Turtle Hospital (Marathon)

We had an afternoon flight out of Miami International Airport and so had time to squeeze in some final activities in the Florida Keys before heading to the airport. We reserved a morning appointment to visit the Turtle Hospital in Marathon.

The tour starts in the Turtle Hospital's Education Center and Gift Shop.

The "guided educational tour" of the Turtle Hospital begins with an overview of the work done there and why it's important. The tour guide uses slides and artifacts to demonstrate conditions that can lead turtles to the Turtle Hospital. It was particularly interesting to learn about their turtle rescue efforts. After the introductory overview, the tour moves onto see the patients. It was interesting to see the surgical center in action while on our way to see the other patients.

There are multiple pools for different turtles in different conditions.

One of the highlights if feeding a large number of turtles in a large pool.

It was also interesting to see turtles of different species and different sizes.

The Turtle Hospital is a facility that used to be a hotel. Obvious advantages of this include having rooms for visiting scientists and others interested in turtle research to use when working at the Turtle Hospital.

The Turtle Hospital also enjoys a beautiful setting right on the water.

The Turtle Hospital provided a nice final "major" activity in the Florida Keys. It was a nice mix of education with learning about a nice cause and spending time with interesting animals.

We also made a quick stop at the Rain Barrel Village as we headed back to Miami.

Sailing in Key West on the Blue Ice

We drove from our rented house in Islamorada to Key West on the Friday of our week in the Florida Keys to sail and snorkel on the chartered Blue Ice sailing yacht.

When we reached Key West, we drove to and parked in the Key West Bight Parking Lot to access the Blue Ice in Land's End Marina at the Key West Historic Seaport. The parking is pricey for a smaller city, but convenient for access to the Key West Historic Seaport.

The Blue Ice holds up to six passengers in addition to the captain and crew member, so our party of six had the sailing yacht to ourselves for this half-day excursion.

It had mostly been a windy week in the Florida Keys and this day was not an exception.

After sailing out a mile or two, it became apparent that the waves were only getting worse and that snorkeling at the reef would be difficult and likely not very rewarding. We discussed the situation with Captain Ron and decided to return closer to land to a snorkeling area he described that would have significantly calmer conditions.

We stopped near Wisteria Island and Sunset Key to snorkel in an area that included a small artificial reef created by a sunken boat in the relatively shallow water.

The sunken boat made for more interesting snorkeling than I expected for this area.

The boat was interesting and there were several different species of fish swimming and hiding amidst its ruins.

After we finished snorkeling and while sailing back to the marina, we were provided with a nice tray of cheese, crackers, and fruit that was especially tasty after having expended energy snorkeling for a couple hours.

Anne's Beach (Islamorada)

We rented a house in Islamorada for our week in the Florida Keys, so we had researched and indentified some things to do in and around Islamorada. One of the things we decided to check out when we had a little bit of downtime was Anne's Beach, which was just a couple miles south of us and right off of the Overseas Highway.

We visited Anne's Beach after a break at our rental house to ride out the fairly brief storm that had prematurely ended our jet skiing in the bay and mangroves near Robbie's of Islamorada.

Because of the ominous weather, it was not surprising that we had the small Anne's Beach to ourselves.

It was easy to see why this would be a popular beach for families with small children or for people with pets. Even with the windy weather, the water in the protected bay was relatively calm.

We were surprised how far an adult could walk out into the water from the beach and still have the water level below the adult's waist.

Here are some of the other quotes we read about Anne's Beach before our first visit there:

• Annes Beach, A Slice of Paradise: "The view from these picnic shelters is worth the trip alone."
• Islamorda Times: Anne's Beach: "Welcome to one of Islamorada's best attractions for the avid beachgoer. While the Florida Keys in general do not offer a large variety of sandy beaches, this little stretch located at Mile Marker 73.4 Oceanside offers a beautiful place to relax and enjoy the day sunbathing and wading in the warm tropical waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Anne's Beach 3Always voted as one of the best beaches in the Florida Keys, Anne’s Beach offers many amenities that can enhance a full day of pure enjoyment."
• Anne's Beach in Islamorada: Worth a stop on drive through Keys: "One of my favorite stops on the drive down the Florida Keys - Anne's Beach in Islamorada — re-opened in 2019 after it was devastated by Hurricane Irma two years ago."
• Anne's Beach in Islamorada Florida Keys: "This Keys Beach is located on the Atlantic Ocean, but there is almost no wave action, due to the wide expanse of shallow water typical for Florida Keys beaches. Visitors can enjoy the clear and warm waters year round."
• Annes Beach In Islamorada Florida Keys Is A Lovely Place To Spend A Few Hours: "Annes Beach is probably the most popular of all the beaches in the area of Islamorada, although it is still pretty low key compared to some of the other beaches you might find in the Florida Keys. ... But if you have visited these other more glamorous examples of sandy loveliness beforehand, then don't be put off by this little beach."
• Reviews of Anne's Beach

Anne's Beach is small, but it does have sand and the two small parking lots are connected to the beach via a wide recently-build boardwalk. The covered picnic tables and available restrooms are additional amenities available at Anne's Beach.

All photographs of Anne's Beach shown in this post were taken on a date in late July 2020 (well after its August 2019 reopening after Hurricane Irma's destruction) with storms moving in and out of the area.

Jet Skiing from Robbie's of Islamorada

We had not pre-planned any activities, charters, or excursions for the Thursday of our week in the Florida Keys to allow for other things to potentially be rescheduled to that day if necessary. However, Thursday morning's forecasted and realized windy conditions were enough to preclude rescheduling any snorkeling activities to that day. Because we were staying at a house we rented in Islamorada, we arranged to return to Robbie's of Islamorada to go jet skiing.

We had seen advertisements for jet skis at Robbie's of Islamorada on prior visits (such as when we kayaked through the mangroves).

We probably should have purchased the jet ski package first because it (at least at the time) included a free half-day of kayak or paddleboard rentals (we had previously paid for the kayaking), but we didn't know what our schedule was going to allow.

Our group of six used three jet skis (two riders on each ski) and we followed the guide out into the bay to begin the two hour jet ski adventure.

We slowed down when we got near and went through the mangroves.

We went much faster when we were out in the open bay.

There is supposed to be 30 minutes of snorkeling as part of the two-hour jet ski adventure, but the guide saw the bad weather coming in fast, so we skipped the snorkeling and arrived back at Robbie's marina just before the storm hit us.

We enjoyed visiting Robbie's of Islamorada again and visiting the marina and jet skiing.

Theater of the Sea (Islamorada)

We had chartered a snorkeling excursion with KeyZ Charters for our Wednesday morning in the Florida Keys, but unfortunately the weather was too windy for snorkeling that day. I was not surprised when Captain Samantha called to tell me the charter would need to be canceled. Although we had been looking forward to snorkeling in the Islamorada area (Alligator Reef and Alligator Lighthouse and Cheeca Rocks), it was obvious that snorkeling would not be very satisfying on that morning. I appreciated Captain Samantha recognizing that and proactively refunding the charter. Even though we did not get to participate in this excursion, I'd recommend KeyZ Charters to anyone interested in snorkeling in the Islamorada area.

Knowing that the weather was not ideal for snorkeling during most of the week we were in the Florida Keys, we had thought out some "Plan B" options to consider. For this day, we decided to visit the Theater of the Sea in Islamorada (the town in which we had rented a house for the week).

As soon as the cancelation of the Islamorada snorkeling charter was confirmed, we purchased tickets for Theater of the Sea online. The General Admission ticket, at the time of our visit, included access to five shows/ride that were offered in the same rotation that one could join at anytime. Seeing all five requires approximately 2 1/2 hours. The five shows/ride were the Fish and Reptile Tour, the Parrot Show, the Dolphin Show, the Sea Lion Show, and the Bottomless Boat Ride. I'll cover each of these briefly in the order in which we participated in them.

We did not arrive at the park when it opened, but the rotating schedule of shows allowed us to easily join the next show to start after our arrival.

The first show we saw was the Dolphin Show.

The dolphins were the stars, but the trainers were entertaining too.

The next show we watched was the Sea Lion Show.

Sea lions are always entertaining and these and their trainer did not disappoint.

The Bottomless Boat Ride is shorter than the shows, but provides a different perspective. The passengers all sit on narrow outside portions of the boat and the center of the boat does not have a bottom. This allows marine mammals to swim and jump in the middle of the boat (though the dolphins did most of their showing off jumping behind, in front of, and alongside the boat).

The Fish and Reptile Tour allowed us to see and hear about select turtles, sharks, rays, and crocodilians living at Theater of the Sea.

The Parrot Show showed off the intelligence and training of several highly entertaining birds.

These birds were beautiful and smart!

After participating in all five shows/rides, we had some time before our scheduled additional Animal Interaction that we had scheduled.

We spent some of that time walking through and looking at the lush vegetation.

We also looked at some of the exhibits such as the fish, turtle, and parrots.

We had purchased an additional Animal Interaction for which we were supposed to meet at the park's Lagoon Beach. We therefore snorkeled at this Lagoon Beach for our remaining time until our Animal Interaction start time.

Lagoon Beach offers a small sandy beach that allows for people to sit or walk in the water as though at a regular beach.

Fish food is available for sale and that food makes it easy to get the fish to come close to the people feeding them.

The beach activity was far greater than the snorkeling activity while we were there, which meant that the visibility in the water for snorkeling was reduced.

Our Animal Interaction session was the final one of the day and Lagoon Beach (which closes earlier than the rest of the park) closed while we were involved in that session. When we exited the session and walked by Lagoon Beach, the water visibility was fantastic because the beach-goers had left.

We had purchased the additional "Swim with the Rays" animal interaction, which was described this way, "Graceful, gentle and fascinating to watch… Experience the thrill of swimming with southern stingrays! Feed, touch, and swim with these docile, beautiful creatures. You will be able to interact with the stingrays in shallow water on a sandy beach. While snorkeling you will be able to observe many types of tropical fish – without going to the reef!"

Other Animal Interactions available at that time included "Swim with the Sharks", "Dolphin Interactions", "Sea Lion Interactions", "Meet the Sea Turtle", "Meet the Alligator", and "Meet the Parrots".

We were given a short introduction to how to feed the rays, which was made more entertaining by a bird trying to sneak some of the food we were going to feed the rays.

We sat in the water and allowed the rays (one of which was huge and heavy!) to come to us holding the food below the surface of the water so that the rays could glide over our hands and eat the food in our hands. As we moved further into the water, the rays could swim onto our laps.

After we had fed the rays, we were able to swim and snorkel alongside them. We also got to swim in and snorkel with the next-door nurse sharks. It was a unique and memorable experience for all of us and well worth the additional fees.

Theater of the Sea photography staff were present for the portion of the animal interaction in which we fed the rays and we purchased the photographs they took of our interactions with the rays. This was nice to have this availability of photographs because we were too busy feeding the rays and swimming and snorkeling with rays and then with sharks to remember to use the GoPro.

It was another great day in the Florida Keys despite our best-laid plans being foiled by the breezy weather.