Greetings from Marathon

We are settling in to Marathon Resort Marina for a month stay. We are both still in recovery mode from our crossing. We decided to treat ourselves to a month of R&R after our rough ride. Now that Kat is feeling better & recovering fast from our trip, she will start to blog about our experiences and share some of the many photos and stories. I will try to be organized in my recollections and apologize in advance if it does not seem that way. We were unable to blog while in Cuba the wifi was so poor. We were also very uncomfortable being honest with our observations so we waited. Our crossing to Cuba: We left Marathon Municipal Marina on March 31st at 4pm with all safety equipment easily accessible. Tomkat headed out of Boot Key Harbor past Sombrero Lighthouse to the most favorable forecast for the week. We had South to Southeast winds, the most we saw was 15 mph apparent which was really about 10mph. We enjoyed a beautiful sunset as we approached the Gulf Stream. It was fun to watch the aquamarine water turn to blue water, dolphins and turtles were delighting us and it signaled us we were getting into deeper water. The depth meter kept climbing over 600 feet. That is when then meter stops functioning. According to the charts we were in areas in the Florida Straits that were over 4000ft. We had a strong opposing current in the Gulf Stream which added about 4 hours to our trip. The seas were about 2-4 feet. It was a struggle to keep on course. We were able to switch off at the wheel a few times. Captain did the majority at the helm. There were few boats encountered our whole trip over. We would go hours at a time and not see any ships or boats. We picked up the Gulf Stream influence about 7 miles out of the harbor and it did not let go of us until we were about 25 miles north of Varadero. We were happy to get into Cuba after an 18 hour motor crossing. The new compass is very easy to read and functioned perfectly. The Bimini Kellee made, kept us shaded and dry. We are looking forward to getting our new dodger when we get back up to St. Augustine. We had lots of motion and we were only able to eat small snacks. We did not have favorable winds to sail. We saw many baby dolphins entering Cuban waters. Kat took the helm and talked to officials coming in, while Captain raised the yellow quarantine flag, which is the International symbol to request clearance into the country.. We arrived salt encrusted at Gaviota Marina in Varadero, Cuba at 10:20am.When we arrived we were excited but nervous. We also got rid of this flying fish hitchhiker. Checking In: We had a small outboard skiff with a dock man lead us in from the outer harbor into the quarantine dock. All the officialdom happened pretty quickly. First the dock master, Francisco, helped us alot in several areas of our stay. He spoke English pretty well and we found out later he was an english school teacher prior. He explained all the procedures we needed to go through. Within 10 minutes we had 2 Doctors come on board,they all took off their shoes before boarding. They all shook our hands before & after boarding and welcomed us to Cuba. They were very friendly and asked us several questions: where did we come from? Had we been in Africa in the past 6months? Do you have a temp? Have you had a fever in the last few weeks? Did we have eggs on board? How many? Did we have any fruits? veggies? did we have any canned meat on board? We offered them CocaColas that they graciously accepted & when they were done, took the tab off. We found out later, that the local woman make purses with them.We then had the immigration official came to the boat. He was a little more professional & offical. We expected when he boarded to search the boat, he did not. He was concerned about engine horse powers, dingy information,radios, if the boat was navigating without any issues.Purpose of our visit & if we had any guns,pets or other people on board. We had read several books, articles prior to crossing. Watched a lot of utube videos. They said they love to get Coca Cola when they visit your boat & like their tips later. So everybody got a Coca Cola! We then moved to a dock where we stayed for 13 days. We raised the Cuban Courtesy Flag in place of our quarantine flag.Then our adventure began. Next chapter tomorrow.