Is this January?

January was a very busy month and we did a number of new things. First, Dave and Annette invited us on their boat and took us to a locals favorite called Boca Grande. Boca Grande is approximately 9 miles east/northeast of Key West within the Key West National Wildlife Refuge. The boat ride there was very pleasant and I realized very quickly why people talk about how lovely this beach is. The north side of the island is a beautiful sandy beach. The boats that make the journey do not bother with throwing an anchor... Instead, they beach their boats and set up for a day of lounging in the sun.. I told Dave and Annette numerous times that it was one of the first times I felt as if I was in a Corona commercial. Here are some images from our day:

Corona view...

Your welcome. 

After our day on the water Dave and Annette invited us over for surf and turf. We had steak, crab claws, and oysters. It was probably the best surf and turf I have ever EVER had. The crab claws were taken from Dave and Annette's traps only 20 minutes before we ate them. We also had oysters that were shucked ( I have no idea if that is the term but I feel like it is - or it is my cornfed vocab making an appearance) placed on the grill using half the shell as a little plate and using only herb butter for some flavor. Rick even liked the oysters. His palette is so grown up :)

I am not sure if I have mentioned this or not in prior post, but our landlord(s) are in charge of the Key West Half Marathon. I know I have multiple friends who enjoy running and besides the 7 Mile Bridge Run in April I think the half marathon is probably the best. The route takes you through all the good parts of Key West so I believe the scenery would be a nice distraction and the best part is that the island is FLAT! There is no mile #10 hill that you have to dread like the Dam to Dam.... and if you happen to get hurt you would not have to wait for the sag wagon(this may or may not have happened to me).. you could just hobble off to a bar, snag a seat and watch the rest of the race. I am mentioning this because Rick and I have done our first good deed for 2013- we volunteered to help set up for the race. Starting on Friday Rick helped to load up the pallets of water from Publix, and then Saturday morning we loaded all the race baggies, t-shirts, cups, tables, chairs etc.. for the packet pick up day.

We got a break Saturday afternoon for some fun in the sun and wind. We got onto Phil and Erin's fishing boat and headed toward Snipe. Due to the direction of the wind our initial journey out toward Snipe was so calm, like bath water calm. And it was slightly overcast so at one point you could not tell where the water ended and the sky began. I wish I would have captured that image but my phone was safely tucked away. The ride was smooth until we got closer to Snipe. This is where we hit some large rolling waves.. but it was still fairly calm. When we arrived at Snipe there was no one there.. let me remind you what snipe is :

This was taken on our first boating weekend.. Snipe is not a terrible place to hang. 

This Snipe day was not quite as Corona commercial as our last Snipe day.. but it was beautiful in other ways. As Phil turned the boat towards the sandbar we were going with the large rolling waves I had mentioned before. As these waves met up with the sandbar they were probably the best boogie board waves I have ever seen. We were able to get the boat anchored safely.. and then we all had to brave the waves to get to the shallow beach. At this point there was no sun and it was a little chilly in the water. We (and by we I mean Phil..) had the idea to build a fire. The boys gathered what dry firewood they could find and we had ourselves a little fire on the beach. Here are some images form our day:

Erin, Carolina, Cher (in spirit) and myself. 

Classic

Phil and Erin's fishing boat bobbing in the waves. The water around the boat was about three feet deep (ish)
I am not sure these images really capture what was happening but the waves would hit Rick about mid abdomen, lower chest. 

Erin's future painting... 

Erin and Carolina's son on a mission to make it back to the boat 

Phil pulling up the anchor

Phil gave me the responsibility of driving straight while he messed with the anchor which may have been a bad idea because Erin, Carolina and I took that as a photo shoot opportunity

I at least looked to see where I was going once.. 

On the ride back towards Key West the sun came out just in time for a sunset cruise and crabbing..

Just grabbing dinner 

Needed two Ziploc baggies for the haul :) 

We ended up with 11 crab claws (quite a haul) and then we went to Carolina's house and we boiled them and ate them. For whatever reason I was placed in charge of cooking our catch. I have learned to different ways to prepare stone crab. The first way is to get a small amount of water boiling and steam the claws above the water until the claws turn red/pink. This may take three minutes or less. Once they are done you take them off the water and crack them with a hammer. The second way I have learned is to bring a pot of water to a boil and then dump the crab claws into the water. Again you cook them until the claws turn pink (maybe three minutes) and then take them out the of the water and break them with a hammer. Both ways I think work perfectly. The challenge, I think, is the cracking of the claw and obtaining all the meat. What is the most difficult is trying to pick out all the delicious crab meat without putting little pieces of shell into the bowl. I learned I am bad at this... BAD. My giant bowl of crab had more little pieces of shells then I care to admit. Luckily, the crab meat is so good and sweet that the shells are over looked because you are literally drooling and eating so fast you absolutely do not care if you have to pull out a piece of shell. YUM... my mouth is watering for sure. Anyways.. this was a good day on the water. After eating we drug our tired butts to our apartment because our first good deed of 2013 was not over...

At 4:45 AM the next morning I get a little pat on the shoulder to get out of bed... we were apart of the water team. This means that we were involved in dispensing all the water Rick had obtained on Friday night to all of the water stops for the half marathon. So.. after being sore from the loading and unloading the day before Rick, myself and three other guys delivered 6 palettes containing 40+ crates per palette and each crate held  4 gallon jugs in them.. (my arms were so tired) We also delivered tables, chairs, and cups. The half marathon started at 7 AM, we just slid across the finish line with delivering the water. (Whew). At 7:15 we hightailed it to our apartment to get ready for.. DEEP SEA FISHING!!!

To be continued...because the Walking Dead is starting.