The Good & the Not-so-good

Our first couple days in Marathon were very enjoyable.  We finished washing down the boat to get the layer of salt off everything.  We put up the rest of the sunscreens over the windows on the sundeck to reduce the heat from the blazing sun.  We off-loaded our bicycles, oiled them up, and rode around town to a couple restaurants.  We enjoyed the swimming pool at our marina, and found that the tiki bar can make a wicked mango daiquiri with a dark rum floater.

The Key Deer will beg for food from the cars, so they
are not afraid of car & highways

The best part so far was meeting up with Don & Shirley from North Myrtle Beach (North Strand Sail & Power Squadron), whom we first met 2 winters ago when we kept our boat in their neck of the woods.  At that time, Don & Shirley took us under their wing, helping us get to know the town and the local Power Squadron members.  They regularly vacation in Marathon & Key West, to the point that they are considered locals.

They look for discarded cigarette butts.  Apparently
tobacco is like a "catnip" for them.

Don & Shirley drove us around the area to show us the lay of the land.  We went across the 7-Mile Bridge to end up on No Name Key to find some Key Deer.  After near extinction, there are now several hundred of these tiny deer, only as big as a large dog.  Although they are technically (and former engineers love to be technical) a subspecies of the Virginia White-tailed Deer, no one knows how they came to No Name, but the first recorded history of them goes back to 1550.  After cruising up & down the roads, we finally saw a couple deer.  Good thing we did, because our “tour guide” was about to lose a big tip!

They then took us to the best restaurant on No Name Key (also the ONLY restaurant on No Name Key) called No Name Pub.  Inside, the décor featured thousands of dollar bills tacked to the walls & ceiling, which reminded us of the restaurant on Cabbage Key, adjacent to Cayo Costa.  After a good pizza, we headed back so Don & Shirley could prepare their boat to head west to Dry Tortugas for a couple days.

Good friends Shirley & Don
(all Power Squadron friends are good friends!)

For those of you who really wanted to see
a picture of my refrigerator
capillary expansion tube, with the bubbles
showing the location of the leak
(all you technical types must be in
hog heaven seeing this photo!)

Our not-so-good was the fact that our refrigerator wasn’t refrigerating because of a refrigerant leak.  I had visions of $3-4000 flying out the front cabin window, which would have to be removed by a boatyard in order to install a replacement unit.  After half a day of troubleshooting, the marine tech (MARINE = double the price) was able to actually find the leak in the tubing & repair it.  We then transferred all our food back into the refrigerator from the big ice chest, until an hour later when the compressor & fan quit again for unknown reasons.  We unloaded all the food back into the ice chest while we got good & mad at that dumb refrigerator.  An hour after that, the compressor came on & the unit cooled down as advertised, after which we moved all the food again back into the refrigerator.  The unit ran through the night last night, so can we ASSUME that it is back to normal (whatever “normal” is)?

So now, we’re planning to rent a car to drive to Key West the next couple days & see what kind of trouble we can get in to.