After a month in Key West we were ready to pick up stakes and move on and say goodbye. But it was with mixed emotions that we left since we had such an enjoyable adventure there. We started our egress through the numerous and sequential keys. We stopped at 7 mile bridge in Marathon Key where a scene from “True Lies” movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis was filmed. It is pedestrian/bicycle only and we had previously ridden our bicycles on this bridge. Therefore this bridge holds fond remembrances for us. We were saddened to learn that the bridge is falling into disrepair and may not be open much longer unless private and public funds are raised. We strolled the bridge for a few miles, looked out over the new automobile bridge, watched pelicans flying around, and then returned to our sojourn northward. Our destination was the first key- Key Largo and John Pennekamp State Park. This park was created to preserve the Florida living coral reef which is the third largest in the world. The park is a great jumping off point for scuba, snorkeling, or boat rides to the Florida Reef which has quite a display of coral and colorful fish. We took a ride on a glass bottom boat since the water was quite rough and was still fairly cold.
After Key Largo, we passed the Everglades and realized that we couldn’t just pass by. Even though we have spent much time there, we just can’t seem to get enough of the Everglades National Park, so we returned there. The water level is quite low but we still were treated to an abundance of alligators and tropical birds.
After visits with good friends in southern Florida, we took a cruise out of Fort Lauderdale, with the ports of call and the excursion trips being what we were most looking forward to. First stop was Cozumel Mexico where we traveled to the Maya Ruins in Tulum. Tulum is one of the best-preserved Mayan cities and the only Mayan city built on the coast. It was surrounded by a wall and was built by the Mayans in the late 13th century. Much of the sculptured decorations on the buildings remain. The buildings reflect the knowledge that the Mayans must have had of astronomy, geometry, architecture, and general mathematics. Some buildings are so aligned with the sun’s movement, that solstices are seen as light projected through openings and onto a specific point. The Maya calendar is famous for illustrating phases, eras, and time as cycles. Yeah, maybe they got 12/21/2012 wrong or more likely we misinterpreted their calendar. The Mayans had their own language as illustrated by hieroglyphics found around. The rock obsidian is found here which they used for tools, spear points, etc. since it has a crystalline structure and makes sharp points easily. We learned that some obsidian turns from its characteristic black to gold when put in the sun. This made it special and beautiful and temples were coated with it on the outside. Turning black into gold was a religious path similar to the alchemist turning lead into gold. Unfortunately, the Spanish saw the shimmering gold temples and wanted it, but thought it some evil magic when all they got was black rock!
While we had been to Costa Rica last February and enjoyed it immensely, we did not go to Limon, Costa Rica, the next port of call. Costa Rica is known for their white water rivers and we regretted not having gone previously. We were excited to see an excursion to the Reventezon River for a white-water raft trip and signed up immediately. We have been on a dozen white water rafting trips in Colorado, Utah, Montana, but this was the best! The number of rapids and the intensity of the rapids made for one great ride! We got drenched, we ran aground, we had to paddle our way out of precariously situations, but---we didn’t get dumped! So we consider it a success and a lot of fun.
The last port was Colon Panama, as close to the equator (9 deg 16 min) as we have ever been. We were able to watch several large vessels go through the Gatun Locks of the Panama Canal. We have seen similar locks before (e.g. Soo Locks in Michigan & 3 Gorges dam in China) so we are still not clear exactly why this was as exciting to us as it was. Part of it was that we understood that to succeed in building the canal, started by the French (who gave up), required a Panama revolution declaring independence from Columbia, required clearing a dense forest, required building a city to house the workers, took 20 years to complete, and cost nearly 20,000 lives, mostly from malaria and yellow fever. The US established a territory known as the Canal Zone and opened in 1914 as an engineering marvel and remains so today. To get ships from ocean to ocean and over the continental divide, Gatun Lake was created. It is so large, it flooded 13 towns in its creation. All ships go from sea level to 84 feet at Gatun Lake and then return to sea level at the other ocean. The US maintained control over the canal and the Canal Zone as a US territory. John McCain was born in the Canal Zone. (Can we see the long form birth certificate for him, please?) The US signed the Canal Zone and the operation of the canal over to Panama in 1999. The average fee to through the locks is $80,000 for a ship to cross with an average of 37-40 ships per day. The highest fee ever paid was $419,000 by a Norwegian cruise ship and the cheapest fee was a lone swimmer. To watch the double gates operate and how quickly the lock filled up was amazing to us. We finished with Panama by taking an ECO tour on Gatun Lake where we saw sloths, howler monkeys (who were howling by our close presence!), white face monkeys, toucans, frigate birds, crocodiles, and many other bird species.
We returned from Panama to Ft Lauderdale by rounding Cuba so closely that we could see the western coast from our ship, even during the day. Havana was obvious by the night lights and it was fun to reflect that we were only 90 miles to Key West (our January home) at that moment in time. We returned to Port Everglades, got our “land legs” back, retrieved our car, and continued our adventure in Florida.
Florida is so amazingly rich with wildlife, especially during the winter months. It offers salt water ocean creatures as well as the intracostal fresh water varieties. On the intracostal waterway we took a boat ride where we saw manatees and dolphins, pelicans, great blue herons, and anhingas. We were thrilled to share Florida and its riches with our middle set of grandchildren and we’ve posted a few of those pictures on Facebook.
Another day on an airboat ride, we saw alligators, an osprey, armadillo, more blue herons than we’ve ever seen in one place, little blue herons, tri-colored heron, rare white pelicans, several bald eagles, endangered black vultures, and finally we found the roseate spoonbills that we’ve been looking for and not seen this year to date.
On yet another day at the Merritt Island National Wildlife Preserve and the adjacent Cape Canaveral National Seashore, we hit the wildlife bonanza. Between the two protected areas, we were treated to a ringside seat watching 6 roseate spoonbills repeatedly fly, land, feed by scooping up on the bottom of the lagoon, and take off. Nearby were quite large feral black pigs, more alligators, numerous wood storks, coots & ducks by the hundred, wild turkeys, and even an armadillo. We finished up the day in the NWR and were treated to a dozen huge manatees feeding right at the shore of a canal. For those of you who are not nature lovers, you will forgive us for our exuberance here.
While not doing high-energy adventures, we did get some time to chill on Cocoa Beach. We searched for the bottle with the genie in it, but alas didn’t find one. But we did find “I Dream of Jennie” still alive and being promoted here. Cocoa Beach is a great beach for kids and for taking long walks, yet still close enough to the Orlando attractions.
We have been following the terrible winter weather that some of you have endured this year, whether it is snow accumulations or low temperatures or both. We are blessed to have been in sunny Florida and are very grateful for that. We hope that this blog from Florida might “sunny” up your day. Spring is on its way and Punxsutawney Phil did see his shadow, remember?
We now head west to the Florida Gulf Coast for the month of March.
