We made it to the Keys!! What a magical place!! Our first evening in the Keys we walked down to the water - the crystal clear, turquoise water and the palm trees right on the sand. Just stunning!! We stayed at a place called The Jolly Roger in Marathon, Fl. This island is located right in the middle of the Keys. For dinner we headed over to Sparky’s Landing. This place and most all of the restraints we ate at in the Keys were suggestions that Trey’s cousin Christina gave us. Her and her family come to the Keys quite often. And, you guessed it, Sharky’s was right on the water!! There was also live music from an incredible, nostalgic cover band (played all the songs my kids no nothing about - the good stuff!!), fabulous drinks and sea food for days! We started with the crab and artichoke dip - delish!! The kids and I got their brick oven pizza for our entrees and it was all so very good!
The next morning, bright and early we headed to Key West for a snorkeling and dolphin tour. Captain Stevie and first mate Colby at Fury Water Adventures took really good care of us on the water! They took us about seven miles off the coast of Key West into the gulf and we snorkeled over protected coral reef. I tried so hard to get some video with my cell phone that had a waterproof case over it and it just didn’t work. Unfortunately, the case had too much air in it and once I got under water the bubble of air was right over my camera. But, I will never forget all those beautiful tropical fish and the colorful coral reef!
While on Key West we had to try out another one of Christina’s recommendations, Sloppy Joe’s! Again, there was more amazing live music and delicious food! We also came across a fabulous art gallery, Ocean Blue Galleries. There we fell in love with an original Anna Sweet resin design named “Miami” that now hangs on the wall of our camper!
The rest of our days we spent snorkeling at our RV park, finding delicious food, and exploring the other islands! An interesting thing about the Florida Keys, is there are hardly any beaches. Most of the edges of island are covered in rocks, sea walls or mangrove trees. We did find one beach that we really enjoyed, Sombrero Beach. 🏝 There are not any waves and no tides coming and going. You can wade in the water all day long without getting tossed by waves. So fabulous!
One of our favorite places we went to was Robbie’s in Islamorada. There we ate breakfast under a palm tree right on the beach! The kids played in the water while we waited for our food and I had one of the best mocha lattes of my life at a cute coffee shop that was out of a camper, Charli’s!! Kinda reminded me of my fave coffee shop back home - Coffee Camper Co. in downtown Monroe!! Also, the craziest thing that happens at Robbie’s . . .You can feed the tarpon!! You can buy buckets of fish and hang out on the dock. These fish are HUGE and they eat right out of your hand. Well, they jump straight out of the water and about take your hand off while you dangle dead fish over them. So creepy and cool too!!!
The Turtle Hospital tour was another incredible place we visited! Many of the turtles were covered in tumors or barnacles. The workers at the hospital will remove them and do their best to get these turtles back into their home. Some of those sweet babies will spend the rest of their life at the hospital or go off to aquariums. We learned that 1 in 600 babies that hatch will survive! This is because they are so tiny and have many predators. Also, a female turtles lays approximately 100 eggs about three times in their mating season. Warmer temperature nest will produce Females and cooler temperature nests will produce males. The temperature climate change is producing almost all females. This is effecting how much mating goes on because there aren’t enough males and this is causing the population to go down. We learned so many interesting facts about sea turtles!
However, the most AH-MAZING encounter with Key wildlife I had was when I was snorkeling and a nurse shark swam right under my body!!!!! I had just gotten some video of the shark with my phone while it was hanging out under a tire and was heading back to the seawall ladder to get out. I was parallel over the top of the water and there it was swimming along with me!!! I was amazed and scared out of my mind!! At that time I didn’t know it was a nurse shark - which are harmless unless you irritate them. Holy moly!!! The most incredible and terrifying experience EVAH!!!! Check out that video!!
Our last dinner on the island was at Mrs. Mac’s Kitchen in Key Largo. There I had the special which was super fun!! It was a yellow snapper stuff with a greek salad! It was SOOOO good and so fun eating out of that yummy fried fish!
We ate SO much good sea food and spent tons of time in the Florida Keys Sun! What a trip this was!!!
Can’t wait for our next adventure!
