May 2 Florida, Day FOUR

Thursday: Today was my first FULL day of camping. Our camp superintendent (David) had everything under control at the campsite (!!), so we decided to kayak at about 10AM (when the sun would NOT be at its hottest). I've only been in a kayak once in my life--with my friend, Angela, on a small lake. I wasn't very good at the steering part; so David and I decided on a two-person kayak for our trip today. I'm glad we decided that! David was very good at steering, and after awhile, I think I caught on and was able to be a little bit helpful at least. 

At Fort DeSoto you can kayak among the mangroves and actually get super close to manatees. I've only ever seen a manatee who was very quickly swimming by David's boat several years ago when we used to cruise down the canals of the very rich folk who had amazing houses there. But TODAY, we were looking forward to some close encounters with manatees; and if we were very lucky, we would see dolphins up close too.

It was $45 per two hours in our double kayak--very reasonable for the fun we had! Here is the map of the mangroves and beaches at Fort DeSoto.

A few weeks before my trip to Florida, I replaced my I-phone that was close to dying (it was very old). David had advised that I get a waterproof case for it, so I did! All of these pictures of MARTIN (the manatee) are taken with my new phone camera. They turned out super nice.

See what looks like a big rock submerged ahead of us?

It is a manatee! At the kayak rental place we read signs that asked people NOT to touch the manatees (they are endangered), so even though I wanted to reach out and touch this fella, I didn't.

This is an osprey nest!

This particular manatee (I named him Martin) stuck by our kayak for a long time. He was very friendly! I had no idea manatees actually were this large; nor did I know that they blew air and water out of their noses. They stayed under water for only so long, and then they had to lift their nose above the water line to get air.

Look! Martin is smiling at me!

David pointed out to me that the marks on the back of Martin are most likely from boat props, which is very sad. Its skin must be pretty tough, though--it looked super thick.

We were out on the kayak a little over 90 minutes and we charged ($$) accordingly--so, about $38. What a deal!

We went back to the campsite afterwards, made lunch and relaxed awhile. I completely forgot what we did that afternoon--I think we drove around the campgrounds checking things out, and took a little walk. It was really nice to be at such a beautiful place with NO agenda, just to relax and enjoy the company of my dear brother.

We took in a gorgeous sunset that evening. I have more than 100 pictures of it, but I will only post my favorites:

Some of these were taken with my phone, but most were taken with my Canon.

It was such a peaceful hour watching the sun disappear ... these photos will make lots of lovely cards.

I was glad when a few clouds came across the sky to greet the setting sun ... skies are so much interesting with clouds, don't you think?

Aren't the colors so amazing?

The sun set a little after 8:00 but the sky was aglow with these beautiful variations of orange for a long time afterwards. We drove back to the camper and watched "Equalizer 3" (these are super intense movies and ... very violent--not my favorite thing to watch, but Denzel Washington is so great in this part and the storyline is so good).