhere, as annoying here as on open water. Except here I didn't get my prop clogged by the stuff which was nice.

 

This small side channel could be explored in a kayak:

Human intervention helps keep the main channel navigable, as shown by these saw marks:

I did not see much wildlife, a flash of white over the trees and the bird was gone. For the rest of the trip, nothing. To see wildlife you generally have to linger...next time I'd bring shade and more time to lounge around in a comfortable beach chair to see who or what might happen by.

As it was the test ride was over so when we came out into open water...

...it was time to head home.

Rain threatened vaguely, giving a little drama to the return run across Cudjoe Bay.

So far so good, no imminent engine failure.

 

Posted with Blogsy

Key West's Palm Reader

The news item below comes from the Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago, a country noted for oil exploration, carnival celebrations and lively newspapers, in the British tradition. The news from this newspaper is surprising and shocking. Not that I go in for palmistry but he was a fixture on Duval Street and now he's dead. As much as it's a cliche, you really don't know when your time is up, so act accordingly.

Florida man killed in San Fernando

By Trevor Watson

Story Created: Sep 9, 2014 at 10:31 AM ECT

Story Updated: Sep 9, 2014 at 11:06 AM ECT 

FAMED Hindu palm reader Mahadeo Jerrybandhan was shot and killed in an apparent robbery attempt at his family's home in San Fernando last night.

Jerrybandhan, a resident of Key West Florida, was shot in a bedroom of his son's home at Cooper Street, where he was vacationing.

Family members said they heard a single shot at around 9.30p.m. and found Jerrybandhan dead. It is suspected that the killer hid in an overgrown lot across the road from family house.

Jerrybandhan, 74, lived at Key West, Florida, and was a respected and much sought after palmist.

The Police Service issued a statement today, making no reference to the murder, but reported responding to a shooting, and finding a loaded gun and marijuana at a nearby pan yard.

The Police Service stated: Around 11:30 pm on Monday 8th September 2014, a party of police officers attached to the Southern Division under the supervision of Constable Richardson was on mobile patrol when they received information relative to a report of shooting at Cooper Street, San Fernando. The officers immediately responded and upon reaching in the vicinity of Pleasantville Avenue, Pleasantville they became suspicious of an opened pan yard gate. The officers made checks in the area and carried out a search on the premises. Subsequently the officers found one black plastic bag containing one Revolver with six rounds of ammunition and a plastic bucket containing a black bag with several packets of Marijuana weighing 3.76kg with an estimated street value of $56,400.00 dollars. Enquires are continuing. 

Abandoned Boats In The Keys

Driving out of Key West I saw this beached lump of fiberglass resting comfortably on the grass. It appears to be a wreck that has been hauled to shore at vast taxpayer expense, hopefully to be removed, sawn up into little pieces and buried forever in a mainland landfill. The problem of derelict boats is huge in  the Keys, where people come and dream of a cheap life in the tropics and find themselves living an unnatural life in a fiberglass bleach bottle in one of the many anchorages around these islands. They laughingly call themselves sailors, but they aren't; they are liveaboards, people who can no more travel by boat than  by magic carpet.

This sad wreck could have looked like this perhaps, a home for a while, then abandoned by an owner who went to the hospital, to jail, or back North to relatives willing to give them a second chance:

Life at anchor is a romantic possibility but the tedium of maintaining the boat, dragging drinking water out to the boat and then taking your trash back to shore, plus finding a way to commute to a job and sitting out hot weather and wet rainy weather in a space the size of a broom closet can wear on the most well intentioned boater. So, slowly slowly the boats get abandoned.

And, once abandoned their fittings below the waterline inevitably corrode or the hulls fill with rainwater and slip beneath the waves. Only, the waters around here are shallow enough that the sunken former homes present less the appearance of the Titanic and more the appearance of a random iceberg. And they can be just as lethal, unlit at night and not easily seen even by day. So the particularly egregious ones get hauled to shore, cut into pieces and hauled away at vast public expense. Monroe County estimates  it spends north of $150,000 a year  clearing these boats.

The problem is the boats are someone's property and as much as they need to be removed the county has to go through complex reporting requirements to establish they are abandoned. No one wants the government taking private property willy-nilly, I guess! Then there is the problem of fiberglass which is completely indestructible and doesn't deteriorate in sun, saltwater, or under the effects of radioactive  fallout. It is the world's least biodegradable product ever. A boat built in 1970 will be as solid and sailable, all other things being equal, as the day it was built. Amazing stuff, but really hard to get rid of; a permanent mixture of resin glue and glass fiber strands hardened and never again to decompose!

Monroe County has an  office dedicated to the removal of these boats, but they can't keep up. The blight it seems will never quite go away.

Southernmost Point, Key West

 I think every couple of years I take a trip to the southernmost knob and record it for posterity.

I suppose one should as after all it is said to be the Southernmost Point in the continental United States. 

 And to be the Southernmost is something to be bragged about, an accident of geography...

 The sea buoy that has been built out of cement to mark the spot has to be refreshed from time to time with sparkling paint and just now its looking pretty good in the September sun.

When storms blow up from the south seawater flops over this low seawall and tends to scrape the buoy clean but so far so good this year.  These guys arrived for their picture kicking a soccer ball.

The line for the picture can get monstrous long in winter. The antenna beyond the fence is actually parked on the actual southernmost point. But as the fence marks the extent of the Southernmost Navy Base our little buoy can be considered the (possibly) southernmost civilian point.

Which is 90 miles from Cuba hey say...actually wait a  minute, according to the Southernmost Historic Tours it's only  87.6  miles to Cuba  from here. 

Everyone is fascinated by that mysterious forbidden island, just over the horizon. I sometimes wonder if Key West would not lose half its luster were Cuba to vanish. I do wish it weren't forbidden though. I am still waiting for the hydrofoil high speed car ferry from Stock Island to Mariel crossing in three hours so I can go riding in the Sierra Maestra of a weekend. 

 They come on foot and on wheels, pause a second and go home with proof they were here. 

That's all they need a few pixels of proof and that  spot is off the list. I'll tell you mys secret though, its best on a moonlit windy night when the sea occasionally tries to climb over the seawall in a burst of spume and spray. 

So on a hot afternoon I breezed up Whitehead Street and paused in front of the Hemingway House for no better reason than to check it was still there. Another fine monument Key West sells mercilessly. His preferred place, Finca Vigia is preserved in aspic perhaps a hundred miles away in the heights overlooking Havana in distant Cuba. Might as well be on the dark side of the moon I am fond of saying.

 Southernmost memorabilia, all present and correct. Check.

Posted with Blogsy

Florida's Big Election

I really like the Eye On Miami Blog and this essay on why Charlie Crist the former Republican governor turned Democrat should be re-elected makes for worthwhile reading. Because I am a Democrat it's easy for me to like Crist even though I am leery of ever hoping for much from our politicians whose campaign expenses feed television budgets and are bought by the oligarchs that really run the country. However one wonders what South Florida might look like were Big Sugar and the Fanjul family ever to get a bloody nose. Could Crist be the man to deliver it? Incumbent Rick Scott presided over the worst case of medicare fraud in US corporate history with his company fined $1.7 billion, but the bright sparks we call Florida voters thought he was a good choice to lead the state. He has been working hard to ingratiate himself with the voters offering money like an old time feudal lord buying off the peasantry but I still prefer Crist. Hmm...a glimmer of optimism, what a strange sensation for me.

Charlie Crist  versus Rick Scott

Why voting for Charlie Crist is good for Florida … by gimleteye

US Senator Marco Rubio really doesn't like Charlie Crist. That much is clear in a hostile letter mailed to Florida Republican voters.

Where's the sugar, Marco?

Remember when Charlie Crist was governor, he tried to fix Everglades restoration with a dramatic purchase of more than 150,000 crucial acres south of Lake Okeechobee to restore the dying River of Grass. The Fanjul billionaires were "outraged" (no one crosses the Fanjuls!) and were biggest supporters of Rubio in his campaign for US Senate against Crist.

Hating on Charlie Crist is what Big Sugar does.

Rick Scott fits squarely into Big Sugar's long plans for developing sugarcane lands into suburban sprawl.

Recently, US Sugar ratcheted up the stakes for taxpayers funding Everglades restoration, easily pushing past the Hendry County Commission a plan to develop 67 square miles of its sugarcane into more Florida sprawl.

That's land Charlie Crist wanted to purchase for the Everglades and was criticized by Republicans for saying it would cost too much. Well what, dear readers, what do you imagine the cost will be, now that industrial, commercial, and residential zoning is attached to it? And when US Sugar paid for Republican legislators to hunt in luxury at the King Ranch in Texas, Gov. Rick Scott was right there -- but he wasn't talking business, he says.

Florida's Republican leaders don't like Charlie Crist, but they are not telling you how they are lining their pockets by wrecking so much of what Floridians value. For instance, everything to do with restoration of America's Everglades is a work-around of Big Sugar.

Republican leaders believe that if government can put a monetary value for corporations on any action, then government can afford to pay for protecting what is harmed by that action. The problem with the formula is that it depends on mis-pricing. Put a higher value than a government regulation is worth and underspend what is necessary to protect the public.

That's exactly what Republicans lead by Gov. Rick Scott did by destroying the agency charged with growth management in Florida. They claimed that the Florida DCA was a "jobs killer" but that was vastly over-stating the case, and cost, against growth management. Instead, after years of under-cutting regulations -- "government-designed-to-fail" is the best description of what Florida Republican leadership believes in -- Gov. Rick Scott simply delivered the final blow, destroying what took decades of bipartisan consensus to build.

It's sweet for them and sour for us. Do once, and, repeat. It's gaming the system, and no governor has been better at gaming Florida than Gov. Rick Scott.

For Republicans, the problem with Charlie Crist is that he can never be one of their cronies, helping to mis-price government action in order to fatten their net worth. These days, that's a very low bar and a very good reason to vote for Charlie Crist.