From Here to There: Key Limin'

Ahh, the Florida Keys.

After living in the state for more than eight years, we finally made a road trip through the Keys a reality. Boy, was it worth the wait! We've in fact been to Key West several times, but have always arrived via high-speed ferry in and out of Fort Myers and never ventured out of Key West proper. We had fun, but this time we were looking for a different experience. And this road trip fit the bill, perfectly.

There seems to be loads of information available about the Florida Keys. I found a very helpful guidebook from Frommer's called Frommer's Shortcuts: The Florida Keys through the iPad bookstore. After viewing websites and blogs galore, I found this book to be the most helpful and complete resource of anything I referenced. It gives a great overview of each area within the Keys along with some ideas of things to do, places to stay and where to eat. It's a good starting point all in one place.

More than 800 keys make up the island chain the sprouts off the tip of Florida, south of Miami. This chain is referred to as the Florida Keys and has five distinct areas. From the north, Key Largo, Islamorada, Marathon, Big Pine Key & the Lower Keys, and Key West. Each area has a different vibe to it. Coming in from the north, we had an opportunity to essentially go anywhere within the chain. After reading the above mentioned book, we ultimately decided on making Big Pine Key & the Lower Keys our base of operations.

There are "name brand" hotels located sporadically throughout the keys, the majority being in Key West and Key Largo. There are lots of different types of accommodations available from high end B&Bs to low rate motels and even camping. We decided to stay at Parmer's Resort on Little Torch Key, just over the bridge from Big Pine Key and fairly central to most of the activities we targeted. It is a basic place, with clean rooms, a nice pool, a continental breakfast with fresh fruit daily, it had great outdoor space for chillaxing and good views. Our room had an efficiency kitchen which was big plus for us. It proved to fit the bill for our needs.

Activities are the heart of any Keys vacation. If you've read any of my previous posts you can probably guess we like to be outdoors for most of our vacations. This was no different. Our major priority was to get a few snorkel trips in, spend some time in the National Key Deer Wildlife Refuge and relax. Thankfully, we were able to do all of that and more. Here are some of the highlights that I would recommend:

Looe Key National Marine Sanctuary - Best reef I've ever snorkeled. Ever. (I'll be being following this post with another to thoroughly discuss Looe. So be sure to check back with the blog soon!)

Bahia Honda State Park - Little but mighty. This state park has it all. The park has an on-site vendor, Bahia Honda Park. You can catch a boat ride out to Looe Key from here which we did for one of our trips to the reef. Reasonable priced and a great experience. You can also rent kayaks, chairs, etc and they have a gift shop for any needs or mementos you might have while visiting.

Key Deer Wildlife Refuge - Not for everyone and that's okay. If you like wildlife, quite places and textbook Florida nature, this place is for you.

Castaways Restaurant in Marathon - $2 Bud drafts and outstanding sushi, ceviche and fresh catch - yes, please!

Keys Fisheries - fresh seafood market and an order window right on site. We stopped here a few times for fresh fish to take back and prepare at our hotel as well as had lunch prepared there one day. Pretty solid. They are well-known for Lobster Ruebens.

We did a lot of things and even worked in some mini-golf and delicious key lime pie. :) But like all vacations, we couldn't do everything. Due to some boat problems from our captain and guide, we had to cancel our backcountry fishing trip. And, we really wanted to get over to Dry Tortugas National Park but being a holiday weekend and waiting on weather reports to make our reservations resulted in having all seats sold out. So we have a good list of things we'd like to do next time we're down that way. Until then, we had a great experience, almost surprisingly so, and are looking forward to some future island time for more cheesin' and limin'.