Everglades National Park

May 10th We went to a Church of Christ. Our family added three to a dozen members who attended the church service. One of the interesting things about traveling has been seeing different church services. When we stayed at Darrell and Evelyn's we went with them to a Baptist church. It was different from what we are used to. They had a full band and gathered people from the audience to form a choir. On the second Sunday we attended, Patrick went up to the choir with Evelyn and the girls and he sang! He liked the band, the singing and the preacher. The preacher started at the pulpit with some Bible verses and then moved down the stage and into the audience. You didn't know where he was going both physically and with service.
After the service, we went back to the camper to relax.

May 11 We ventured down to...

 Our first stop was at the Ernest Coe Visitors Center for a passport stamp and some swamp knowledge at the exhibits. Its about where the 9336 road symbol is on the map. Royal Palm is about where the time stamp arrow is.

They had a statue of a panther. Patrick wondered if there were any pink ones and Iris climbed up and sniffed the statue's butt.

There were multiple signs like these. I didn't get to see one though. They are pretty elusive. 

 The next stop was at Royal Palm along State Route 9336. They had a boardwalk trail out over a borrow pit that was dug in the early 1930s to build a road through the area. What amazed me was that no matter where we were, at the borrow pits, the swamp itself, or the little canals was the clarity of the water. It was crystal clear.

This is what the River of Grass looks like. Small stands of trees here and there but mostly grass. There were signs to some of the observation points listing the elevation at 3 feet above sea level.

Talapia fish, an invasive species.

Turtles

One of two alligators we saw sleeping under the mangroves.

Becky is in love with the air plants that grow on the trees. These were in full bloom.

A nice gar. He is probably a foot and a half long. The water is clear but the camera has a hard time seeing down into it.

 We continued down 9336 to Flamingo. I have an affinity for little places at the end of the road on a map. That describes Flamingo. It had a hotel, restaurant and other ammenities until it was hit with two hurricanes in the same year, Katrina was one of them. Now it is just a visitors center, a nice campground, with electric hookups, no water or sewer and a marina. The marina provides boat tours up the canal and out into the Bay of Florida. At $32 per person it wasn't cheap and we didn't go.
We met a ranger on the ferry back from Fort Jefferson who told us that we shouldn't go to Flamigo, that it wasn't worth the trip and we should just drive route 41 across the see the Everglades. That didn't sit well with me. How could you be a ranger who worked in the everglades and tell people not to go to the visitors centers? We went!

 The beach at Flamingo

 We couldn't have picked a better day to go! The wind off the ocean and the sun on your face is one of those days when I'm an old man, I can close my eyes and feel it just like I was right there. It was beautiful and perfect.

Pictorial proof that we were there!

A manatee swims in the marina.

What better reason to go to Flamingo that to see a crocodile? We were told that this was a mama with eggs that hadn't hatched yet.

  In the middle of the river of grass there are these little mounds, sometimes large mounds of trees. These are caused by alligators burrowing down into the mud to make wallow pits when the water level is low. These pits can get six to eight feet deep attracting fish and birds and other wildlife. The little mud banks that stick out of the water allow trees to begin growing and pretty soon you have these areas like you see in the pictures. The cycle of life because of an alligator wants to burrow in the mud. Pretty amazing how God designs things to work together.