Advertisement
Published: November 11th 2014
Edit Blog Post
Monday 10
thNovember 2014 From the Caribbean to Miami and the Florida Keys
Our last two days at sea passed under cloudy skies. We think Mother Nature was trying to care for the red lobsters, who were still determined to sprawl on their sunbeds on deck, whenever the sun broke through. As we got to the Bahamas we saw more shipping as well as a couple of fins breaking the water; they were probably dolphin. We got to Miami before the sunrise; a dark sky lit by a spectacular blaze of neon! Guess what? It was raining!
Whilst out at sea the day before, we had seen six swirling whirls of cloud, three of which reached the water, drawing it upwards like a vortex to form water spouts. These were followed by vertical bright rainbows (our camera doesn’t really do these justice). Apparently, these phenomena herald rain and poor weather. How true! After fourteen days of balmy weather on a very calm sea, it rained for twenty four hours after we docked in Miami.
We took a tour on an airboat into the Everglades in torrential rain. Alligators like to bask in the
sunshine, so they were all hiding away from us. Only one alligator popped his head up near our boat. We then saw a few more in captivity as well as a baby which for a few dollars we were able to hold and photograph. Despite the awful weather, the Everglades trip was well worth taking. The scenery is so unique and we had a great guide and driver on a small boat (many of them hold two or three times the number of passengers). We saw several Ibis birds as well as Black Buzzards, Turkey Buzzards and Grey Heron. The Everglades is not a swamp, like in Louisiana, so doesn’t smell. It is moving water. In fact, it is a giant river, covered in grass, which keeps it shallow and slow-moving; a giant river that covers all of the central part of Southern Florida, right down to the Keys where we are now.
We hired a car in Miami to drive down to the Keys for a week. We are still technically in the Everglades, since we are in the northern Keys at the moment (Key Largo) and on the Florida Bay side. Gators do swim across
from time to time. We hope that they do not right now, since we are “sitting on the dock of the bay” writing this blog, enjoying a bottle of wine! We have a cabin on an RV park. It is very basic, not like the cabins on Spanish campsites, which are luxurious in comparison, but clean and cheap and in a great location. The park is owned by a long-haired elderly hippie, who is totally chilled and really welcoming and helpful. This is a good place to be. Just a five minute walk away, on the ocean side of this narrow island, is Rock Harbour and a nice little restaurant and bar. So, we are sitting here, with our cheap bottle of Italian red, our two little blue collapsible camping cups rather than crystal goblets, thinking “Yeah, this is the life!” However, tomorrow, back to reality, we simply must find a sink and do some washing. We have run out of pants! Forecast is for sunshine for the rest of the week.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.045s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 10; qc: 19; dbt: 0.0199s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb