Florida 2

Later that day, I drove further south and stopped along the way to do the walks that were signposted.  In Florida in the summer, it is less about walking and more about giving blood!  The mosquitoes were large in number and each smack on your leg would kill three to four, but it was worth the walk.  Windeley Key has a fossil reef in a quarry that was dug.  They got part way through using the rock and realised how incredible it was.  It was amazing how easy it was to tell the different corals apart, even in rock.                                                                                   

The time difference was still kicking me.  I was waking really late and struggling to go to bed before midnight each night.  I wasn't trying too hard to change because I knew I would be back soon enough, but the early dives were hard work!

This was the second dive.  Actually part of why I wanted to dive here.  I had spent some of the first day finding someone that was going out and convincing them to dive it rather than snorkel.  This is Christ of the Abyss, a bronze statue that prays for those lost at sea.  It is a replica of another statue in the Italian riviera.  It was just beautiful.  The visibility was perfect and the lighting, everything just fell into line.  The statue is covered with fire coral now, so it is hard to touch without a poison oak type reaction, but I wasn't there to touch it, I wanted to photograph it!  My buddies were pretty relaxed about letting me hang around the statue (although we did look elsewhere that dive as well), but I was just amazed at the whole idea!  It is just awe inspiring to see art work placed where you have to work a bit to find it. 



 Then we went to a reef called Horseshoe reef.  Guess what shape it was in?  Anyway, it was great!  Barracudas, Moray Eels, teeming fish of all description... just what you want when diving!  I found the reef less colorful than the Australian Great Barrier Reef but with many more fish.  The other difference was the sharks.  I have rarely dived in Australia without seeing a shark.  Not big ones, just black and white tip reef sharks, but here I never saw any.  One of the Dive instructors on the boat said that they rarely see them.  Still it was a brilliant place to dive!

When I was done with the diving, I rented a canoe and did a 'canoe trail'.  I had never heard of a specific trail set out like that for canoes, but it was great!  It meant that my arms and my legs both got a work out that day!  The trail is through the mangroves and because you can be almost silent, you have some hope of seeing wildlife.  I saw birds and fish but what was the best part was the silence.  There was no noise at all, but the birds and frogs.  Drifting along in complete silence, just listening to the world as it is now and how it would have been tens of thousands of years ago.