Florida National Parks Trip

Dry Tortugas National Park

Fort Jefferson, February 11, 2009

Our trip began in the “quaint” island of Key West with our first park being Dry Tortugas. The Dry Tortugas National Park is located way off the Key West Coast. Only accessible by boat, we boarded a Fast Cat, a huge catamaran for our 3.5 hour trip out to the park. It was an awesome boat ride our in pretty much the open ocean. Little Jadeyn was ecstatic, leaning way over the edge to feel the wind in his hair and the spray of the ocean on his face. We met a wonderful couple out on their 30^th wedding anniversary celebration and enjoyed talking with them the entire day and they loved entertaining our little guy.

The small portion of the park that is located above the surfaced of the water is a small cluster of island, the largest of which contains and old fort: Fort Jefferson.

The Spanish explorers named the islands because of the abundance of turtle meat, and dry came from the fact that there is no fresh water on the islands. We learned all about the history of this beautiful old fort and enjoyed touring through it, up to the lighthouse and walking around the moat.

Jadeyn’s favorite part of the day was trying to chase the seagulls and snipes. He turned on the turbos crawlers and almost caught a few. There is a moat the circles the entire fort which allows you to walk around the whole island and look straight down into the clear blue water to see the fish. Who needs to snorkel with a view like that!?