Hello readers! Let me start this blog post checking in on you and how you may have been affected by Hurricane Helene. She was a beast and we are saddened to see the devastation and disruption she has caused to so many. We were blessed to be just west of the center and were personally spared beyond yard debris. We hope that whatever your recovery situation is that things will be restored quickly.
Now on to our Edges of South Florida trip planning. I told my mom last week that there's a reason we are planning this trip for the spring rather than fall - Hurricane Season! We've had to wait until this week to be able to book our tickets for the Dry Tortugas National Park's Yankee Freedom boat that will take us from Key West over to the island. Because DH has a senior national park pass, we are able to get a discount of $15 per ticket for the day trip. We'll spend three nights in Key West, so we selected the middle day for this outing.
They currently have a Fall promotion where you can save $50 off two tickets if you book and travel between now and around Thanksgiving. I don't know if they will offer anything similar for spring, but since we only have limited time, I wanted to go ahead and get us squared away.
A guided tour of Fort Jefferson is included with the day trip. There is also a self-guided tour plan available to download. We prefer doing guided tours because we find it more interesting to hear about it than to read about it. We can always go back through and spend more time looking at points of interest after we've had an orientation.
The day trip also includes breakfast and lunch which I didn't know until I started writing this blog entry! As I have celiac disease, I was happy to see that they have gluten-free options available.
They say the beach there is the best in the Keys - I'm sure others may disagree, but we'll be sure to check it out! We're not really "sit on the beach" people, but we may decide to take a dip in the water. The ferry boat includes fresh-water rinse showers (with warm water, they say) to help get the sand and salt off before the 2 hour boat ride back.
Have you been to Dry Tortugas National Park before? What were your impressions?
~ Cindy D.
