The Florida Everglades aka The River of Grass

Visited Feb. 9, 2021

 By Janell

 

We had a few nights in West Palm Beach, but we didn't really do anything in WPB; it was just the closest RV park that we could get into that was near (kind of) The Everglades and Miami.

Our first day out we drove 1¾ hours to get to the Everglades. We splurged and booked a private airboat tour, and boy was it awesome! Our guide’s name was Ray, and he grew up here visiting the Everglades.

We saw several alligators and a variety of birds. We also learned about the history, ecosystem and changes to the Everglades, over the seasons and over the years.

The Florida Everglades is actually a slow-moving river, 60 miles wide and over 100 miles long. It's called the River of Grass because of the way it looks: with sawgrass marshes, cypress swamps and mangrove forests.

The Everglades has two distinct seasons: dry (mid-December through mid-April) and wet (the rest of the year). Ray told us that by April, most of the water we were seeing would be gone. There are alligator “holes”, and that’s where the alligators will be hanging out when the majority of the swamp dries up.  These deep holes of water are marked by clumps of bushes.

One of the greatest threats to the survival of the Everglades has been the impact of humans. No surprise, right? As the population of Florida has risen, water has been diverted to protect homes and property and to create agricultural land, as well as for human use. While restoration efforts seek to return some of the natural flow, the Everglades as they are now are markedly changed from their natural state.

 

As you can see, we had perfect weather!

Isn't this a classic alligator shot? Just like you'd see in a cartoon!

And now for your close-up, Mr. Gator

Isn't the scenery spectacular?! The reflections in the water were amazing!

This is a Purple Gallinule below, and she is looking for worms in the flowers. She didn’t seem the least bit concerned with us.

See how she walks across the leaves? She doesn’t have webbed feet.

Here she has one of the flower centers on her beak.

 

 

 

 

 

After our airboat tour we drove a few minutes down the road to Shark Valley Trails in Everglades National Park to bicycle through the Everglades! There’s a 15-mile paved loop for cyclists, walkers and the occasional tram that comes through the park.

We thought we'd seen a lot of alligators on our airboat tour, but there were even more along our bike trail. So many that we lost count! We saw many varieties of birds, some turtles and many, many alligators! Even baby gators!

It was pretty freaky pedaling right alongside the canal where the gators hang out. At first there was just the “canal” of water on our right side; and then there was water on both sides of the trail, so I had to double my alligator scanning! I never thought I would do something this "risky", but the gators really didn't seem to be concerned with people, as long as you leave them alone.

 

We stopped many, many times along the trail to take photos of alligators. We had just done that with this one gator, and I started to move on while Marty was still taking shots. Then we heard this little chirping noise, and we saw baby gators!!! There were five or six in all. The first two we saw were just little ones, maybe about a foot long. And then as we watched, we saw a “teenager”, if you will (I really have no idea how old he was, but he was probably about 2 feet long).

 

Mama

Check out the video of the babies below. If you look closely, as the teenager approaches, you can see a couple of the small ones up on a branch. Baby alligators have yellow bands across their bodies, and I think you can just barely see them on the guy on the branch.

And then the mama gator, who we had originally stopped to photo (of course, we didn't know she was a mama at that point), swam down to where the babies were and gave us the eye! Time to go!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 Half way through the trail there’s an observation tower you can go up on to see a great view of the Everglades!

 

The tower

Looking down from atop the tower - this guys is all of 10', if not longer!

Hello, ... we can see you!

 

 

Visiting the Everglades was an amazing experience for us!