Last Day in the Florida Keys

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The weather was incredible on our last day, Tuesday. We took the dinghy over to the sand beach again and baked in the sun. Ian left at 5 am to go on a fishing boat. We are counting on him to bring supper home as we have invited Lydia and Roger over tonight. We met them at the Dockside Bar a few days ago. The have a beautiful Choy Lee sailboat called the Lydia Green. Seeing as it is our last day, we had to drink up any beers left so we took a few to the beach. Kind of nice how you can drink anywhere here in the keys. We saw lots of dolphins swimming right past the beach. One came up about 5 feet past the point. Pat met a few guys from Naples, Italy and had a nice time talking with them. Eamonn met a couple of girls and took them out for a spin in the dinghy.

I went snorkeling and was totally amazed that the reef was right there, 20 feet out from shore. I was swimming with schools of fish. Fantastic. Then I got a little nervous as I looked up out of the water and I was caught in a current pushing me right around the area where the shark was. And me without my flippers. So I quickly got my butt back out of there. I was very excited that I got to swim a reef before we left. Had to have a couple of beer to celebrate and get the taste of salt water out of my mouth of course.

There was a bald fellow just floating on his back on top of the reef in the water. 3 pelicans started diving right around him. I guess there was a school of fish swimming there that they wanted. It was too funny watching that. Pelicans are these huge birds with wingspans about 10 feet and and when the dive, they tuck their wings right in and drop like and arrow. With their big bills. they just pluck the fish right out of the water. I just love to watch them. So the poor guy is just floating out there and all of the sudden these 3 pelicans are dive bombing all around him. Gotta love the wildlife here.

We went to the Dockside Bar on the way home and met up with Roger and Lydia, a couple we had met a few nights before and invited them for supper on our boat. Ian had gone out fishing on a real fishing boat and came home with an abundance of fish. Fantastic. We had a feast. Hillary and Charles dropped by. And Jay, the owner of the boat. I will say no more on that subject. I will just leave it by saying it was a fun last night of a great vacation.

When I embarked on this journey, I had my fears about traveling on a boat with all guys and me. I must say that it really was a fabulous journey and I probably would not have had that much fun on a boat full of girls. Well, maybe, but different. We all got to know each other a little better and I believe that we all respected each other for our own differences. These men are gentlemen and scholars and I am so thankful that they allowed a woman on board.

I am also thankful for the swearing lessons that I took before the journey. This helped with my communication with the retired Irish doctor Eamonn, on board. We had fun telling people that we had an Irish doctor, an Italian banker, a German IT man, an English electrician, and a Canadian woman. I don't recall anyone mentioning that I was a massage therapist, just a woman.
Well, Jay, the boat owner did mention the fact that I was a massage therapist and told me that he gave great foot massages and asked if I wanted one. Well, of course, I said, YEAH, and then he continued on to my hands. Unfortunately, I had to stop him there. Now that was a wonderful end of a wonderful week.
I was out on the boat for 9 days but have only blogged about 5 of those. The rest of the time I believe we were sailing or eating, or drinking, and having fun. Something other than sitting on the computer.