Leaving Key West

It wasn’t easy to leave Key West but I managed to tear myself away. Layne was in California with her girlfriends and I had almost two weeks to meet her in New Orleans to pick her up. I could have continued to sit in Ket West but I decided I had to move on up the road. So I did.

I left our last comfortable secure moochdock routine and took to the  Overseas Highway  at 4:30, passing familiar landmarks in the dark, pausing at the park in Tavernier to make tea and walk Rusty in the first golden light of day. I was sorry to leave, pushed by the inner voice telling me to explore. We will be back after Thanksgiving for a final round of friends before South America swallows us up. 

Homestead was illuminated by full sunlight when we stopped on the Main Street, an extension of Krome Avenue, and Rusty took his favorite walk; urban exploration. Homestead went through a period of expansion and bright commerce but downtown looks rather battered -aren’t we all?- by Covid I assume and uncertainty. 

iOverlander shows this levee as a spot to spend a free night alongside anglers and airboat tours. In the spirit of stopping to see everything I decided to check it out, a short distance west of Krome on Tamiami Trail. Turn off at the pump station and ride the gravel a quarter of a mile for splendid views of the river of grass. I made tea and Rusty sat around looking his usual princely self. 

Tamiami isn’t a special secret name. Barron Collier who paid to build the first road across the Everglades in the 1920s simply called it the Tampa to Miami road, numbered by the government as Highway 41. It passes through Miccosukee country and the tribal police are not fond of speeders as I found out to my chagrin twenty years ago at some ungodly hour of the night and wasn’t I surprised to get pulled over…

The first part of the 24 miles of Loop Road are in Dade county but they are also in the reservation and the homes above are standard Miccosukee style built up on flood proof (for now) mounds. After a few miles you enter Big Cypress Preserve part of Everglades National Park. You’ll notice the Feds have repaved  the road which is also in Monroe County though Key West has never bothered to put up County  markers here on the mainland. 

No alligators were molested  on this drive through their turf but the approach of the huge GANNET2 encouraged a few to spontaneously lurch off the grass into the water. Neither Rusty nor I dismounted in their presence. Just a respectful precaution you understand…

Loop Road is a series of smoothly traveled straight stretches joined by wide sweeping curves. Oncoming traffic can see each other from far enough away to figure out a passing spot. Patience is the name of the game on the 15 miles of gravel. 

I found I was not alone in enjoying the road through the woods. Personally I’m pretty sure you’d see as much sitting down in comfort in the air conditioning but an air of being on safari can bring it’s own pleasure. 

Some families have vacation homes on the cape or in Kennebunkport. Others share their inherited privacy with swamp critters…

Sweetwater Strand is the mother lode of alligator sightings. Enter Loop Road at the west end, at Monroe Station, for a much shorter drive to spot gators. 

And here they all are:

Alligators are dinosaurs and aside from being fearsome they don’t have much spare brain capacity to do anything that might be interesting to watch. They just sort of lie there immobile and unblinking. It’s worked for millions of years so why change the habits of eons past? 

The term “watching paint dry” comes to mind. They are much less dangerous than popular imagination  would have you believe. However if they should grab you or your dog it’s usually curtains so in my opinion the risk/reward assessment needs to be made very carefully. 

If you go to the shark valley observation trail you will see loads of them right at the edges of the paved trail and they are, or have been so far, entirely docile. 

I saw some youngsters swimming with masks in one of the strands next to the road. I waved and said nothing as I drove on by but better them than me. People tell me I am brave to travel to Latin America in a van. To me it is enjoyable and not at all scary where swimming with alligators seems neither sane nor pleasurable. 

Below you see an apartment sized pet. And yes some people do like to keep them as pets. And with so many stray dogs needing homes…

This sign post (looking south toward Sweetwater Strand) marks the boundary of Big Cypress Preserve and also the northernmost boundary of Monroe County, not that there is a sign to that effect. Collier County has inconsiderately abandoned the last four miles of the Loop Road to potholes and ruts, bad enough to cause a rental convertible to make a U-turn a short way in from Tamiami Trail.  

If larger vehicles like RVs lose their nerve there is a marked “last chance” turn out just past the toilets and picnic tables which are the only services to be found the length of  Loop Road, within sight of Highway 41. 

There once used to a gas station and restaurant in an old abandoned building called Monroe Station. I can’t find my pictures of the old structure so I found these on the web  with a link describing the  fascinating story of pioneer Florida motoring. An idiot with a camera and a desire to take night pictures accidentally burnt the building down in 2016 and now it’s a hunters’ parking lot. 

Check out the Abandoned Florida website for some great pictures and the full fascinating story of the Monroe Station so named as it was closest roadside service station to the northern tip of mainland Monroe County. 

https://www.abandonedfl.com/monroe-station/

Across the highway  is a typical Miccosukee village.  

Turn left to Naples and right to Miami. Rusty and I turned left heading for Dinner Island campground. 

Alligator Alert

I have visited the Blue hole on Big Pine Key for twenty years and then on Thursday the well known Blue Hole resident said goodbye in spectacular fashion. Out of the water and along the trail he crunched some thing so loudly I imagined it was my bones.

The Blue Hole is called that because it is a pool of freshwater in a spring of islands that lack freshwater resources. There are no natural lakes or springs or rivers or streams in the Florida Keys. Alligators live in fresh water (crocodiles, the less aggressive dinosaurs, live in salt water) thus there aren't any in the Keys. A puzzle is here!

Since Hurricane Irma. new signboards have gone up to explain the vagaries of the Key Deer refuge whose office is closed to the public (Thank you Covid)  in Big Pine but you can read the public sign boards wherever they are posted. And there are lots of them.

I have no desire to feed Key Deer who congregate around homes where the best vegetation is raised on ornamental gardens. The idea of feeding an alligator is about as appealing to me as having an unnecessary colonoscopy but some people do actually feed them I was told by a resident of one of the houses near the Blue Hole.

I know a long time alligator in the Blue Hole starved to death after ingesting a rubber toy thrown by some imbecile visitors which blocked its intestine and prevented it eating. Which explains the mystery of a fresh water dinosaur in islands surrounded by salt water. The alligators of the Blue Hole are imported.

The story of tarpon in the fresh water was a new one to me, see below:

Hurricane Wilma pulled a number on these islands with massive flooding in every direction. My way home was blocked by an alligator in the roadway apparently washed out of the Blue Hole by the same floodwaters that brought the tarpon. All I saw was a wet black tail swishing angrily as the beast sought refuge in the mangroves. 

I was hoping to spot the alligator in the water somewhere near the viewing platform overlooking the hole which in real life isn't blue at all. Instead as Rusty walked on his leash ahead of me to the left I looked to the right and to my surprise saw the snuggle toothed snout poking up through the undergrowth. Rusty never saw a thing and was probably wondering why I keep him on a leash on the rare occasions we visit this place. Rules are rules and sometimes they serve a visible purpose.

We walked on and wandered the trails round the hole. I kept Rusty close but honestly I wasn't concerned at this point. Alligators inspire terror and they are fearsome beasts but as long as you aren't stupid they will leave you alone. Being stupid is swimming in freshwater canals where they live, especially at dusk or at night. 

I wondered at the algae blooming in the water all round the pond. I can't imagine it bodes well for the residents of the hole and made me wonder if coming out of the water to sit in the shade might be preferable to being surrounded by scum. Maybe alligators aren't so fussy.

By the standards of mainland forests the pines of Big Pine Key, so called for the size of the island not the trees, are pretty small and underdeveloped. A pond like this in most areas of the East Coast would be nothing special, but around here where quarries are the only source of fresh water lakes this place is rare in the Lower Keys.

The construction projects required to develop these islands needed gravel and rock to build homes, rail beds and roads. And they dig these materials out of the ground. Where you find a freshwater pond you find a quarry. This one is particularly pretty thanks to the growth on its shores. 

We walked out the back into the edge of a subdivision of homes that apparently attract flocks of Key Deer. Rusty was much more interested in the smells in the bushes than he was in live animals and just like the alligator he saw nothing around him except what he smelled. I reckoned it was a good walk.

If the hour long drive to Key West doesn't put you off you could do worse than live behind the Blue Hole among the trees and wildlife.

The speed limit on Key Deer Boulevard, the main connection to the Overseas Highway is thirty miles per hour and speeds are checked. Deer are everywhere so texting while driving will end up doing you no good at all around here. 

Driving north from the highway the road is straight and featureless among little pine trees and palm shrubs. Some maniacs ride the full five miles to Port Pine Heights on the bike path in the blazing sun.

The Blue Hole, three miles from the traffic lights in Big Pine.

Normally you stand on the platform and peer down at the water.

The literature explains how fresh water trapped in these places gathers in a pool above the salt water penetration in the rocks below.  They call the fresh water a lens as that is what to looks like I suppose when seen in profile.

I recommend taking a look around before reading the small print based on this last visit.

I put Rusty in the car and went back to see what I could find. I found nothing wandering around and peering. Oh well I thought, he's gone back to the water. Had he hell. A slight rustling sound under the trees and finally I spotted him.  He had long since spotted me and I could see his round black beady eye following my movements which suddenly stopped.

He found something hard and crunchy in the leaves and while I watched her crunched. Alligator jaws are powerful in part because they are fixed. They can't chew, they can only tear or in this case crunch. 

Alligators creep me out more than other predators because they snag their food when they can and put their prey in a hole underwater to rot so they can pull it apart more easily. This means they don't hunt when hungry but when they have the opportunity to grab something.

They can run like mad on land and they swim like fish. Well adapted is what you could call them. I'm told we look large to them on land because we tower over them and that puts them off snagging us. I hold onto that thought. It seems to work, as he turned around, came out of the tree with some trouble with his tail and then rested, watching me. I decided to keep my feet and went home.

The Blue Hole

I had a suspicion the recent cool weather might have pushed the most famous resident of the Blue Hole to shallower warmer waters. I  guess I got that right.

With clear blue winter skies and bright sunshine under a strong cool northeast wind, the blue hole was looking quite appealing. 

One of the longest straight roads in the Lower Keys is Key Deer Boulevard which points due north three and a half miles across Big Pine Key. Two thirds of the way to the end when you think you somehow have driven too far, there it is, a brown sign announcing the blue hole.

This being winter the Blue Hole attracts quite a few cars, and I might add no masks (except mine). A few days ago I made one of my sarcastic remarks comparing mask wearing requirements to stores that require customers to wear shirts and shoes and my rather heavy handed humor insinuating that the shirt requirement  should be abolished got me a written reprimand. No, I don't really want to see naked chests when I go shopping. However I did see a lot of naked faces congregating around the alligator. 

The signs against feeding are generally in vain I believe. The previous alligator in the Blue Hole suffocated when it ingested a pink plastic toy thrown at it in the water. Every visitor to Florida live sin holy terror of the alligator yet it is the dinosaur that is at risk from contact with humans. Ah irony.

Don't forget: "don't feed the wildlife." In case you had forgotten while walking across the fifty foot pathway to the water's edge - DON'T FEED THE WILDLIFE.

I made a comment to the  person six feet away about how lucky we were to get to see the elusive alligator, a comment that elicited a blank stare.  No less than I deserve no doubt. I don't much care to talk to people on my days off but when I overcome my reluctance in an effort to be polite I get rebuffed. I make a terrible salesman. They could not  take their eyes off the alligator which gave no signs of life and gave an excellent imitation of paint drying...under water.

There is all sorts of information about alligators and wildlife refuges for anyone with a penchant for information, of which there were none. People came, looked, got bored instantly and left. For the record: crocodiles are salt water creatures, shy and retiring and can be found occasionally in the Keys, mostly the northern islands nearest Florida Bay.  One swam down to key West for a socially isolated vacation probably and caused a sensation. I remarked rather tartly to my long suffering wife that seeing a polar bear might perhaps have been cause for astonishment in the sub-tropics.

Alligators are freshwater creatures much easier to find in the Everglades than in the Keys where freshwater is scarce. The parks people say alligators cruise the Keys looking for fresh water but I've never seen one in 20 years of walking the trails. I suppose from my perspective it's good that they say this stuff so more people are scared and I get to be alone in the back country.

I have to say the Blue Hole was looking slightly blue when seen from  a certain angle.

Though really the water is green and somewhat tannic when you look straight down. There are no rivers or lakes in the Keys and places like the Blue Hole are created by humans digging up the rock to make gravel for construction and the resulting quarry, when abandoned fills with rain water and here it is: alligator country. Humans import the alligators, they don't just sprout here by magic.

A pleasant spot to waste fifteen minutes on your way to pick up groceries at Winn Dixie up the road. 

I was lucky enough to get to see the wild creature of the deep on this trip.

I don't come here that often but he (or she) made this trip worthwhile. Let's face it, alligator watching isn't that interesting but without the sight of the dinosaur the Blue Hole is pretty much as interesting as any backyard pond Up North. 

Mask free parenting: bring them up right!  I stepped aside for them and they walked by pretending I wasn't there. The Keys do attract some socially inept people. Myself among them I suppose.

It was a good afternoon to out looking at Nature.