Boot Key Harbor is a secure refuge and has excellent small-craft facilities. Several marinas and a boatyard in the western part of the harbor can provide berthage with electricity, gasoline, diesel fuel, water, ice, launching ramps, marine supplies, and hull, engine, and electronic repairs. A boatyard on the north side of the harbor, immediately eastward of the highway bridge, has a 50-ton mobile lift. There are several fish wharves in the harbor where fuel and some services can be obtained.
Navigation:
Click the “Map View” button above to see a chart of this harbor.
Boot Key Harbor, on the south side of the town of Marathon, is entered southward of Knight Key about 4.5 miles northward of Sombrero Key Light. The entrance channel is marked by a light and daybeacons; the color of the banks is also a good guide for the narrow entrance channel. Daybeacons also mark the channel through the harbor for a distance of about 1.5 miles. In 1983, the reported controlling depth was 7 feet, but shoaling was reported along the southerly side of the entrance channel; caution is advised.
A highway bridge, over the channel at mile 0.13, has a bascule span with a clearance of 24 feet at the center. An overhead power cable on the west side of the bridge has a clearance of 65 feet.
A group of four radio towers on the southwestern end of Boot Key and four radio towers about 1.1 miles eastnortheastward of the first group are prominent. Also prominent is a tower with a blue strobe light at a marina 1.2 miles northward of the southeasterly radio towers.
