Friday, November 18, 2011

Will you call on me when you're living on the sea?


Florida: Part Four
Now, I'm always a fan of a good boat trip on holiday, and I'm also a fan of the fact that we managed to fit in not one, but 2 boat trips whilst in Florida.

The first was an airboat ride through the mangroves in the everglades: a perfect morning after the wedding cure! The tour guides were great: ex fishermen who knew the winding paths through the mangroves like the backs of their hands. They put on a bit of a show for us trying to track the alligators down, and raced the tow boats alongside each other! We didnt really get much of a glimpse of an alligator but we did get to see a pelican who landed on the front of our boat before we had even left the dock, and a rather friendly, but reputedly vicious racoon...!

On the way back to the dock we spotted Grimms Stonecrab, a little crab shack where we stopped to munch on some fresher-than-fresh stonecrab claws. Yummers!






The second boat trip was in a speed boat out from Naples and into the Gulf of Mexico, where we each took turns to drive it ourselves (very scary!) saw dolphins, moored up at a secluded beach, and later a private island, drank beer, and watched some wake boarding. pretty much paradise!