On a beautiful Wednesday morning, June 16, 11 boats struck out for Marco Island and Key West. Two sailboats headed directly to Key West and the nine powerboats, led by Cruise Leaders Guy and Dianne Stigall, headed for Marco Island Yacht Club. Arriving at MIYC early afternoon, once all were tied up and chores tended to, we met at the pool and enjoyed Painkillers and Pina Coladas, along with a quiz “Know Your Club”. The group led by the Schneiders (the Conchs) scored the most points on this activity.
On Wednesday evening, the majority headed to Arturo’s Restaurant for a delicious Italian dinner where the owner greeted us and assured our enjoyment of the evening. Taxis were called to return us to the marina in a downpour. This storm was likely part of a system that caught our sailboaters that night and tossed them about in the darkness for several hours.
The nine boats left MIYC between 6:30-7:30 and headed toward Key West in calm seas, each at their preferred speed. This allowed several photo ops of boats en route along the way. All eleven boats arrived in the early afternoon; they were greeted with Rum Runners and goodie bags and sent off to explore their surroundings. All 32 aboard the eleven vessels headed out to dinner at Café Sole, renowned for their hog snapper.
The following morning, most of the group enjoyed Sheila’s enthusiastic and humorous history tour of Key West aboard the Conch Train. Everyone met at B.O.s Fish Wagon for lunch, enjoyed the “local color”, the fish sandwiches and were quizzed again. This time the quiz was about Key West. The teams worked hard to remember all they had seen and heard so far. The team led by the Scheinerts (6 Toed Cats) won this quiz and scored so well as to receive the overall quiz prize. Our boaters were on their own to enjoy the rest of the day as they wished.
The following morning (Saturday) everyone, except the three couples who took the express boat to Dry Tortugas for the day, headed to Blue Heaven for breakfast (don’t feed the roosters). Then the group was free once again to enjoy Key West as they wished using the travel guides provided by the Cruise Leaders. Lindsey Scheinert put together a Pub Crawl schedule for that afternoon, allowing people to come and go as they wished. We started at 4pm at the Green Parrot, followed by Capt Tony’s, then Sloppy Joe’s where we heard Pete and Wayne perform, moving on to Irish Kevin’s to enjoy a terrific entertainer. Most of the group joined at one time or another and a few went the whole way!
Departures Sunday morning started in the early hours of the morning and proceeded for several hours, depending on cruise speed and destination. The wind and seas were favorable enough to allow all to reach their intended port. Once all boaters had checked in, including the sailboaters who traveled overnight again-but thankfully without thunderstorms, Cruise Leaders Guy and Dianne were satisfied that a fun cruise had reached a satisfactory conclusion.
