Jan. 16:
Needing to be away from our parking meter before 9:00 was a good incentive to get up and back on the water for our crossing of Miami harbor. The Day’s Inn served no breakfast and Miami Beach is not a place to find a breakfast restaurant. I was satisfied with a bar that Heather fed me and some Gatorade. We pulled away from the boat ramp expecting swells from ships, yachts, tugs and unknown other hazards but found none of the above. It was beautifully clear as we rowed toward the skyline of high buildings. We reached the water in front of the Miami Herald building where we could almost see the reporters writing their stories about the latest acts of violence and I wondered if any had seen the press release that Lenora Campus, TOTO’s public relations director, had sent them about TOTO’s gift to Habitat for Humanity and our efforts to raise money for Habitat on our rowing odyssey. Then I realized what they might have seen if they had looked out on the water below them was much too pleasant and peaceful a scene to help sell their paper. There were two happy people enjoying a gentle passage through a violent city known for its carjackings and high murder rate.
We rowed under the huge causeways past several huge cruise ships lined up at the cruise ship terminal and lines of container ships and barges. There were no wakes. The skyline was impressive and gave very convenient markers to steer by for a long time before they receded to the horizon. Key Biscayne passed by in the remote distance and the rest of the horizon ahead was void of land as far as one could see. We did not really have a destination today and the lack of one when rowing toward the unknown is somewhat unnerving. The chart showed no details of anything that looked like a place one could land near a road, much less a public boat ramp. I could feel the 24 miles of yesterday and the adrenaline had warn off. A gentle paddle at 17 strokes per minute was the best I could do. Anne Manning, the Executive Director of the Greater Miami Affiliate had agreed to meet us if I called to tell her when and where. I could determine neither. But the miles trickled by and the sun was hot.
Heather had been a bit confused by the coast line, and the lack of the identification of buoys outside the ICW gave us some difficulty finding out where we were. So we, at last, rowed up to a fisherman on the shore near what appeared to be a park and asked where we were. This question should, in retrospect, generate a humorous response. It did. We were at the dam by the Deering mansion near Cutler. The wind was building from the Southeast, the direction we were heading, so significant further progress seemed unlikely and I felt like taking the opportunity to get out while we knew where to tell Anne she could find us. She knew right where we were and arrived within minutes. The fisherman was catching small fish which he would throw to a little blue heron who had become accustomed to being spoiled and was waiting eagerly for each tossed morsel.
Heather had something to watch while I went to get the car.
Anne drove me to Miami Beach through rush hour traffic and I arrived to find 20 minutes left on the parking meter I had fed 10 dollars worth of quarters earlier. It had been greedier than the little blue heron I thought. When I returned to find Heather the birds were coming in off the water and I think the little blue heron was completely satisfied.
We found a hotel near the University of Miami where we showered and dug out our better clothes for the first time since we left home. Johan von der Goltz, a classmate from St. Paul’s School who lives in Key Biscayne in the winter and Needham, MA in the summer, had invited us to join him and two other classmates, J. Howard Boulton and Bob Stewart, for dinner. We had an excellent mini reunion. Johan and Howard seemed the same as ever after fifty years - just a little more gray. Bob, I had forgotten. He had been at the school only for a year and had been expelled for what all of us would have wanted to do. After dinner we got some pictures of the four of us. We look forward to our 50th reunion next year! It was 11:00 p.m. before we were back at the hotel. It was a late night for me after another 19 miles.