Dear Friends and Family,
      Another week has come and gone here in Key West and Mary and I are 
still here in the land of the strange. I say strange because we have 
witnessed things that you will not see in any other place on earth. Today we 
saw two sea turtles mating out in the middle of the ocean. It really was a 
unique sight. I don't think I have ever seen that before even on the National 
Geographic Channel. And yes we did take pictures. Mary even took some video 
footage of it in case any of those nature shows want to buy it from us. Who 
knows? This morning we were anchored just off of the Southwest corner of the 
Marquesas keys which is located half way between Key West and the Dry 
Tortugas. About 7:00 AM this morning we were awakened by the sound of a Coast 
Guard helicopter buzzing over our boat. I turned on the VHF radio to listen 
in on what might be happening and I heard somebody on the radio talking about 
some people on the Marquesas Islands. There was a group of Cuban refugees 
that had been spotted on the island and the Coast Guard was coming to 
investigate. After about 30-45 minutes a CG cutter showed up and a couple of 
smaller CG boats were dispatched to the island to pick up the refugees. From 
what I heard on the radio it was 16 adults and 2 small children. Mary and I 
dinghied to the island after all of the excitement to catch some bait fish 
with my cast net and to let Razor find a couple of nice bushes. While we were 
catching some needle fish and mullet Mary and I both thought that we could 
hear voices where there shouldn't be any. We got back into the dinghy and 
headed back to the boat. Maybe I should have called the Coast Guard but I 
didn't. It must be pretty bad in Cuba to brave the weather, currents and the 
unexpected in small boats just to get to the USA We have it better than 90% 
of the rest of the world, in this country, and sometimes we just don't 
appreciate it.
      Speaking of strange Mary and I went to the drag races here in KW 
earlier this week. Now when I say drag races in KW you have to remember where 
you are. Drag Queens my friends, running up and down Duval Street in full 
regalia. It was one of the funniest things I have ever seen. They gathered 
all of the drag queens up on a stage right on Duval Street where they paraded 
themselves in front of the gathered throng and then one by one they ran the 
course laid out for them. The objective was to run from the stage to a bar, 
drink a shot of liquor, run down the street to another bar, drink another 
shot, run to another bar, drink another shot and then back to the stage. All 
contestants were timed with a stop watch but could get extra handicap points 
depending on how high their high heels were, how tight their dresses were and 
whether or not they brought all of their shot glasses with them to the finish 
line. Every time they would run past us, Razor would lunge towards them 
barking like crazy. If I hadn't had him on a leash it would have been chaos. 
Speaking of races I have entered Loafer's Glory in the Wrecker's race this 
coming Sunday. If the winds are as light as they have been the past couple of 
days we might have an advantage by using our spinnaker sail. Don Miller, the 
former owner of the boat has graciously agreed to help crew for us and 
thereby give us another advantage. I have also enlisted the help of a young 
lady who will also help us crew the boat during the race. It so happens that 
she, Mary and I all attended the same sailing school with the same instructor 
so that should be a big help. That and the fact that she said that she would 
wear her thong bikini to distract the other crews and give us another 
advantage. The way I see it we will have so many advantages that it will be 
unfair to race against the other boats. I will report the results on next 
weeks letter. For those of you inquiring about my health just let me say that 
the climate here certainly agrees with me. I feel great and I am breathing 
better than I have in a long time. I really appreciate all of the replies and 
letters of concern that all of you have been sending to me and I just want to 
say ,"Thank you." Well, that's it for now folks, it's getting late. Good luck 
and God Bless and greetings from "Cayo Hueso." 

Sincerely,

Rick

P.S. for those of you that didn't get the corrected website address, here it 
is again.

       www.geocities.com/rayrayweb2002