Mangrove Boat Trip

On Tuesday, January 29, we and our guest Jane took a National Park Service boat tour through the mangrove swamp.  Our captain and guide, Steve, has lived in Everglades City his whole life and knows the wildlife very well.

We headed up Crooked River into the islands formed by the mangrove trees.  The water was very shallow, and it was low tide, but the boat was flat-bottomed and Steve knew the channels well.  We wove through the islands and dodged the sandbars, finding flocks of ibis, egrets and spoonbills.

We spotted an osprey surveying the area for likely food:

Egrets hung out together in the treetops, too:

A cormorant also took a rest in a tree between fishing expeditions:

Later in the day, we visited a section of the Big Cypress National Preserve and spotted several manatees who were seeking warmth and fresh water:

All this exploring made us hungry!  Here are Jane and Kathy recovering their stamina at the Havana Cafe on Chokoloskee Island in the Everglades National Park: