Babymoon!

Warning: Lots of pictures! (You have been warned.)

We left last Tuesday night after J got off work and flew to Fort Lauderdale.  We arrived early (yay!) and picked up our rental car.  They asked if we wanted a Hyundai Elantra or a VW Jetta..... no brainer!  We took off in our Jetta for our hotel, which I booked on Priceline.  We woke up the next morning, had a quick breakfast and were off to Shark Valley!

The drive took longer than we planned, but we made it! There was a lot of construction on the two lane road through the Everglades, so that slowed us down.

Shark Valley has a 15 mile loop you can bike or walk... or take the tram. My advice: TAKE THE TRAM! Not sure why I thought it was a good idea for my almost-7-month-pregnant self to ride a bike... I made it almost 5 miles before deciding to turn around.  My knee wasn't bothering me, it wasn't so much that it was hard... but my butt has never hurt so bad.  (It hurt for 2 days afterward!) So take the tram!  

We did see lots of wildlife up close.  I never anticipated seeing so many alligators up close.  It was really neat!  Then we headed out to lunch (gator nuggets and Mahi Mahi) before finding an airboat ride.  This was really fun!  I have a video I will upload at some point, but here are the pictures from the airboat ride.

We saw a gator and some raccoons, but that was it.  Riding through the mangroves was fun though!

After the airboat ride, we went to our hotel and swam before heading out to supper.  There were 6 places to choose from. 6. We ended up at a decent place and had salad and steamed shrimp. The view was nice, too!

Day 2

We had planned to go to Key Largo, but our boat ride there was canceled due to high winds, so we ended up exploring Big Cypress Preserve and going to Naples.  We took a scenic drive through the Preserve (27 miles on a dirt road) before heading to Naples for lunch.  We have never seen so many gators... we weren't expecting to see so many.  I am pretty sure we saw hundreds! Pictures along the drive:

After we finally found the main road again, we were off to Naples.  We ate at a cute restaurant where I had some amazing fish tacos (which I would later regret because I had terrible heartburn!).  We walked to the beach and enjoyed the beach for a bit before heading back.  It was a gorgeous day!

Day 3

I didn't get a phone call about our boat trip, so we were off to Key Largo!  The drive was just over two hours, but again, lots of construction on the road getting out of the Everglades.  We stopped for lunch in Key Largo before finding our boat.  It was a 45 minute ride out to the reef.  Once we arrived at the reef, we pretty much drifted around the roof. And the water was choppy. J almost got sick and I didn't feel so great, but it was neat to see and beautiful!

Barracuda!

 

We enjoyed the ride back in and were thankfully for solid ground!  We drove back to our hotel and had a quick swim before passing out for the night!

Last Day

Nothing remarkable really.  It rained and stormed.  We were on a dirt road when it was REALLY bad, but we made it out alive!  We tried to go see an area where there were manatees, but we didn't stay long since it was raining.  We are pretty sure we saw the ripples from one even if we didn't see an actual manatee.  Then, we drove to Miami, which was nothing special in our minds. After that, we went to Hollywood to the Hark Rock Casino to kill time until our flight.  We ate and played a few games, but it is rather boring really!   We headed to the airport early and just sat around until our flight.  We made it home safely, but exhausted.  We are glad to have gone, but nothing was so great we see ourselves going back.  Think we have seen all the Everglades and Keys have to offer... but we will go back to the beach!  It was a nice getaway before baby arrives at just the perfect time.