Boy how life has changed in just a week. We are still in Marathon, FL and will continue to hang here for a while longer….

Just after my last post we were told our marina was closed – no more incoming transient boats! The next morning, we were informed that the County of Monroe, which is ALL of the Keys, ordered a shut-down on all short-term rentals (hotels, vacation homes, RV parks, marina’s, etc.).  The order issued (3/19), stated that if you didn’t have a rental agreement for 28 days or longer you had until 6:00 PM on Sunday (3/22) to leave The Keys. Yikes! People were scrambling. Marinas and fuel stops were closing daily.

Hmmm, what do we do? Fortunately, we had talked to the dockmaster a couple of weeks ago about extending our stay for another month. We definitely decided to take advantage of the extension and feel very lucky to have secured a place to stay. We will take our friend’s (Flip Flop) slip. They decided to leave for Palm Beach where they will be closer to family.  Their boat is larger than Scout so they can go on the “outside” rather than staying on the ICW which will be faster. They also carry about four times the fuel we do so the likelihood of them being stranded by closures is doubtful. They were able to secure a privately-owned slip that they had rented last year.

So Flip Flop and crew took off this morning (3/26) and we will move to their slip tomorrow where we will continue to ride out this pandemic. It’s a beautiful place with sunny skies, temperatures in the 70’s and 80’s, nice breezes and clear water. There are worse places to be stranded, right?

Hope everyone is healthy and safe.