Visiting Key West, or windbound yet again.

Yesterday we went exploring and sightseeing historic Key West.  We saw Mallory Square (well before sunset!), the Mel Fisher Treasure Museum, the southern most monument in the US, plus Duval Street and lots and lots of people.

Here's Sue trying to cut in front of all these other people who are waiting to have their picture taken in front of Mile Marker 0.

Here I'm trying to chat up Marilyn - she didn't really have a lot to say.  For all you youngsters, this is from the scene over the subway grate in the movie Seven Year Itch, also starring Tom Ewell.

Here's the local Tow Boat US trying to help the Disney cruise ship Magic warp into their dock.  I wonder is Disney sprang for unlimited towing also?

On the way back to our boat, after having ice cream, we were going to stop and talk with the people on the boat from Sydney, Australia.  The first thing we noticed was that the people weren't on the boat.  The second thing we noticed was that their boat appeared to have dragged it's anchor.  Since heavy winds were forecast for last night and on through Wednesday, we decided to set a second anchor.  And just to be safe, we decided to set a different type second anchor.  (The holding around Key West is only rates a "3" out of "4".)   Around 6:30 the wind shifted and started to build in strength; the boat seemed to be holding fine. 
Thinking we might have an uncomfortable night ahead if the wind built as predicted, I decided to take a little nap around 9:30.  A quick last minute check revealed that we were dragging, two anchors, very quickly towards the main Key West channel!!  We fired up the diesel, pulled up the first anchor by hand, pulled up the second main anchor with the windlass, and motored up to what we hoped would be a better spot.  We dropped the main anchor again, only to realize that we were once again dragging, FAST!  We pulled up the main anchor yet again, pulled out our third anchor and put it on the anchor rode (rope and chain) that we had tried to set our second on and  dropped the anchor again.  The anchor finally seemed to be holding, but just to be sure we decided to keep an anchor watch.  I slept for a couple of hours while Sue sat in the cockpit reading and watching bearings and distances to make sure that the boat wasn't moving.  Then we switched, keeping that schedule up until daylight.  So far we haven't dragged again.
If you looked at the SPOT location we're anchored between Wisteria Island and where the wind is coming from, so we get protection from the waves  and a little protection from the wind.  There are whitecaps rolling through most of the other anchorages because there is no land mass upwind.  Probably the worst part, after moving the boat around in the dark to re-anchor, is the wind noise.  We're wearing ear plugs when we try to sleep.  And on a bright note (no pun intended)  I saw 5 or 6 meteors while I was up for my stints.  Sort of odd, considering all the ambient light from the city lights.

The last time we were here with our little boat we were windbound because we didn't have a dinghy to go ashore.  Now we're not sure how safe it might be getting the dinghy upwind back to the boat.  We haven't seem many boats, large or small, moving today.  Looks like a good day to nap and read.  Sue just washed a few unmentionables - hope they don't blow away before they dry.