The Overseas Highway to Key Largo

    Packing everything back into the car wasnt nearly as fun as moving into our Sanibel condo.  Amanda and Marlene efficiently cleaned out the cupboards and made lots of snacks for the two hour wait at the airport.  We packed food for some breakfasts and lunches.  I booked a place with a refrigerator in Key Largo knowing that we would have leftovers from our busy week.

    We dropped off some of the family and luggage at the airport, and then drove further south.  We drove across the state of Florida on "Alligator Alley."  This is a very straight road that passes through Big Cypress State Park, and the Everglades National Park.  For most of the drive the highway has eight foot fences topped with barbed wire on both sides of the road. In addition, the bottom third of the fence is reinforced with some heavy duty steel cables.  I wondered what was being kept in or out and Googled it.  The tall fences are to keep wildlife in the parks and off the road.  The cable prevents cars that go off the road (sleepy or drunk drivers) from sliding under the frnce into the ditches populated with alligators.  Okay, I am happy that I looked that up.

    We caught the Overseas Highway near Homestead, Florida.  It is actually US 1 which goes the 127 miles from Miami to Key West.  Large parts of US 1 were built on the former right of way of Key West extention of the Florida East Coast Rairroad. The extention was named the Overseas Railroad and was completed in 1912 and then partially destroyed by a hurricane in 1935.  It was too expensive to rebuild the railroad so the property was sold to the State of Florida.  Several portions of road, connected by ferries were already in place providing access to Key West, but the comination of ferries and roads was cumbersome to maintain and slow.

    The first portion of US 1 is a narrow two-lane highway which travels through Florida brushland.  It has the familiar high fences and sea blue cement barriers down the center of the road.  I think that the barrier is to keep frustrated drivers from u-turning and giving up.  The traffic is heavy and very slow.  My MapQuest app gives me the distance remaining as well as the probable time of arrival.  Imthought it was just wrong when it predicted that the 35 mile drive would take us 90 minutes.  It was very close to accurate.  It wasn't until the last few miles that we could see water and really get the sense that we were on an "overseas" highway.

     Tomorrow is Easter Sunday so we are stopped for two nights in Key Largo at a 50's motel right on the one of canals which wind through the island.  We have a screen lanai overlooking the water and look across at some huge homes with equally huge boats.  Dozens of tour boats motor past taking divers out to the huge reef just outside Key Largo.  The view and the small kitchen are all this place has going for it as it is otherwise pretty tattered, but it has been fun to sit and sip pina coladas and watch the world go by.  Peaceful and quiet.  Too quiet actually without all the family voices in the background.