Florida Keys, Day 1

I'll start with a little bit of background history of the Keys. A guy named Henry Flagler built the Overseas railroad, all the way out to Key West (about 110 miles from the mainland). It operated from 1912 until a major Hurricane of 1935 wiped out sections of it, along with killing a lot of people. They then built the overseas highway, in many cases using sections of the old railway pilings. More recently, whole new sections of highway has been built, and you'll see the new one running alongside the old highway/railroad.

The Dry Tortugas are a set of keys 68 miles west of Key West. There is no road going there. You can only get there by boat or floatplane. I recommend looking it up online for a lot more information about it. (Here's a good start: Wiki on Dry Tortugas NP )

From 1826 to 1846, it was only used for placement of a lighthouse. Building began in 1846 of the enormous Fort Jefferson to be an advanced post to defend the Gulf of Mexico. It eventually became obsolete and was never quite completed. It is the largest masonry structure in the Western Hemishere, and made up of 16 million bricks. It became a National Park in 1992.

I only had heard of it about 2 months ago, checked out that site, and knew we had to go there someday. A couple weeks later, Maria's friend tells her that his buddy in Oregon heard about a trip his friend took to the Dry Tortugas, and is flying out to take a boat ride to the Dry Tortugas on the 30th of December. We immediately invited ourselves to join them. They were only going to be in the keys the night of the 29th (Saturday), camped at the KOA on Sugarloaf Key. We figured we'd just make a long weekend of it since Monday was New Year's eve...we'd be in Key West already...

I downloaded and printed a copy of a guide to Key West I'd seen on the ADVrider forum. Captain Ron and Pirate John put together a great guide of what to see and do while in the keys, starting from Mile marker 110 as you enter the Keys, all the way to Mile Marker 0 in Key West. The guide saved us a LOT of having to figure things out, learning about the Keys in various random places, and finding the best places to eat! We would have missed so much on this trip, had it not been for this guidebook! We saw so many things we otherwise never would have known about. You can find the guidebook at Bucaneer Publishing We did not get a chance to visit everything in the guide, but some changes have taken place, but mostly it is just as the guidebook says!!

We decided to drive down before first light on Friday, and that part was mostly uneventful. It was only my second time through Alligator Alley, but we were just going straight through. We didn't want to stop anywhere in or around Miami (another trip), as we knew there was so much to see in the Keys.

The guidebook said we needed to take Card Sound Rd onto Key Largo, and for good Mojo, we needed to stop at Alabama Jack's. Sounded good to us, and after a 300 mile drive first thing in the morning, we were hungry. We got there about a half-hour before they opened, but they opened for us, anyway. Weather was beautiful, and we sat on the rail, with the water under the floor. It could not have been a nicer way to start out trip to the Keys!





Ordered up the sampler platter: Conch Fritters, Grouper Fingers, Battered Shrimp, Steamed Shrimp, Crabcakes, and something else I forget.



They didn't have a current CA license plate, so I gave them the front CA plate off my truck to tack onto the wall. Hopefully helped with the Mojo!

Then a few yards down the road, pay the toll, and drive over the really tall and short bridge onto Key Largo!



Our first stop, again going by Pirate John's Guide, was the Florida Keys Wild Bird Sanctuary in Tavernier. The place was free (takes donations to help with the upkeep, of course), and rehabs birds that have been hurt or otherwise messed up. A lot of 1-winged Pelicans, for instance. Free to walk around and explore. We enjoyed it, and would not have even seen it had it not been for the Guidebook. First time I've seen a spoonbill in the wild, anywhere in Florida.









After checking out the premises, we had to stop at the giant Lobster, just because it's silly. Florida Lobsters don't have claws for some reason...but the guidebook said this place was a shopping center. It sure had been, but the owners of a Montessori School decided it would make a good location for their facility, and bought the property. Numerous signs telling people to stay out, and that it was a school. I made sure to trespass to take pictures and re-enact the one in the guide.





The next stop on the drive out into the Caribbean was at the Hurricane memorial. The hurricane I mentioned in the beginning killed a LOT of people down in the Keys. Somewhere around 700, though the numbers are not truly known, and differ, depending on who you ask. The memorial in the pictures below is in Islamorada, and you can learn more about it here: Hurricane Memorial Page. It was put up in 1937, I believe? A well-kept memorial on the National Register of Historic Places.







The water was getting nice.....



Next was one that my friend Charles had told me about, as well as being in Pirate John's book. Feeding the Giant Silver King Tarpon at Robbie's Boat rentals. ( Robbie's) Buy a bucket of fish, walk out and feed them to the Tarpon, try not to get bit by the Pelicans, who want the fish, too...

Really bizarre, but a must-see!















A quick stop at Anne's Beach to see how the water is (keeping in mind it is December 28th in this picture!)




We started seeing more sections of the old railway and highway in different places.









Another vacation idea:


Later on in the weekend, we'd be standing on the section of that bridge on the left:


When we got to Big Pine Key, we had to go extra slow, as the island is a Key Deer preserve. They are smaller deer that are super protected. $250 fine if caught feeding them, so I don't wanna know what the speeding fine is here...signs EVERYWHERE to slow down, deer x-ing, etc. Since they are so well protected, they are not afraid of people.





That is the same deer...he never ran away even when I pulled right up next to him. Just stood there. I was getting hungry, so it was a good thing the guidebook told us about the No-Name Pub on No-Name Key. We had good mojo from stopping at Alabama Jack's earlier, as we got the last seat available before the line started forming outside. By the time we left, the wait was 45 minutes to an hour. Food was great!

We were almost to Sugarloaf Key, where we were hoping we could camp. We only had a reservation at the KOA for the next night, and we were going to need to sleep for 4 nights in the Keys. We don't like to plan our trips out too much...takes a lot of the fun out of it, and worse comes to worse, we find a beach and stretch out! It turned out they had room, since we were only tent-camping. We set up camp, and made some tea before going to bed. I don't like KOA-style campgrounds, normally...but it was a last-minute trip, and all the State Parks were booked solid since it's the height of the season down here.