![]() However, if your interest in sea life is more up close and personal, visit Theater of the Sea to swim and interact with dolphins, sea lions, sharks and stingrays.As you head down Hawk Channel looking for a marina to berth your yacht, you'll pass Hens & Chickens, a well-marked group of shoals off Plantation Key. Whether your angling leans toward bonefish, tarpon or sailfish, you can have it all here. Bush, then a frequent visitor and avid fisherman. Islamorada is also the Sportfishing Capital of the World and was made famous by President George H.W. Today, Islamorada is also known as the Village of Islands and actually encompasses five isles, from Plantation Key in the north to Lower Matecumbe Key in the south. Why the early Spanish explorers named this cayo purple has been lost to history. ![]() Quick: What does Islamorada mean in Spanish? Time's up! Purple island is the answer. The marina offers just about every amenity you can imagine: golf course, spa, tennis courts, watersports, and even a cooking school for kids. Dry Rocks is home to the foot bronze Christ of the Deep statue, which sits below the surface.Dock your boat overnight at the Ocean Reef Club and experience the megayacht lifestyle. ![]() Pick up a mooring ball at Molasses Reef or the perennial favorite Dry Rocks Reef and put on your mask, snorkel and fins. The upland park on Largo Sound offers kayaking and canoeing through mangrove swamps and tropical hammocks, and snorkeling and diving at its marine park out on the reef. Allnut while cruising the Key's canals.But the real star of Key Largo is John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park. (By land, locations in the Keys are noted by their mileage from Key West, which is Mile Marker/MM 0). She departs five times daily from Marina Del Mar located at Mile Marker 100 along Highway 1. Strangely enough, there is another Humphrey Bogart connection to Key Largo: The original African Queen, the steam-powered star of the Bogart and Hepburn movie of that same name, has been restored to its original Hollywood splendor and now gives tours around Key Largo. Key Largo offers a relaxed atmosphere during the winter boating season and, obviously, shares a name with a classic 1948 Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall movie. And fortunately for boaters, the Keys are easy to transit in all weather, day or night, because the naturally formed Hawk Channel is well marked for buoy hopping and offers comfortable passage when the seas are raging outside the reef in the Gulf Stream.We'll begin our cruise from the Miami area and head south, keeping the prevailing easterly winds first on our beam and then on our stern as the Keys turn westward. ![]() If you mention those two magic words the Keys to any boater in Florida, immediately what springs to mind are visions of sparkling clear waters, snorkeling, scuba diving, tickling for lobsters, deep-sea fishing, back-bay flats fishing, and simply relaxing and letting go.A coral rock archipelago and accompanying barrier reef that stretch 200 nautical miles from Key Biscayne to the Dry Tortugas comprise this national marine sanctuary. Other wildlife viewing opportunities may be found in areas managed by the Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Recreation and Parks, in local city and county parks and in national wildlife refuges.Ĭheck out other species recorded from Florida Keys WEA, or add observations of your own, by visiting the Florida Keys WEA Nature trackers project.The Florida Keys are aptly named, because they do offer the keys to a boating paradise unmatched anywhere in our lower 48 states. The Great Florida Birding and Wildlife Trail showcases excellent wildlife viewing sites throughout the Florida Keys. Birds are abundant in the marshes, mangroves and exposed mudflats. Visitors can launch kayaks here and explore coastal habitats. This rest stop for paddlers or bicyclists is a good spot to check for butterflies attracted to a variety of flowering plants. Sammy Creek Landing on Sugarloaf Key is a former home site that has been replanted with native vegetation. Some color forms have become extinct from over-collecting and loss of habitat. More than 50 color forms with varying whorls of pink, green, yellow, orange and brown evolved in the isolated hammocks of Florida. Florida’s population of snails may have descended from snails floating over on logs from Cuba or Hispaniola. Often called “the living jewel of tropical hardwood hammocks,” the Florida tree snail is found in the United States only in rockland hammocks of extreme southern Florida and the Keys. ![]()
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