Debnet and I got back Sunday night from yet another amazing holiday together, this time to the Florida Keys.
We set off on Thursday evening after I got home from work, had a relatively easy drive south past Miami to the start of the Keys, light traffic most of the way, and we got to our hotel on Long Key, about halfway to Key West (68.5 miles away) about 8:30pm. Unfortunately it was dark by the time we started the long drive down through the Keys, so Debbie couldn’t really appreciate the view, but we made up for it the rest of the time.
For those of you unfamiliar with the Florida Keys, they are a series of islands that start south of Miami, and run roughly southwest all the way down to Key West, over 150 miles from Miami. A series of bridges link the islands, the longest being Seven Mile Bridge, which is spectacular, and appeared in the movie True Lies with Arnold Schwarzneger and Jamie Lee Curtis.
The link between the islands was first created in the early 1900’s by Henry Flagler, who built a railway link down there, but 40 miles of this was destroyed in a huge hurricane in 1935, and soon after a project turned this into a road link instead. Part of the railway is still standing, and there are some spectacular views of this from Bahia Honda Key.
Well, we arrived at our hotel in the dark, and were disappointed that although we were supposed to be right next to the ocean, there was no ocean view. However, having unpacked the car, we took a walk and found out that the dark patch to the side of the hotel wasn’t bushes, it was just OCEAN! We had a lovely view right out over the Gulf Of Mexico, and the hotel had a nice raised deck with a hot tub and pool, so you could relax and look up at the stars. Very nice… The room was freshly decorated, nice comfy bed, and a small kitchen too with a fridge/freezer. Had a nice dip in the hot tub and the pool while sharing a bottle of wine, then stood and watched the stars before heading off to bed.
Friday we drove down to Key West, with some great views of the islands and bridges. It was hot down there as we rode the Conch Train around the island, and then walked up and down the main street “Duval Street” which is full of shops and bars. Lots of old houses too with some cool architecture, including the Hemingway House where the author used to live. Had a nice lunch, walked, shopped, then sat in the car and dodged a heavy shower an hour before sunset. Key West is the southernmost part of the USA, and only 90 miles to Cuba too.
One of the main things to do in Key West is to go to Mallory Square, which faces west, and to watch the sunset. Of course it had rained which gave rise to some clouds where there had been blue sky earlier, but the preparations went ahead, with a number of sideshow entertainers setting up – acrobats, fire eaters, jugglers and a sword swallower, as well as people selling things. It’s a great place to spend an evening in Key West. Well we watched the sword swallower who kept on trying to entice people to watch him instead of just getting on with the show, and 15 minutes later as the heavens opened again, he did his act in all of 10 seconds, as much of his audience ran for shelter. His fault for being greedy!
So we went into a gift shop to shelter, I got the umbrella out of the car – which acted as a deterent to more rain, and we watched some more performances and then the sun setting, albeit through the clouds. Then, back to the car and the long 68.5 miles back to the hotel.
Having had a good lunch, neither of us were hungry, so we just ppened another bottle of wine and dipped in the hot tub and pool again like the previous night.
Saturday we weren’t sure what to do, as Debbie had never snorkelled before or taken a glass bottomed boat trip. We decided to head to Bahia Honda State Park, about 20 miles south to spend some time at the beach. Paid $6 for the two of us to go in, very reasonable, and as we went down to the beach, a lovely beach, there was a group from a church community having a cookout and telling people on the beach to come join them for some free food. Well, we had a nice snorkel, with Debbie panicking a little as I led her by the hand out into the water, which as the most was about 8 feet deep. It wasn’t the best place to snorkel, but we saw some fish, a lobster (which scared her somewhat), and then she started choking and came up, just as we came across a huge fish – I mean 4 feet long, just feeding a few feet away from us. Sadly she didn’t even see it, but in all my dives or snorkels it’s one of the largest I have seen, and on about 4 feet of water too. Well we went back and got dried off, then up for some food. We were welcomed by the people there, had great burgers and hot dogs, watched them baptise a girl in the ocean, and not a single advertisement for the church or a single bit of preaching. They were a very nice group indeed. I headed back in for another good snorkel, saw more fissh and 6 lobsters as well. After that, we looked around the rest of the park, got some good photos and video of the remains of the railway bridges, and headed back to the hotel.
Back at the hotel I managed to tun in to the last quarter of the Notre Dame game, which they were winning against North Carolina, but sadly lost in the end. From what I saw in the last quarter the best team won. Got cleaned up and showered, watched the sun set from outside the room, then walked next door to a nice Italian restaurant. We decided on this since it would probably be a 5 mile drive to anywhere else – plus it looked ok!
Had a great meal, bottle of wine (surprise) and it turns out our waiter was English, so we got chatting with him. His 2nd job was working at the Dolphin Research Center about 10 miles south of the hotel on Grassy Key, and he told us about the dolphins there, and the things you can do, so we decided to make that our treat for our last day. You probably won’t be surprised to find that we ended our day with a dip in the hot tub and the pool and watching the stars…
Sunday we got up leisurely, packed, took final photos, and headed south to see the dolphins.
The Dolphin Research Center is nothing like Seaworld! It juts out into the Gulf Of Mexico, and is a series of enclosures separated by a wooden walkway and plastic mesh under the water, so the dolphins can talk to each other. They have 19 dolphins there, including the daughter and grandchildren of Flipper (you remember Flipper right?). The tv series was filmed there, and all of the dolphins were bred there. We opted for their Meet A Dolphin package, and as well as watching the shows, we got 15 minutes on a platform and got to touch and shake fins with Talon who is Flippers grandson. Very cool. Got some great photos of that. They have a number of different shows, but you can stand on the walkway that runs between the enclosures and watch all the dolphins, not just the ones that are performing. All of them will do tricks for you, swimming and jumping just for fun, so it’s a totally different atmosphere than Seaworld, and you can spend hours if you want just watching the dolphins.
Well, having spent a couple of hours there, it was time to head north, so we hit the road, sropping in Key Largo for a quick bite at Wendy’s and then headed to John Pennekamp State Park for a last visit to the beach and a snorkel. The beach, Cannon Beach, is so named because a few years ago they sunk a number of cannons and an anchor from Spanish shipwrecks of the early 1700’s on the reef. It wasn’t very nice as beaches go, and Debbie didn’t want to snorkel, so she sat in the shade of some trees while I “ouched” my way down a man made beach covered with lumps of coral to the water’s edge. The people in the water had stirred everything up and the water got deep rather quickly, so I saw nothing until I got close to the end of the roped off swimming area and the depth dropped to 4-5 feet. The cannon were very clear to see, shame it wasn’t a real shipwreck, and I spent a good time snorkelling there. Inside the reef area, it shelved steeply down to maybe 25-30 feet, but hard to see with everythign stirred up. About 10-15 feet down there was a shoal of at least 20 large fish, a good 3 feet long, probably Snook, so I took a number of opportunities to plunge down and swim with them. They didn’t seem to bothered about me being there, as long as I didn’t try to touch them, and even then they only kept inches away.
Off then as it was getting close to 5pm, and back on the road headed north to Miami and Deerfield. Got home around 8:30pm, tired, sticky, but having had a really wonderful time together.
Sad now, just 1 more weekend before Debbie has to head home to England. Just 9 more days together, and most of that with me working too 
Well I hope you enjoyed reading about our weekend. Hope you had a good weekend too.
As regards my lenses – they mostly just went down yet again… So did Debbies, although Google seems to have picked up on one or two which is good.
That’s all for now folks…
