Deanna's Exciting Blog!: Trip to Florida Keys

During the week between Christmas and New Years I traveled to the Florida Keys with Denise and Penny. We left on December 26 and arrived back home on January 3. It took us about 2 days to drive each way, and we spent Monday afternoon - Saturday afternoon in the Keys. There were several reasons for going

warmer weather than Goshen, IN
sunshine. (Goshen is known for persistent cloudiness during the winter)
something exciting to do
Goshen College owns a facility for marine biology on Long Key that I handle the reservations for as part of my work. I had never been there and thought it was high time I got there so I could better explain the facility to interested groups, and also to develop relationships with some local people who I had previously only had email contact.

We went with plans to clean the facility and do minor repairs. We ended up working our butts off. The facility was somewhat dirtier than we expected, and we spent lots of time laundering mattress pads, blankets, and pillow covers, and cleaning the place from top to bottom, including wiping down all surfaces with all purpose cleaner, cleaning the refrigerators and ovens, fixing toilets, etc. etc. etc. Looking back I probably wouldn't have prioritized some of the work so much, but when you are overwhelmed with all there is to do, you are only there for a limited amount of time, and you are task-oriented like me, you probably would have done the same thing. We did take a day off to go to Key West and the beach, and enjoyed some long lunch hours on the pier, and some relaxing time for reading and watching a movie.

I realized when I got back that I took more than 400 pictures. Part of this was my task while I was down there since the GC maintenance director hadn't been down to the facility for several years and some improvements and changes had been made since then. Also, my boss has never been there so I wanted to give him a feel of the place. Add that to all the personal pictures I took and it ended up being quite a lot. I have picked about 30 pictures to put on the blog, and even then that seems like a lot for one post. So I will likely make several posts about the trip since I'm not sure I can get it all done tonight.

Following are the pictures, which should give you a taste of what we saw and what we did.

Ready to leave! Saturday afternoon in my driveway.

We drove through the night to my aunt and uncle's winter house in Sarasota. Even though they were still at home (up north) for the holidays we enjoyed hanging out and relaxing there before embarking on the rest of our trip the next morning.

Citrus at the fruit stand we stopped at in Sarasota.

We decided to take the 2-lane road through the Everglades instead of staying on I-75, in the hopes of seeing nicer scenery and more wildlife. Instead we mostly saw lots of people. We passed one of the entrances to Everglades National Park. The parking lot was full and there were cars parked on the side of the road for at least 1/2 mile in both directions. It was a weird feeling to feel like you were in the middle of a wilderness but yet surrounded by a lot of people. We got out to take a picture and then kept going. A real trip to Everglades National Park will need to wait for another trip.

We saw many Panther Crossing signs on the road through the Everglades. I read online that there are estimated to be only 100-200 Florida panthers left (they are extremely endangered). I think we must have seen at least 50 signs, one for every 2-4 panthers. I guess they want to make sure they don't die from car accidents.

The bridge leading off the mainland to Key Largo. There was a LOT of traffic as we headed south. It was stop and go traffic for about 20 miles, then opened up a little as we got farther south.