The Florida Keys

We’re in Islamorada at about the mid-point of the Keys, at a lovely hotel.  Our room looks out on the Bay side of the island, on a small channel between our hotel  and a small island which contains the hotel’s swimming pool and a lovely covered lounge area and bar, right on the water.  The days have been warm (high 70s-low 80s) and humid.  The evenings are in the low 70s and more humid.  The sunsets are lovely—this photo is taken from the hotel island with the pool:

 The Keys have not recovered completely from Hurricane Irma.  As you drive down Highway 1, there are still lots of debris piles along the road, and there are crews picking up the debris:

  

Some marinas still have not untangled all the boats:

  

But the worst part, for the shops and restaurants, is that many of the large hotels have not re-opened for this season.  We stopped at the Islamorada Visitors’ Center, and had a long discussion with the volunteer there.  He said it’s counter-intuitive.  You would expect the big hotel chains to have crews come in and rehab their properties, but that has not happened.  Instead, all the small mom-and-pop properties and the boutique hotels have completely rebuilt, but there’s much delay with the large properties.  Only about 50% of the hotel rooms in the Keys are open, and that’s hurting the shops and restaurants.  Indeed, there’s little traffic and no trouble getting into the most popular restaurants.

We’re being so relaxed!  We sleep late (at least Joyce does), have a late breakfast, do some activity in the morning, have a late lunch, go back to the room and rest and read, and have dinner.  Start over.  Activities so far have included a walk on the rehabbed railroad bridge which is now a hiking, biking and fishing trail parallel to the longest span over water in the Keys:

 Hanging out there were loads of pelicans and a lone cormorant:

  

We’ve been to the wild bird sanctuary and (although they don’t call it that) bird zoo where rescued birds who are too damaged to survive in the wild are kept in cages.  The wild egrets were unafraid of humans there.  

And we’ve eaten too much.  The fresh fish is wonderful here, and the conch chowder (a tomato-based chowder which is how I think all chowder should be) varies a lot from place to place, and I am trying many and enjoying them all.

 Tomorrow we plan a nature hike at the Crane Point Nature Center, and then in the late afternoon we’ll take a champagne sunset sail to celebrate Joyce’s birthday.  We plan to spend the day in Key West on Thursday, and we leave the Keys and fly to Bogota on Friday.