Last Few Days at John Pennekamp

 

Saturday January 20, 2024 - Today we rode our bikes in search of T-shirts and stickers.  

the mermaid and the pirate

don't eat me!

Sunday January 21, 2024 - First the first time since we got to John Pennekamp SP (11 days ago) we drove the RV.  It's been great to be able to ride our bikes everywhere, but we're wanting to do a few things on Islamorada, which is about 20 miles south of here.  Since we were driving by the Community Center where we play pickleball, we decided to stop and play a few games.  Next we drove down the Overseas Highway to Windley Key State Park, which was an old limestone quarry.  There were multiple interpretive trails in the SP, and we enjoyed reading from the guide they let us borrow at the ranger station.  I had heard about a local farmers' market that we hit next and then the Florida Keys Brewing Co, which had a great beer garden and live music!

You can see the walls of the limestone quarry behind us.  The limestone was used by Henry Flagler in the early 1900s to build the overseas railroad connecting mainland Florida with Key West.  The keys are made up of limestone from ancient coral reefs, so there was plenty of limestone for the project

fossilized coral

remnants of the railroad

Kevin was feeling hot, so hugged a gumbo limbo tree to cool off

pretty saw palmettos along the trail

We parked in front of these cool painted fish at the Farmers Market, it's another breezy day, as you can see from the flag.

Kevin found a tomato, at the farmers market, for our burgers tomorrow

Florida Keys Brewing.  Each of the tap handles is a mermaid.

Beer in the beer garden.  There weren't any open tables, so we sat with a couple who had just moved to Islamorada from Phoenix in the last year.  It was interesting to chat with them about what it's like to live in the Keys

Tiny in front of the Brew Pub

Monday January 22, 2024 - 

Our usual morning walk, 1.5 miles around the state park

we think it's a frigate flying overhead

It's a yellow flag day, 20 mph winds all day

burgers and hot dogs on the grill

Tuesday January 23, 2024 - Today's our last day at John Pennekamp, so we wanted to get a final day of pickleball in.  We don't know when we'll find such a great place to play.  We did laundry, shopping and made one last trip to the Caribbean Club for happy hour and a sunset

It was a busy day at pickleball, you can see Mary in the orange shirt got out her megaphone, to call out names for open courts.  We're going to miss Key Largo pickleball!

Wednesday January 24, 2024 - One last morning at John Pennekamp.  Our next campground is in the Everglades National Park.  We have 3 nights booked at Long Pine Key Campground (which we've stayed at 2 other times when we're in the area).  We stopped at Walmart in Homestead to stock up on groceries and then we stopped at "Robert is Here", the huge fruit stand a few minutes from the entrance to the Everglades.  It's known for its milkshakes, and the last time we were here, the line was too long, so this time, we got to try out the shakes.

 

Our last morning walk past Far Beach

At lunch we completed our 800th NYT crossword puzzle!

Kevin loves bananas

Chocolate milkshake for me and Key lime milkshake for Kev

Kevin rigged up this holder for the cute butterfly we bought at the farmers market.  It's a bookshelf bracket that he added a couple of our heavy duty magnets to.  The tail on the butterfly twirls in the wind, which seems to be always present in Florida.

look at the face on that butterfly

an evening walk through the campground

the moon over our campsite

Thursday January 25, 2024 - After lunch today, we rode our bikes to the Royal Palms Visitor Center.  The main road through the Everglades doesn't have any shoulder to ride our bikes on and is quite busy, so we wanted to go for a ride, but didn't want to be out there in traffic.  We noticed on the hiking map that there was a trail that went out the back of the campground and met up with a dead-end road that leads to the visitor center.  There are two loop hikes at Royal Palms which we wanted to hike, so we decided to ride our bikes for some extra exercise.  It was a 9 mile round trip ride, and Research Rd ended up being a great road to ride on, with very few cars.

The .5 mile trail out the back of the campground

Anhinga Trail

A cormorant

Our first alligator in the Everglades

The old Ingraham Highway that was the first road built between Homestead and Flamingo.  It took from 1915-1922 to build the road and even then it was unpaved.  The original reason for building the road (and canal that ran alongside the road), was to drain and develop the land.  Naturalists (and visitors) also used the road to explore the area.

Gumbo Limbo trees, on the Gumbo Limbo Trail

One of the many Royal Palms that the Royal Palm Visitor Center was named for

The ride back to the campground

Back on the trail to the campground

John Pennekamp - Snorkeling, Kayaking and Manatees

 

Sunday January 14, 2024 - We love an early morning walk around the park, before it gets crowded with people (especially on the weekend).  We hadn't done the Wild Tamarind Trail yet, which was a small loop with name tags for all the trees we've been trying to learn.  And of course we went out for a bike ride.

Morning walk-looks like an outfitter dropped off some kayaks for a busy Sunday at John Pennekamp

The Wild Tamarind Trail

Kev reading the nameplates

We stopped at Rowell's Waterfront Park on our way back from Winn-Dixie

I love these signs around the park, saying you shouldn't swim with crocodiles

It's a windy day!

Monday July 15, 2024 - We usually like to play pickleball when we're in Florida, so we looked online to find out if there were any courts around that we could ride our bikes to.  We found that the Key Largo Community Park, which is 3 miles from here, has 6 courts, so we headed out to see if anyone was playing.  It was a mob scene!  We talked to a couple players who said courts are open for pickleball 8:00-1:00 every day ($5/day or $10/month), so we'll give it a try tomorrow.  After lunch we went to Cannon Beach and then rode our bikes to the Carribean Club for a few beers and a sunset.

Lots & lots of pickleball players!

Kev the snorkeler

Only a mile and a half bike ride to the Carribean Club

Can't beat $2.50 beers

Nice dive bar, which was used in the movie Key Largo, with Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart.  Guess we'll need to watch the movie.

Pretty views from the bar

and live music every night

but we're here for the sunset

Nice spot to watch from

Tuesday January 16, 2024 - We hopped on our bikes at 7:30AM for pickleball.  It was a fun group of people and was very organized (a wipe board keeps track of who's up next to play and the park provides the balls and nets.  Seemed like most of the people we met were from Key Largo, but there were a few we ran across that were just down for the winter.  

We stopped at Publix and bought some Cuban bread for dinner (sticking out of Kev's backpack)

Wednesday January 17, 2024 - It was a lazy day, walks around the campground, laundry and another bike ride to the Caribbean Club for a few beers and views.

another green flag day at Far Beach

Our "tight" campsite.  We're surrounded by monster trailers!

Crockpot chicken/stuffing

workout day

Pelicans at the Caribbean Club

We had the backyard to ourselves, at the Caribbean Club, since it was the middle of the afternoon

Thursday January 18, 2024 - Susan was leading another nature hike, so we thought we'd join again, and see if we could cement some of the stuff she taught us last week (and maybe learn some new stuff too).  In the afternoon we booked a snorkel trip.  It was $50/person for a 2.5 hour trip.  The boat took us 5 miles out to a coral reef and we had an hour to explore.  It was a great trip!  Kev took the GoPro, so if you've got 5 minutes to spare click the link and see all the cool fish we saw.

We're back with the mangroves (red mangroves, and black mangroves).  Susan said they drop, literally, 1 ton of leaves a year.

Susan talking about the Gumbo Limbo tree.  She said you can hug a Gumbo Limbo on a hot day and it will cool you down, since they are 10 degrees cooler than the outside temperature.  She also said if you put your ear to the tree you can hear the xylem and phloem moving through the tree.

An orb weaver

Heading out to the reef

It was a fun time!  We saw a barracuda, lots of parrotfish, blue tangs, and damselfish, just to name a few.  The temp of the water was 71, which sounds warm, but after an hour I was ready to get warm!

Friday January 19, 2024 - We played pickleball early, stopped at the grocery store for some shopping and then rented a tandem kayak for a 2 hour paddle through the mangroves.

It was a VERY foggy morning!

headed out the John Pennekamp park road to the Overseas Highway

by the time we got to pickleball we were damp all over.  The humidity had to be 110%

Another great day of pickleball.  By the time we left there were 40 people there!

It seems like we stop at Publix every day

Let's go kayaking

a mangrove tunnel

the view of Far Beach from the water

Cannon Beach

We saw 2 manatees!  Don't they have the cutest snouts?

This snout was so high above the water

I loved the 2 circles they left after they popped up for air.

Kev got some great video of them with the GoPro

If you want to watch a video of the kayak trip, click the YouTube link below, but if you just want to see the manatees, they are in the last minute or two of the video.  In the video you can hear the manatees munching on sea grass