(see the full-size close-up below)

In the tropics after a fog has settled over the water, the early morning light and the approach of the warming sun starts the fog rolling away. These sailboats were photographed in the Marquesas Keys 30 miles west of Key West. They are getting ready to move out and one has turned on his running lights just in case.

By the time the hot tropical sun climbs up over the horizon, they will both be beating a course around the western key of these islands not far from where Mel Fisher found the Mother Lode of Nuestra Señora de Atocha, one of the wealthiest Spanish treasure ships to be dystroyed by hurricane in these tropical waters. At the time we were on these keys we found a broken pottery shard typical of ceramic vessels carrying foodstuffs aboard this galleon. Early documents report that the bow of the wrecked Atocha was found on these keys, named for the Spanish Marquis de Caldereita who headed the Spanish salvage effort searching for the lost treasure galleon not long after it disappeared in 1622 in these waters.

This is a close-up image from the full-size print, showing the detail involved