This was my full day in Key Largo, and I’d planned to spend most of it at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park. Judging from the website, it had all sorts of stuff to do. I’d decided to start the day with a glass-bottom boat tour, which I’d already booked, but I’d gotten an email Thursday night that the tour was cancelled and did I want to move it later or to another day? What that meant, though, is I wasn’t in a time crunch like I’d thought I’d be.

The Hampton Inn, although not a fine hostelry establishment, was actually pretty good in what it provided, which included a full breakfast bar. After my usual in-room morning routine, I got cleaned up and went to breakfast. I think they had little omelets that day, plus I had a little sausage, potatoes, fruit, coffee, juice, a couple of little pastries. The usual crush of tourists all fighting for a place at each serving station, but not too bad.

Got my stuff together and headed out. First I just wanted to take a look at Rowell’s Waterfront Park. Quite small, but of course on the water. I walked around, it was very pleasant.

Then off to Pennekamp. What’s funny about Key Largo, and most of the keys, is it really is all Route 1, and often, if you want to make a left, there’s a barrier, so you end up making a lot of U-turns to get to where you need to go.

By then, I’d found out that all the glass-bottom tours had been cancelled that day – it was very windy – so I just explored. First, Cannon Beach (which has cannons on it!), then the nature trails – there were three different loops. I’d thought about renting a canoe or kayak, but decided against it.

So this was all very nice, but I’d kinda thought I’d spend the whole day there, and I was pretty much done by lunchtime. (I tend not to linger, especially when traveling by myself.) So I headed out and checked out the visitor’s center, where she gave me a great map of Key West (which confused me at first until I realized it wasn’t Key Largo) and a whole bunch of coupons for discounts and free drinks at restaurants.

I wasn’t hungry, but a coffee stop sounded nice. I wanted something local, not Starbucks (although they had that), and a quick Google Maps search had me picking the Cupacabana. I drove out there, past the Pilot House (which was a restaurant the guide book had suggested), and realized once I got there that the Cupacabana was a food truck in the parking lot of the Dolphin Adventure place. No, I wanted a cafe. I also checked out a local outdoor-deck restaurant called Backyard Cafe, but they were about big food and beer, not coffee. So I decided to give a shot to Denny’s Latin Cafe, and set the Google Maps to take me there. This was a little more complicated, and I had to loop around a couple of times, because the sign just said, in huge letters on the canopy, CUBAN FOOD. But I went in and sure enough, it was a Cuban place mostly populated by Cubans, but they were nice enough to serve me. I got a ‘Cuban latte’, which I think is really called a cortadito and “Cuban Toast”, aka ‘tostada de mantiquilla’, which was, sure enough, just a toasted cuban loaf with butter – and this was a really nice little midday snack.

Back to the hotel, where I checked out the tiki bar and beach situation. The beach had a boat tie-up place and an actual beach, and the boat place had a tiki-structure with beach chairs, and some were empty. (I really don’t like being in the sun, wanted the shade.) So I quickly ran and got changed and put all my devices and towel and stuff in a tote bag and grabbed one of those chairs. There was a couple there in front, trying to fish, and wouldn’t you know it, an iguana came right up to them! and she fed it something. Very friendly. And I read and surfed internet and lounged, very nice.

While lounging, I did a little googling to see if there was anything else Key Largo-ish I wanted to do, and there was an art gallery that was closing soon, so I went and got dressed and drove to it. It wasn’t bad, but nothing I really wanted. Then back to the hotel, back in the bathing suit and down to the beach and swam for a while. Small little area, but perfectly nice. Missed Charles – reminded of me of the late afternoon dips we took off of South Beach in 2016.

Got a shower, then killed time at the tiki bar with a strawberry daiquiri before news and knitting, then dinner.

I decided to go to the Fish House, where I had a coupon for free key lime pie. They sat me at the bar, where I had a cosmo and “Fish Ventura”, which was delicious – mahi mahi and artichokes.

A guy came in and sat to the stool on my left, but he ordered quickly and wanted yellowtail and went to the back to pick his fish. He was clearly a regular, and it turned out he was there every night. He was a construction worker and very friendly, so much so that I was like, ‘Hmmm…. what’s going on here?’. But if he was making the moves, it was too subtle for me. I also chatted with the couple to my right, who were from the famous Florida “Villages”. They were fun. And when I got my free key lime pie, they had regular, or a coconut version. So I started laughing, since my random playlist in the car had just that day served up “Coconut”.

So I got the lime and the coconut, and no bellyache – it was really good!

The tiki bar lady had given me recommendations for places with live music, so if I’d felt social, I could have gone for some, but far more typically me, I went back to the room and watched more news and knitted some more.

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Coming up – actually doing the Keys drive!