We arrived in the Florida Keys after a relatively short drive (only about an hour and a half) down from our stay at the Best Western in Florida City. We stayed at the Long Key State Recreation Area. Long Key is about four miles long. It is quite narrow. Our campsite was actually only about 50 metres from the road (a bit noisy at night, considering US 1 is the ONLY way to get along the Keys).
The neat thing about our campsite was how close it is to the water. If I kept backing up the trailer I would have driven it into the Atlantic Ocean. Unfortunately, the campsite suffered quite a bit of damage from hurricane Mitch. The people who frequent this spot tell us that the area used to be quite well covered, and each site was almost completely private due to foliage. Now there is very little. Some sites seemed to be almost completely denuded. It is a bit sad. The cleanup has been completed, of course, with a fair amount of replanting here and there, but it will take some time before it gets back to its previous state.
On Tuesday we all drive down to Key West. Actually, this is a fair hike, since we are at mile marker (MM) 67 and Key West is down at zero! The traffic goes fairly slowly, and for the most part it is a two-lane road (with occasional places for passing). We all went on the Conch Tour Train. This is an excellent tour of Key West. It takes about 90 minutes and you travel around in what appears to be a little train:
We saw a great deal of sites - the city itself is quite interesting, a tremendous history and has been through times of plenty and times of very little (from the richest city per capita in the US in the mid-1800's to the poorest in the early 1930's). It is now doing quite well due to its main industry - tourism.
On Wednesday we had an amazing trip on Bud and Mary's Coral Reef boat out onto the reef. All of us went in the water. Five of us with snorkel equipment (here's Dan and Reba:
And one with full SCUBA - having been at the class in the morning. The one, Heather Lynn (this is an action shot, which explains some blur):
In fact, she liked it so much that we booked her to go back for another trip on the Thursday morning. Unfortunately, when Thursday morning arrived she did not feel well, so she did not go. Just as well, Dad wasn't feeling good the night before, since it was very windy and he was worried about rough weather, her being eaten by a Great White (actually Tiger Sharks are more prevalent and probably more dangerous), or having trouble on this second day of a relatively deep 40 foot dive that was scheduled.
Reba's snorkeling trip was not her highlight (she got a bit seasick), so, on Thursday Reba had her 'day-in-the-sun' (so to speak), taking a round-the-lagoon trip riding the dolphins! There is an attraction called 'Swim With The Dolphins' and Reba did it all by herself while the rest of us toiled at packing up the trailer:
The Florida Keys are definitely a highlight of our trip! The weather was spectacular - 80 degrees every day (with lots of sun) and about 65 at night. Very pleasant sleeping, really, since there is a bit of a breeze and we are right on the water (if Heather Lynn and Reba fell out of their end they would almost fall into the ocean (mind you it is only 1-3 feet deep for a hundred metres going out). Well, on to the Florida Everglades to try and dodge some alligators and get eaten alive by mosquitoes!