• 45NorthAmericas Great LoopTraveler
    The road to the Alligator Farm. Market gardens and sugar cane where the Everglades used to be.
    Gators, ready for the 'feeding show'. I would be too, if I was them.1Juveniles, coming along nicely...1Airboats ready for usPut your purses and bags in one box and take your earmuffs from another. And get ready to get wet!1Sorry about the fence...When he lifted his chin, that jaw snapped shut with enough power to cut a house in half...Rosie wanted to give him a kiss, but his jaws were taped shut. Might have been just as well.1Meet the world's biggest rodent... capybara1Red-and-green macaw (Ara chloropterus), also known as the green-winged macawPorky-pine... but which is the ass and which is the elbow?Fennec fox (Vulpes zerda), which is the smallest species of canid (dog family)What on EARTH could you do with a 5-inch tongue? I get enough gravy on my shirt as it is...1The kinkajo had gone into a deep hole in a tree, so I borrowed this from the interweb...1This is what the farm is all about1Think of your large, old tabby... then triple it. That's one of these little critters...Miami airport from our hotel bar (Holiday Inn)1Green iguana, a large, tree-dwelling lizard native to Mexico, Central and Sth Americajust anutha conda (trying to get out of the tank to meet me)

    Days 50/51: Leaving the Florida Keys

    Nov 25–26 in the United States ⋅ 🌬 25 °C

    We used up a day packing, cleaning up the dodgy old apartment we'd had the use of for free, and helping Rosie with some computer and phone issues. Then the next day, I cooked bacon and eggs (to use them up), we finalised packing, turned everything off, and headed back out onto US-1 for the run up to Key Largo, off the Keys, and up to Florida City to the Everglades Alligator Farm. Rosie had found a brochure that described a bit of a zoo and airboat rides. We were there within 2 hrs, watched some gator feeding, then set off on our scheduled airboat ride (25 min, which I thought was a bit short), followed by a gator show and a walk around the gator farm.

    After that, we set off for Miami and I bought us in via Old Cutler Rd, which provided a great look at some very nice homes in some very tree-lined streets. We proceeded around the city on I-95 and then out to South Beach so I could show Rosie the art-deco district and the hotels along Ocean Drive. Then it was a 30-min drive in traffic, back across the city to our hotel for the night near the airport. Tomorrow, I'll drop Rosie there--she goes on to Washington DC, NYC, Las Vegas, and SanFran--and head back to South Beach to check into my hotel for 5 nights before my own departure back to Australia.

    Graeme and Lorraine and I have already 'done' Miami, so there's nothing for me to rush out and look at, apart from the beach if the weather's good. So I'm just going to swan around the hotel. And an 8-month adventure will be at an end.    Read more