A 377-day sailing expedition from Pensacola through the Florida Keys, Bahamas, and Eastern Caribbean to Puerto Aventuras, Mexico. One small boat. Snorkeling, diving, exploring, meeting people, and paying attention to what's happening underwater.
Adventure expedition sailor. Former Navy submariner. Forty years of doing hard things on the water and loving every minute of it. The Blue Rim 5™ Sailing Expedition is his next chapter — 377 days from Pensacola to Puerto Aventuras, through the Florida Keys, the Bahamas, and the full Eastern Caribbean.
Ninety percent of this is pure adventure — sailing, snorkeling, diving, exploring, eating what comes out of the water, and having long conversations with interesting people at waterfront bars. The other ten percent is paying attention to what's happening to the reefs. Both things matter. Neither one gets sacrificed for the other.
Catamaran Dan
Ove Ironhand
Nevado Raiders™
Launching November 1, 2026 from Palafox Pier in Pensacola, Florida. 377 days. 63 stops across four volumes — the Gulf Coast, the Keys, the Bahamas chain, the Lesser Antilles from Puerto Rico to Trinidad, and back west through Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Nicaragua, Honduras, Belize, and Mexico to Puerto Aventuras.
The BEC is the opening chapter of Blue Rim 5™ — a multi-year coastal sailing program that continues from Puerto Aventuras into the Rim Run Caribe™ (expected January 2028) and eventually the Pacific circuit. But right now it's about the Bahamas and the Eastern Caribbean, done right, with no rush and nowhere to be but the next anchorage.
Pensacola to Puerto Aventuras. The Florida Keys, Dry Tortugas, full Bahamas chain, Turks and Caicos, Puerto Rico, USVI, BVI, Lesser Antilles, Trinidad, Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, and home.
From Puerto Aventuras deeper into Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras. The Mesoamerican Barrier Reef. The Blue Hole. Río Dulce. The Bay Islands. This is where the reef work really begins.
Hobie Getaway catamaran. 17 feet. 24-inch draft. She gets into places bigger boats can't go, and she draws exactly the kind of attention at every marina that leads to the best conversations of the day.
Wind and solar. Torqeedo outboard. Jackery 2000v2 with 440 watts of solar. Starlink Mini. Hookah dive system for getting on the reef without tanks. DRAGR sled for gear and instruments. Everything on board for a very long time away from marinas.
See the Full Build →
Shamrocket — Hobie Getaway Catamaran
The reef work matters. But so does everything around it — the evenings at anchor, the food, the people, the stories, the rituals. That's the other half of this. What the Mint Julep is to horse racing, the Rim Runner™ is to this expedition.
Heavy rocks glass with a blue rim band. 2 parts coarse sea salt, 1 part sugar. Wet rim with fresh lime. Fill with fresh ice.
1½ oz white rum • ¾ oz blue curaçao • 1 oz pineapple juice • ½ oz fresh lime juice • 1 oz coconut water • 1–2 dashes bitters. Shake hard. Strain over ice.
Float ½–¾ oz dark rum over the back of a spoon. Blue below. Dark above. Do not stir.
Track the route, the reef, the water, and whatever else is worth documenting as the BEC unfolds stop by stop.
The Full Route →The documentary side — the reefs, the coastlines, the people, and the reality of what's happening underwater.
The Archive →If you want to help keep Shamrocket in the water and the reef observations coming, here's how.
Support →
Blue Rim 5™ • Catamaran Dan • Nevado Raiders™