2.14.16 - 2.15.16 - Key Largo

We did not need to bail out of Everglades for lack of a campsite, but we did bail out a day early for the bugs, and for having seen what we wanted to see.  Our neighborhood friends (who we had serendipidly met at the Everglades visitor center), Patti and Joe, who winter in Key Largo, were most hospitable in their offer to let us ‘camp’ in their driveway, so we took them up on it.  Key Largo is the first island, and the largest, in the archipelago heading to Key West, and a shot hop from the everglades.

As we were leaving the Everglades, we saw a cute young couple hitchhiking with backpacks who needed a ride to the bus station in Florida city.  We were going right through there on the way to Key Largo, so we offered them a ride, told them we'd take them to the bus station, but that we wanted to stop and do a couple small loop trail hikes on the way out of the everglades. They wouldn't get to the station until the middle of the afternoon.  They agree that would be fine.  Turns out they were from France - had started their adventure in Canada and were moving south.  They were  alot of fun.  It was like having 'the kids' with us.  International travel is so enriching ... for everyone.

Joe and Patti took us on a boat ride to see the beautiful waters around Key Largo.  We saw mangrove forests and drive through a canal with some of the most extravagant waterfront homes around.  

They dropped us off at the pier of John Pennekamp state park.  We hoofed it around there for a while … again spectacular water colors. 

Then we took a ranger led walk on Windley Key Fossil Reef Geological State Park to learn about the quarry that produced a decorative stone called Keystone.  The keystone rock is petrified limestone embedded with ancient coral fossils.  The quarry closed in the 1960's.

Our very full day ended with a drive by the old boat used in filming of the movie ‘African Queen’.  The boat was built in 1912 and is on the National Historic Registry.

The next morning, Patti attracted the Manatees over to the dock using a fresh water hose. They love drinking fresh water from the hose.  They couldn’t be uglier.  This one turned over to float on his back while drinking from the hose.

Manatees,  also called sea cow,  can be up to 12’ long and weigh 1000 pounds.  They have thick wrinkled skin and whiskers; newborn babies weigh about 60 pounds,  they eat about 15% of their body weight daily in sea plants.  Their small widely spaced eyes have eyelids;  they have cheek teeth that are continuously replaced during life.  They sleep about 50% of the day, surfacing for air about every 15-20 minutes.  Florida manatees have been known to live 60 years.  They have task learning abilities similar to dolphins.  Manatees frequent show scars from cuts inflicted by recreational and commercial watercraft.  Boat mortality rates are high.  Boats and other environmental treats have resulted in their status as an endangered species.

Thank you Patti and Joe for letting us perch at your house.  We had a wonderful time with you and really appreciate your hospitality.

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