I navigated for Key West.

Arriving in sight of Mallory Square, I saw several thousand people lining the bulkhead where the cruise ships normally docked. There was some kind of festival event going on. In the channel off Mallory Square, the ocean-going speedboats were running upwards of a hundred miles an hour, their drive gear throwing white-water-rooster-tails.

I radioed the Coast Guard and was told the harbor was closed to incoming traffic. I could not anchor in sheltered water until the first...