It’s still so crazy that we’ve made it this far…on our boat!  But here we are.  It’s amazing here.  Ben and I have never been to the Keys so we’re pretty excited to be here.  I’ve enjoyed everywhere we’ve been on the loop so far, but admit that I’m most excited about the next few months to come. We are headed to a lot of places I haven’t been before.

The view on our way into Key West.  Just look at the color of the water!

The last few days have been great as well.  Lots and lots of sunshine and fun times.  We enjoyed Marco Island. We spent a lot of time in the dinghy.  Checked out the Snook Inn for dinner our first night there.

The next day after school we headed out in the dinghy to Goodland, FL.  It’s this tiny little community right next to Marco Island and is the place to go in the area if you want fresh stone crab…which we did…again!  On our way there we took a little detour up a creek to check out some pretty cool trees and huge bird nests.  It’s fun to explore in the dinghy because we can go anywhere we want without depth issues.  Molly just put her feet right in while in this creek.

These trees were so pretty

These tree roots are amazing

Most of the channel markers were home to very large nests

We had a great lunch at the Marco Lodge in Goodland and then picked up fresh stone crab and a key lime pie for dinner next door from the Kirk fish market.

The girls dancing to the live music at lunch

We took the dinghy back and headed to the pool of course.  The girls were thrilled to have a night in.  They get really sick of eating out.  It’s a nice change for them to grab lunch out and then stay in for dinner.  They can swim and shower and put jammies on and have a relaxing night.  We put them to bed and then had a feast of stone crab once again.  So good.

We pulled out of our harbor at 7:45 AM this morning to begin the 100 mile trek to Key West.  There is all sorts of weather moving into Florida right now but most of it is north of here. We knew we had a clear forecast to get here this morning but didn’t want to try it after that.  We had good water for most of the trip but the wind picked up and it got choppy towards the end.  Our last 5 minutes before we pulled into the harbor either the wind changed direction or we changed direction or something but we took some waves that soaked us up on the fly bridge.  Once in our harbor our view was just spectacular.

After getting settled we walked into town and hit some of the “must go to” spots, looked around, watched the Key West women’s march down Duvall street and did some shopping.

The girls at Sloppy Joe’s

Key West Women’s March

The girls looking at another version of the statue they like in Sarasota

We got back to the boat just before sunset and Ben, Molly and Ron went out in the dinghy to explore the anchorage just outside the harbor wall and watch the sunset.  The girls got another night in tonight as we decided to just stay in and grill.  We have so much we want to see here.  We only have our slip until Monday however with the crazy winds moving in tomorrow and Monday we’re hoping that people that are supposed to be here won’t be able to get here so we can stay longer.  Time will tell.  We want to try to get to one of the maritime museums, the Hemingway House, the Truman “Little White House”, Fort Zachary Taylor park and a few good restaurants.  So much to do and see!  Monday may just need to be a field trip day instead of a school day to fit it all in.

I’m once again feeling so blessed to be having this experience of a lifetime with my family.  It just seems to get better every day.

Ben hasn’t blogged in awhile so he may blog about this trip as well.  It was our second Gulf crossing and he’ll tell it from a different perspective.