From sending postcards to swimming with dolphin

Wednesday 4 March
Key Largo

I am disappointed to miss the Ivey House's Mangrove Tunnel eco-adventure, (www.evergladesadventures.com) but the bonus is that I don't have to rush around first thing. The six and a half hour trip is a hefty $124, with a $25 discount if you are staying at the Ivey House. Lunch is included.
While the boarding house is certainly not luxurious, it is extremely comfortable and fastidiously clean. My room is one which surrounds the pool with ceramic floors, so I am concerned that passing traffic will mean a disturbed night. In fact, I sleep like a log, so much so that I allow myself the luxury of two cups of Typhoo before my morning shower. Hurrah again for the travel kettle!
Breakfast is a pretty substantial buffet served in an open area with large hostel-style tables, but with the tours having departed at crack of dawn, there's not a lot of folk about.
There's hardly a car on the road as I depart, but I stop a couple of times to take a few snaps.
The old road between Tampa and Miami, US41 or the Tamiami Trail, is at its best here and the drive towards Miami is extremely pleasant. I am heading along a deserted stretch, when I spy a tiny little post office to my right. I think about it for a mile or so, then curiosity gets the better of me, so I make a U turn. My Hertz NeverLost is not pleased and takes a lot of convincing that I know what I am doing. Ochopee Post Office is the smallest in the entire US. Nanette Watson, the postmaster, is busy sorting the morning mail, in time for people to start picking it up at 1030. At this busiest time of year, she will have some 1500 visitors a week, but a quarter of that out of season. She's only the third native Floridian I have met on the entire trip, coming from Chokoloskee Island. I pay $1.33 for a stamped postcard which will get a local frank I am told this is quite coveted by collectors. In my card, my mother is thus told not to throw it away!

JoNell has suggested a couple of other stops en route to the Keys. The first is The Kirby Storter Roadside Park and Boardwalk. It turns out to be an absolutely delightful mile long walk through a Cypress Forest. It's the sort of thing that Americans do terribly well and I am thrilled that I took the time to stop. The walk is utterly, utterly charming.
The second is to visit the Big Cypress Gallery, where the work of Clyde Butcher, widely regarded as one of America's greatest living photographers is on display. While his work, always in black and white, is undoubtedly hugely impressive, the prices of some of his prints are astonishing. One 3 feet by 4 feet limited edition print of a moonrise, admittedly truly wonderful, is a jaw-dropping $8275. There are other prints which cost three thousand dollars more.
Clyde Butcher turned to photography for solace after a drink driver killed his son.
I am taking in the wonder of some of his work (www.clydebutcher.com), always captured on large format cameras, when a rather noisy and overbearing guide from Everglades Day Safari comes in with a mini bus full of sardine-like tourists in tow. The spell is broken, so I pay $30 dollars for a book of Clyde's work and continue my journey east.
The journey gets pretty slow and tedious for the last 10 miles as I approach the outskirts of Miami, passing Miccouskee where the owners of a vast number of cars are hard at work losing their money in the casino.
Turning south, the road is lined with hundreds of nurseries, from where, presumably, the landscaper gardeners of Naples and beyond get their specimens. Near Homestead, I stop to marvel at the efficient way in which a team of Spanish-speaking workers strip a field of tomatoes and load them at breakneck speed into tractor-pulled trailers.
Having skirted round Miami, I join Highway 1 just south of the exit for Biscayne National Park.
A lot of road works are going on, so the journey to Key Largo averages just 45 miles an hour. But I'm in time for my first ever chance of swimming with dolphins. I join a group of six UK tourists, each of whom has paid $185 for the experience. (www.dolphinsplus.com). I am fascinated to learn that the clicking noise that dolphin make comes not from their mouths, but from an area near their blowhole. While they have stereoscopic vision like us, they can also use their eyes totally independently, so are able to keep tabs on two things at once. Kevin the instructor, is very good at explaining what to do once we are in the water and, trussed up like chickens in tight-fitting wetsuits and life vests, we are soon putting the theory into practice.
I am swimming with Nica and Elvis, two Atlantic Bottlenose Dolphin. Kevin, who's from Ohio, tells me that he'd set his sights when he was very young on a career working with animals and, after graduating, spent time with Sea World in Orlando before joining Dolphins Plus.
I feel rather like one of the subjects being trained as Kevin puts the delightful animals (and me) through my paces. I am propelled round the pool, letting Nica and Elvis nose into my feet or my outstretched hands. Their skin feels rather like tough rubber, totally smooth. The funniest bit is when I am asked to sing. Kevin tells me that the animals will respond to something rousing. So, when I belt out a chorus of 'Flower of Scotland', I am surrounded by a whole chorus of clicking animals, others swimming to join Nica, Elvis and I in the fun. Remarkable, quite astonishing and a huge privilege to have been able to do.
I will confess, though, that having to change in a toilet is not what I would expect for a fee of $185.
My home for tonight is Dove Creek Lodge (www.dovecreeklodge.com) further down Highway 1 in Key Largo.
During this trip, I have been fortunate to have stayed in and visited many wonderful properties, but none so far has had quite the wow factor as this. Maybe it's the proximity of the water and the turquoise water of the south Atlantic, but the exceptionally comfortable and stylish Dove Creek has it all.
I should really go and eat out, but I have procured a couple of wonderfully fresh tomatoes from the Mexican workers up the road and have bought some nice bread and cheese. I am glad that I brought my tiny little salt and pepper containers!