This morning I woke up a little early and instead of fighting for more sleep, I got up and kept reading my book. I manage to wrap it up before everyone starts getting up. On to the next entry in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series! Of course the expected rain didn't come last night so we sweat lodged ourselves for nothing. Our plan is to attempt to get the camp broken and gear brought down to the docks by 9:30 since the ferry was early yesterday. This way we can swing by the visitor center before the people from the ferry arrive and have our stuff ready for the ferry when they arrive. Court helped break the tents down while the kids deflated their bedrolls and pillows. We get everything pulled back together, the common gear in the big bin and all of the snorkelling stuff and get ready to head out. As we are breaking camp we can hear the nesting area for the birds start to get really loud and active. A storm is coming, just a little later than predicted. We finally get the gear moving towards the boat house when the rain starts. It's a light sprinkle at this point and we manage to get everything under the roof before it picks up a bit. Awesome! During a lull before the ferry, everyone but me goes to the gift shop. I didn't see anything I was interested in last night and I felt better having someone near the gear although it was probably not needed. Everyone gets what they want and get settled in for waiting for the ferry.

Now the heavens open up. We are talking about partial horizontal rain to the point that the first yard or so into the boat house is no longer a safe place for the gear. We move everything back and wait out the rain again. This time we get a nice little lull and a chance for me to go check out the birds a bit. The ferry arrives and we bring our gear out to the area for the people to put it on board. A few minutes go past, people are still disembarking the boat and I can see that they are loading our cooler onto the ferry when the heavens open up again. Ironically all of the people that had just been in line to get snorkel gear to go swimming are now under the roof of the boat house as well. I've never really understood this. Regardless, we wait out this storm and it is a little after 11 which is when lunch is being served on the ferry. Score! We get on board and have our subs with some drinks and cookies. There is some minor discussion about possibly going back out and looking around but we all just decide to chill on the ferry until we leave except for a brief security sweep that they need to do on the boat.

On the ride back to Key West we are brought past a sandy key that is supposedly one of the only remaining breeding sites for the Masked Booby. We do get to see a handful of the birds chilling on the beach area of the island which is awesome. I love seeing boobies. The rest of the ride home is pretty uneventful which is nice considering the previous few days. Most of us sleep most of the way. As we get pulling into Key West we see a sailboat that has just flat out sunk along a sea wall. Only the mast is sticking out anymore and there are a handful of people swimming around it like they are trying to figure out how to get it back up. Not sure that it's worth it guys.

We get back to the dock and I am tasked with going to get the van. I hurry along to get it and bring it up. Somehow I manage to get there before the fam gets the equipment so I drain the water from the ice in one of the coolers and attempt to get some stuff setup before they arrive. When they arrive we unpack what's back there in an attempt to get things reorganized in a somewhat familiar manner. We get everything thrown in there and start heading out of the keys with the plan being for Gideon to drive after we get off the chaos that is Key West. We drive by the Southernmost Point marker thinking we might stop and get a picture but it's an absolute mob scene and bail on that idea. Gideon gets what picture he can take from the road. We decide to swing by a Dairy Queen to grab some food but it turns out to be one of the locations that only serve ice cream. Okay, there's one another two hours or so up the road so we snack instead and drive on. Gideon takes over just outside of Key West and does a great job driving. We even get to see a Key Deer on our way out! It was hiding amongst a bunch of fake deer that someone had used to decorate their business.

Gideon pulls into DQ and switch drivers as Abby and I get the food. Court brings us the rest of the way to the hotel with a quick stop at a CVS for some supplies. Since we are staying here for a while, the plan is to unload everything and I start doing exactly that onto two luggage carts that Court has brought out for me when she comes back out and says that the guy needs my ID since I booked the reservation even though she's my spouse and has my last name. Whatever. I get everything onto the carts, move the van and go to our rooms for sleep.

Tomorrow, Biscayne National Park!

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