Key West and Key Largo, Florida

The Florida Keys runs about 110 miles long. We parked our motorhome in Layton, Florida, which is at Mile 70, and drove with our car to Key West, the southern most tip (Mile 0), and on another day, drove in the other direction to Key Largo (Mile 100), near the start of the Keys. Did you follow that? 

We loved our stay in the Keys. For the most part, the weather has been great (in the high 70s) with some days more humid than others. No rain at all. The Fiesta RV Park is located right on the Gulf of Mexico. Every night we walked 100 feet to watch the sun set over the water.

Boat on the water in the RV Park

Children cleaning fish they just caught with

pelicans waiting for the scraps.

Here are some of the sunset pictures we took.

We really enjoyed our trip to Key West on December 24. The town was packed with tourists. First, we went to the furthermost point in the United States.

 Jerry got a rare picture of this marker without any tourists

standing next to it while someone took their picture.

Like this!

Trains, horses, buses, bikes all over the place.

And roosters roamed the streets everywhere.

We were going to visit Ernest Hemingway's house,

but the line was too long.

Instead, we visited the live Butterfly Museum. We were told that there are between 13,000 and 15,000 butterflies in place. Because Chanti was with us, we took turns going into the Museum. I don't know about Jerry, but I'm lucky if I saw a total of a couple hundred butterflies. Where were they hiding???

The Butterfly Museum (it was very humid in there)

Of course, Jerry had to visit Jimmy Buffett's Original Margaritaville where he had its famous Cheeseburger in Paradise. 

We also had to take a picture of Mile 0 -- the start of Highway 1.

One more picture of a hotel complex on the beach in Key West.

Then yesterday, we drove in the other direction to visit Key Largo and take a boat ride to see the coral reef.

This is the glass-bottom boat that took us and another 150 

of our fellow passengers 7 miles out in the Atlantic Ocean

to see a mile-long stretch of coral reef.

Having seen the coral reef barrier in Tahiti, we were anticipating seeing pastel mint green, blue, yellow and pink coral together with very colorful fish of all shapes and sizes. What a disappointment! It took us 45 minutes to get out there, and this is what we saw.

We had a relaxing boat ride, though, and thoroughly enjoyed the green waters, canals and houses along the way before we reached the ocean.

Heading out to the ocean.

We drove 60 miles out of the Keys today and are staying in Florida City through the New Years. Our next adventure for the week is to explore the Everglades and see the alligators. 

HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!!!